The 10 Best International Records of 2025
Looking back on the musical landscape of worldwide sounds that pushed boundaries. Presenting a selection of ten notable albums that defined the year in music.
10. The Percussionist Sarathy Korwar – There Is Beauty, There Already
A continuous, 40-minute suite of repetitive percussion could sound like it isn't the most accessible listening experience. But, south Asian drummer and composer Sarathy Korwar converts this persistent pulse into a hypnotically captivating piece. Guiding an group of three drummers, Korwar develops a complex percussive vocabulary across the record's ten sections. The work draws from Steve Reich's phasing motifs alongside classical Indian rhythmic patterns, each grounded in the recurrence of a persistent, thrumming refrain. The longer one listens, this refrain starts to mirror the ceremonial rhythm of devotional music, pulling the listener deeper into Korwar's unique percussive universe.
Number Nine: The Lebanese Artist Yasmine Hamdan – I Forget, I Remember
Following an long absence, Lebanese vocalist and composer Yasmine Hamdan returns with a melancholy collection of songs. It continues exploring the Arabic-sung, dub-tinged sound that made her a staple in the Arab alternative scene since the 1990s. Hamdan's vocal delivery is quiet and ruminative, singing soft melodies over the bowing strings of a track like Hon and the rumbling trip-hop groove of Vows. On livelier tracks such as Shadia and Abyss, she employs a trembling, yearning vocal technique against north African synth lines and rattling electronic percussion. The album's sound is sparse and understated, yet this minimalism creates the perfect environment for Hamdan's deeply felt compositions to resonate. The album proves to be truly deserving of the wait.
8. Debit – Slowed Down
Mexican electronic artist Debit specializes in uncanny reworkings of archival audio. On her most recent project, Desaceleradas, she zeroes in on the 1990s variant of cumbia rebajada – a slowed, dub-inflected interpretation of the shuffling Latin American musical style. Debit drags this sound to a near-halt, processing its signature synths and off-beat rhythm via layers of murk and hiss to create a new, sinister groove. At turns ambient and discomfiting, Debit morphs the joyous dancefloor sound of cumbia into a enduring, ethereal afterimage.
7. DJ K – Liberator Radio!
Sensory overload is the key term for the music of Brazilian producer Kaique Vieira, who performs as DJ K. Inventing his own genre of "bruxaria" (witchcraft), Vieira stacks a cacophony of sirens, pummeling bass tones and shouted lyrics over the enduring Brazilian dance style of baile funk. This captures the energetic sound of favela street parties. On his second album, Radio Libertadora!, Vieira ramps up the energy, throwing in everything from techno kick drums to samples of the Islamic call to prayer into his unruly bruxaria mix. The result is a especially hyperactive and overwhelmingly noisy forty-minute listening experience. Surrender to the cacophony and Vieira's unapologetic productions become unexpectedly exhilarating.
6. Mohinder Kaur Bhamra – Disco Punjabi
Sikh devotional singer Mohinder Kaur Bhamra's 1982 album of disco music and Punjabi folk melodies is a rediscovered treasure. Recorded by her son, music producer Kuljit Bhamra, Punjabi Disco's ten tracks offer an unusually engaging blend of the sharp sound of 1980s synthesisers and programmed drums with her fluid classical Indian vocal technique. Electronic percussion mirrors the rolling tones of the traditional drums, while synthesiser melody parallels the traditional sound of the reed organ on tracks such as Pyar Mainu Kar. Elsewhere, bossa nova rhythm comes to the fore on Soniya Mukh Tera, and Nainan Da Pyar De Gaya boasts a driving disco bass groove. It's a club-ready hybrid pioneered more than ten years before the rise of Asian Underground music.
5. The Mongolian Artist Enji – Sonor
From Mongolia singer Enji's soft fourth album, Sonor, expands on her jazz-inflected sound to present some of her most diverse music so far. Departing from her training in traditional Mongolian "long song" singing, the record's eleven songs range from the gentle jazz-pop melodies of downtempo number Ulbar to the German-language narration lyrics and twanging guitar lines of Unadag Dugui. The album also includes a sprightly, funk-tinged cover of the 1980s Mongolian classic Eejiinhee Hairaar. Featuring a live band rather than her standard setup of guitar and bass, Sonor's sound manages to stay close, inviting the listener into the tender acoustics of her singular voice.
Number Four: Derya Yıldırım & Grup Şimşek – Yarın Yoksa
Inspired by the 1960s legacy of Anatolian rock established by groups such as Moğollar, German-Turkish singer Derya Yıldırım's latest work with her band Grup Şimşek blends the electric jangle of the amplified traditional lute with woozy keyboard and classic soul melodies. It's a retro-70s aesthetic grounded in Yıldırım's powerful high register and influenced by producer Leon Michels' analogue tape aesthetic. But, on classic Turkish songs such as the folk tune Hop Bico and 1960s song Ceylan, the group finds vibrant new territory. They create sinuous, downtempo grooves and lifting vocals that lend a fresh, quirky spin to the Turkish psych sound.
3. The Colombian Artist Lido Pimienta – La Belleza
Gregorian chants, Czech harpsichord folksong and symphonic arrangements converge on Colombian-born singer Lido Pimienta's stunning latest work. Orchestrating music for the sixty-member Medellín Philharmonic Orchestra, Pimienta and producer Owen Pallett journey through a vast range including the Gregorian chants of opener Overturn (Obertura de la Luz Eterna) to the dramatic interweaving lines of Aún Te Quiero and the rhythmic dembow rhythms of the brass and woodwind-led El Dembow del Tiempo. It is Pim
