Our Ten Most Outstanding International Albums of 2025

The past twelve months have offered a rich tapestry of global sounds that pushed boundaries. We explore ten remarkable albums that defined the year in music.

10. The Percussionist Sarathy Korwar – There Already Is Beauty

The concept of a 40-minute, uninterrupted piece built on insistent percussion might not seem the most approachable listening experience. Yet, Indian drummer and composer Sarathy Korwar converts this persistent pulse into a hypnotically captivating piece. Leading an trio of three drummers, Korwar develops a dense percussive vocabulary throughout the record's 10 movements. The work channels Steve Reich's phasing motifs as well as Indian classical phrasing, each grounded in the reiteration of a continual, thrumming refrain. As the album progresses, this refrain begins to emulate the ceremonial rhythm of devotional music, pulling the listener further into Korwar's singular percussive world.

9. The Lebanese Artist Yasmine Hamdan – I Remember I Forget

Following an long absence, Arab vocalist and composer Yasmine Hamdan returns with a contemplative album of songs. She expands on the Arabic-language, dub-influenced aesthetic that made her a staple in the Arab alternative scene since the 1990s. Hamdan's vocal delivery is quiet and thoughtful, delivering delicate melodies over the string arrangements of a track like Hon and the rolling trip-hop beat of Vows. On livelier tracks such as Shadia and Abyss, she employs a wavering, yearning vocal technique over electronic lines with North African flavors and rattling electronic percussion. The production is minimal and subtle, yet this minimalism provides the perfect environment for Hamdan's deeply felt songwriting to take center stage. The album proves to be well worth the long anticipation.

8. The Mexican Producer Debit – Desaceleradas

From Mexico producer Debit has a knack for eerie reworkings of historical sounds. For her latest release, Desaceleradas, she focuses on the 90s style of cumbia rebajada – a slowed, dub-inflected take of the rhythmic Latin American dance music genre. Debit decelerates this sound to a near-halt, processing its signature synths and syncopated rhythm through sheets of distortion and hiss to produce a new, menacing beat. Periodically atmospheric and unsettling, Debit transforms the joyous party music of cumbia into a lasting, ethereal memory.

7. DJ K – Liberator Radio!

Sheer intensity is the operative word for the records of Brazilian producer Kaique Vieira, who performs as DJ K. Coining his own genre of "bruxaria" (witchcraft), Vieira stacks a tumult of alarms, pummeling bass tones and screamed lyrics on top of the classic Brazilian genre of baile funk. This emulates the energetic sound of urban celebrations. On his second album, Radio Libertadora!, Vieira cranks up the intensity, incorporating 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 sonic journey. Surrender to the noise and Vieira's bold productions become unexpectedly exhilarating.

Number Six: Mohinder Kaur Bhamra – Disco Punjabi

Sikh devotional singer Mohinder Kaur Bhamra's record from 1982 of disco music and Punjabi folk melodies is a rediscovered treasure. Produced by her son, music producer Kuljit Bhamra, Punjabi Disco's ten tracks offer an strikingly compelling combination of the sharp sound of early synthesizers and drum machines with her fluid classical Indian vocal technique. Drum machine patterns mimics the undulating tones of the traditional drums, while synthesiser melody replicates the classic sound of the reed organ on tracks such as Pyar Mainu Kar. Meanwhile, Latin-inflected grooves takes center stage on Soniya Mukh Tera, and Nainan Da Pyar De Gaya features a fast-paced funky bass rhythm. It's a dancefloor fusion created over a decade before the global breakthrough of South Asian electronic music.

5. The Mongolian Artist Enji – Sonor

From Mongolia vocalist Enji's soft new release, Sonor, builds upon her jazz-influenced sound to deliver some of her most diverse music so far. Moving away from her training in traditional Mongolian "long song" singing, the record's selection of pieces travel from the gentle Norah Jones-esque 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-inflected cover of the 1980s Mongolian classic Eejiinhee Hairaar. Showcasing a live band rather than her typical setup of guitar and bass, Sonor's sound is still intimate, inviting the listener into the gentle acoustics of her singular voice.

4. Derya Yıldırım & Grup Şimşek – Yarın Yoksa

Drawing on the 60s heritage of Turkish psychedelia established by groups such as Moğollar, German-Turkish singer Derya Yıldırım's latest work with her band Grup Şimşek blends the distinctive buzz of the amplified traditional lute with drifting keyboard and soulful tunes. It's a retro-70s aesthetic rooted in Yıldırım's strong high register and influenced by producer Leon Michels' warm, tape-saturated aesthetic. But, on Turkish standards such as the nursery rhyme Hop Bico and 1960s song Ceylan, the group reaches lively new territory. They create sinuous, slow-burning grooves and lifting vocals that give a novel, quirky twist to the Turkish psych sound.

3. 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 fourth album. Orchestrating music for the 60-piece Medellín Philharmonic Orchestra, Pimienta and producer Owen Pallett journey through everything from 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 woodwind-heavy El Dembow del Tiempo. It is Pim