Our Ten Greatest International Albums of 2025
As the year draws to a close, we reflect on the worldwide sounds that expanded horizons. We explore ten notable albums that shaped the year in music.
Number Ten: Sarathy Korwar – There Already Is Beauty
An album consisting of a single, extended movement of cyclical drumming may not appear the most accessible musical proposition. Yet, Indian percussionist and producer Sarathy Korwar transforms this persistent pulse into a strangely alluring album. Directing an trio of three drummers, Korwar crafts a intricate percussive vocabulary throughout the record's ten sections. His composition references the phasing techniques of Steve Reich as well as Indian classical phrasing, all anchored in the recurrence of a ongoing, pulsing figure. As the album progresses, this refrain evokes the trance-inducing cycles of ceremonial music, luring the listener further into Korwar's singular percussive realm.
Number Nine: Yasmine Hamdan – I Forget, I Remember
After an hiatus of eight years, Arab vocalist and composer Yasmine Hamdan returns with a mournful album of songs. The work builds upon the Arabic-sung, dub-influenced sound that cemented her status in the Arab alternative scene since the nineties. Hamdan's voice is quiet and ruminative, singing soft melodies over the string arrangements of a track like Hon and the rumbling trip-hop beat of Vows. During more energetic moments such as Shadia and Abyss, she employs a quivering, longing vocal technique over Maghrebi-inspired synth melodies and clattering electronic percussion. The musical backdrop is minimal and subtle, yet this austerity offers the ideal canvas for Hamdan's emotive songwriting to shine through. The album proves to be well worth the long anticipation.
Number Eight: Debit – Slowed Down
Mexican electronic artist Debit has a knack for uncanny reimaginings of historical sounds. For her new album, Desaceleradas, she zeroes in on the 1990s variant of cumbia rebajada – a decelerated, dubby take of the rhythmic Latin American dance music genre. Debit slows this sound even further, running its signature synths and syncopated rhythm via sheets of sludge and noise to create a fresh, menacing groove. Sometimes atmospheric and discomfiting, Debit morphs the joyous party music of cumbia into a enduring, spectral echo.
Number Seven: DJ K – Liberator Radio!
Maximalism is the defining principle for the music of Brazilian producer Kaique Vieira, AKA DJ K. Pioneering his own genre of "bruxaria" (witchcraft), Vieira piles a cacophony of alarms, explosive bass tones and screamed lyrics over the classic Brazilian dance style of baile funk. This captures the driving sound of favela street parties. On his new record, Radio Libertadora!, Vieira escalates the ferocity, incorporating everything from driving techno rhythms to the sound of the Islamic call to prayer into his frantic bruxaria mix. The result is a notably hyperactive and punishingly loud forty-minute sonic journey. Surrender to the assault and Vieira's brash productions become oddly liberating.
6. The Singer Mohinder Kaur Bhamra – Disco Punjabi
Sikh devotional singer Mohinder Kaur Bhamra's 1982 album of disco beats and Punjabi folk melodies is a reissued gem. Produced by her son, music producer Kuljit Bhamra, Punjabi Disco's ten tracks offer an remarkably compelling fusion of the synthetic sound of 1980s synthesisers and drum machines with her ornate Indian classical singing style. Electronic percussion mirrors the wavelike tones of the tabla, while synthesiser melody doubles the classic sound of the harmonium on tracks such as Pyar Mainu Kar. Elsewhere, bossa nova rhythm is prominent on Soniya Mukh Tera, and Nainan Da Pyar De Gaya channels a fast-paced walking disco bassline. It's a club-ready hybrid delivered over a decade before the global breakthrough of South Asian electronic music.
Number Five: The Mongolian Artist Enji – Sonor
From Mongolia vocalist Enji's soft latest record, Sonor, expands on her jazz-inflected sound to deliver some of her most wide-ranging music yet. Stepping outside her background in traditional Mongolian "long song" singing, the record's eleven songs travel from the gentle jazz-pop melodics of slow-burning number Ulbar to the German spoken-word lyrics and twanging guitar lines of Unadag Dugui. The album also includes a lively, funk-inflected cover of the 80s Mongolian pop hit Eejiinhee Hairaar. Utilizing a ensemble rather than her usual setup of guitar and bass, Sonor's sound is still close, pulling the listener into the tender acoustics of her singular voice.
Number Four: Derya Yıldırım & Grup Şimşek – Yarın Yoksa
Inspired by the psychedelic tradition of Anatolian rock established by groups such as Moğollar, Turkish-born, Germany-based singer Derya Yıldırım's latest work with her band Grup Şimşek merges the electric jangle of the electrified saz with drifting Mellotron and soulful tunes. It's a 1970s throwback sound grounded in Yıldırım's powerful high register and influenced by producer Leon Michels' analogue tape sound. But, on Turkish standards such as the nursery rhyme Hop Bico and 60s classic Ceylan, the group finds vibrant new territory. They craft smooth, slow-burning grooves and powerful vocals that lend a novel, unconventional twist to the Turkish psych sound.
Number Three: The Colombian Artist Lido Pimienta – La Belleza
Sacred music, Czech harpsichord folksong and symphonic arrangements all come together on Colombian singer Lido Pimienta's extraordinary fourth album. Arranging music for the 60-piece Medellín Philharmonic Orchestra, Pimienta and producer Owen Pallett journey through everything from the liturgical vocals of opener Overturn (Obertura de la Luz Eterna) to the theatrical counterpoint melodies of Aún Te Quiero and the rhythmic dembow rhythms of the woodwind-heavy El Dembow del Tiempo. It is Pim
