This 10 Greatest International Records of 2025

The past twelve months have offered a rich tapestry of worldwide sounds that expanded horizons. Here is a countdown of ten remarkable albums that defined the year in music.

Number Ten: The Percussionist Sarathy Korwar – There Is Beauty, There Already

The concept of a 40-minute, uninterrupted piece built on insistent drumming may not appear the most accessible listening experience. However, Indian drummer and composer Sarathy Korwar transforms this persistent pulse into a unexpectedly magnetic piece. Guiding an ensemble of three drummers, Korwar crafts a intricate percussive language over the record's ten parts. The work draws from the phasing techniques of Steve Reich as well as traditional Indian musical phrasing, everything tethered in the reiteration of a persistent, driving refrain. As the album progresses, this refrain evokes the trance-inducing cycles of ritual music, drawing the listener deeper into Korwar's singular percussive universe.

Number Nine: The Lebanese Artist Yasmine Hamdan – I Forget, I Remember

Coming off an long absence, Lebanese singer-songwriter Yasmine Hamdan returns with a mournful set of songs. The work builds upon the Arabic-sung, dub-tinged sound that established her as a fixture in the Arab alternative scene since the 1990s. Hamdan's voice is gentle and ruminative, singing soft melodies over the string arrangements of a track like Hon and the rolling trip-hop beat of Vows. For more upbeat numbers such as Shadia and Abyss, she adopts a quivering, yearning vocal technique over north African synth lines and clattering electronic percussion. The production is minimal and restrained, yet this simplicity creates the ideal environment for Hamdan's emotive lyricism to take center stage. The album proves to be truly deserving of the long anticipation.

8. The Mexican Producer Debit – Desaceleradas

Mexican electronic artist Debit has a knack for eerie reimaginings of historical sounds. On her latest release, Desaceleradas, she focuses on the 90s style of cumbia rebajada – a slowed, dub-inflected interpretation of the shuffling Latin American musical style. Debit drags this sound even further, running its characteristic synths and off-beat rhythm through veils of murk and static to produce a novel, menacing beat. Sometimes atmospheric and discomfiting, Debit converts the celebratory party music of cumbia into a enduring, ghostly memory.

Number Seven: The São Paulo Producer DJ K – Radio Libertadora!

Sensory overload is the operative word for the music of São Paulo producer Kaique Vieira, who performs as DJ K. Coining his own genre of "bruxaria" (witchcraft), Vieira stacks a onslaught of sirens, explosive bass tones and screamed lyrics on top of the classic Brazilian genre of baile funk. This recreates the energetic sound of urban celebrations. On his second album, Radio Libertadora!, Vieira escalates the energy, adding everything from four-on-the-floor techno beats to the sound of the Islamic call to prayer into his chaotic bruxaria mix. The result is a notably hyperactive and overwhelmingly noisy forty-minute listening experience. Submit to the cacophony and Vieira's brash productions become strangely freeing.

Number Six: Mohinder Kaur Bhamra – Disco Punjabi

Sikh devotional singer Mohinder Kaur Bhamra's early-80s release of disco beats and traditional Punjabi tunes is a newly appreciated masterpiece. Produced by her son, music producer Kuljit Bhamra, Punjabi Disco's ten tracks deliver an unusually captivating combination of the sharp sound of electronic keyboards and drum machines with her melismatic Indian classical vocal technique. Electronic percussion mirrors the rolling tones of the tabla, while synthesiser melody doubles the traditional sound of the harmonium 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 features a fast-paced disco bass groove. It's a party blend delivered more than ten years before the global breakthrough of South Asian electronic music.

Number Five: Enji – Resonance

Mongolian vocalist Enji's soft latest record, Sonor, develops her jazz-inflected sound to present some of her most diverse music to date. Stepping outside her training in traditional Mongolian "long song" singing, the record's selection of pieces travel from the soft jazz-pop melodics of downtempo number Ulbar to the German-language narration lyrics and trilling guitar lines of Unadag Dugui. The album also includes a sprightly, funk-inflected cover of the 1980s Mongolian classic Eejiinhee Hairaar. Showcasing a ensemble rather than her standard setup of guitar and bass, Sonor's sound manages to stay close, pulling the listener into the tender soundscape of her unique voice.

4. Derya Yıldırım & Grup Şimşek – If There Is No Tomorrow

Drawing on the psychedelic tradition of Turkish psychedelia pioneered by groups such as Moğollar, German-Turkish singer Derya Yıldırım's latest work with her band Grup Şimşek fuses the metallic twang of the electrified saz with dreamy Mellotron and R&B-inflected lines. It's a retro-70s aesthetic anchored in Yıldırım's strong falsetto and influenced by producer Leon Michels' analogue tape aesthetic. But, on Turkish standards such as the folk tune Hop Bico and 1960s song Ceylan, the group finds lively new territory. They develop smooth, downtempo grooves and soaring vocals that impart a new, quirky twist to the Anatolian psychedelic style.

Number Three: The Colombian Artist Lido Pimienta – La Belleza

Gregorian chants, Czech harpsichord folksong and orchestral strings all come together on Colombian-born singer Lido Pimienta's extraordinary latest work. Arranging music for the 60-piece 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 theatrical counterpoint melodies of Aún Te Quiero and the syncopated dembow rhythms of the brass and woodwind-led El Dembow del Tiempo. It is Pim