Our Ten Greatest International Releases of the Year 2025
As the year draws to a close, we reflect on the global releases that defied expectations. Presenting a selection of ten notable albums that shaped the year in music.
10. Sarathy Korwar – There Is Beauty, There Already
The concept of a 40-minute, uninterrupted piece built on repetitive drumming could sound like it isn't the most accessible musical proposition. But, south Asian drummer and composer Sarathy Korwar turns this insistent rhythm into a strangely alluring album. Guiding an group of three drummers, Korwar creates a intricate percussive language throughout the record's ten parts. The album channels minimalist concepts from Steve Reich combined with classical Indian rhythmic patterns, all anchored in the recurrence of a continual, driving figure. Over its duration, this refrain begins to emulate the hypnotic repetition of ceremonial music, pulling the listener deeper into Korwar's singular percussive universe.
9. Yasmine Hamdan – I Remember I Forget
Coming off an eight-year break, Lebanese vocalist and composer Yasmine Hamdan re-emerges with a melancholy collection of songs. The work builds upon the Arabic-language, dub-influenced sound that established her as a fixture in the Middle Eastern independent music landscape since the 1990s. Hamdan's voice is soft and ruminative, delivering delicate melodies atop the string arrangements of a track like Hon and the deep trip-hop groove of Vows. On livelier tracks such as Shadia and Abyss, she employs a trembling, yearning vibrato over north African synth lines and rattling electronic percussion. The album's sound is minimal and subtle, yet this minimalism provides the ideal environment for Hamdan's expressive compositions to resonate. This is a record that justifies the long anticipation.
8. The Mexican Producer Debit – Slowed Down
Mexican producer Debit excels at eerie reworkings of archival audio. For her most recent project, Desaceleradas, she focuses on the 1990s variant of cumbia rebajada – a slowed, dubby take of the shuffling Latin American musical style. Debit slows this sound even further, filtering its characteristic synths and syncopated rhythm through layers of sludge and hiss to create a novel, foreboding beat. Periodically ambient and unsettling, Debit morphs the exuberant party music of cumbia into a lasting, spectral memory.
Number Seven: The São Paulo Producer DJ K – Radio Libertadora!
Sensory overload is the defining principle for the music of São Paulo producer Kaique Vieira, also known as DJ K. Coining his own genre of "bruxaria" (witchcraft), Vieira piles a onslaught of sirens, explosive bass tones and shouted lyrics over the longstanding Brazilian dance style of baile funk. This recreates the energetic sound of neighborhood block parties. On his second album, Radio Libertadora!, Vieira escalates the energy, throwing in everything from driving techno rhythms to samples of the Islamic call to prayer into his unruly bruxaria mix. The result is a especially hyperactive and deafeningly intense 40-minute sonic journey. Give in to the assault and Vieira's unapologetic productions become unexpectedly liberating.
6. The Singer Mohinder Kaur Bhamra – Disco Punjabi
Sikh devotional singer Mohinder Kaur Bhamra's record from 1982 of disco music and traditional Punjabi tunes is a reissued treasure. Recorded by her son, music producer Kuljit Bhamra, Punjabi Disco's ten tracks present an remarkably compelling combination of the metallic sound of early synthesizers and programmed drums with her ornate classical Indian singing style. Electronic percussion mimics the rolling tones of the tabla, while synth lines replicates the traditional sound of the harmonium on tracks such as Pyar Mainu Kar. Elsewhere, Latin-inflected grooves takes center stage on Soniya Mukh Tera, and Nainan Da Pyar De Gaya boasts a driving funky bass rhythm. It's a dancefloor fusion delivered more than ten years before the Asian Underground explosion.
Number Five: The Mongolian Artist Enji – Resonance
Mongolian singer Enji's delicate new release, Sonor, builds upon her jazz-inflected sound to present some of her broadest music to date. Moving away from her background in traditional Mongolian "long song" singing, the record's selection of pieces range from the gentle Norah Jones-esque melodies of slow-burning number Ulbar to the German spoken-word lyrics and trilling guitar lines of Unadag Dugui. The album also includes a lively, funk-inflected cover of the 80s Mongolian pop hit Eejiinhee Hairaar. Featuring a ensemble rather than her usual setup of guitar and bass, Sonor's sound remains personal, drawing the listener into the tender soundscape of her unique voice.
4. Derya Yıldırım and Her Band – If There Is No Tomorrow
Drawing on the 60s heritage of Anatolian rock pioneered by groups such as Moğollar, German-Turkish singer Derya Yıldırım's latest work with her band Grup Şimşek merges the electric jangle of the amplified traditional lute with woozy Mellotron and R&B-inflected lines. It's a retro-70s aesthetic anchored in Yıldırım's commanding high register and influenced by producer Leon Michels' warm, tape-saturated aesthetic. However, on Turkish standards such as the folk tune Hop Bico and 60s classic Ceylan, the group reaches lively new territory. They create smooth, downtempo grooves and lifting vocals that impart a fresh, unconventional spin to the Anatolian psychedelic style.
Number Three: Lido Pimienta – La Belleza
Gregorian chants, Czech harpsichord folksong and orchestral strings merge on Colombian-born singer Lido Pimienta's extraordinary fourth album. Arranging music for the sixty-member Medellín Philharmonic Orchestra, Pimienta and producer Owen Pallett traverse everything from the liturgical vocals of opener Overturn (Obertura de la Luz Eterna) to the dramatic interweaving lines of Aún Te Quiero and the rhythmic dembow rhythms of the woodwind-heavy El Dembow del Tiempo. Yet, it is Pim
