The Ten Best International Albums of 2025
The past twelve months have offered a rich tapestry of international releases that expanded horizons. Presenting a selection of ten remarkable albums that defined the year in music.
10. Sarathy Korwar – There Is Beauty, There Already
A continuous, 40-minute suite of repetitive percussion might not seem the easiest listening experience. But, Indian percussionist and producer Sarathy Korwar transforms this driving beat into a strangely alluring album. Guiding an trio of three drummers, Korwar creates a dense percussive vocabulary across the record's ten sections. The album channels Steve Reich's phasing motifs as well as classical Indian rhythmic patterns, each grounded in the reiteration of a ongoing, driving motif. As the album progresses, this refrain evokes the hypnotic repetition of ritual music, drawing the listener further into Korwar's singular percussive world.
9. Yasmine Hamdan – I Remember I Forget
Coming off an long absence, Arab vocalist and composer Yasmine Hamdan re-emerges with a melancholy set of songs. She expands on the Arabic-language, dub-tinged aesthetic that cemented her status in the region's indie music scene since the 1990s. Hamdan's vocal delivery is soft and introspective, delivering tender 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 adopts a quivering, longing vibrato over Maghrebi-inspired synth melodies and rattling electronic percussion. The production is sparse and restrained, yet this simplicity creates the ideal setting for Hamdan's emotive compositions to resonate. It is well worth the long anticipation.
Number Eight: The Mexican Producer Debit – Desaceleradas
Mexican producer Debit specializes in uncanny reimaginings of traditional music. On her new album, Desaceleradas, she focuses on the 90s style of cumbia rebajada – a decelerated, dubby version of the rhythmic Latin American dance genre. Debit slows this sound down to a crawl, running its signature synths and syncopated rhythm via veils of distortion and hiss to create a fresh, menacing groove. Sometimes ambient and unsettling, Debit morphs the celebratory party music of cumbia into a enduring, ghostly echo.
7. The São Paulo Producer DJ K – Liberator Radio!
Sensory overload is the defining principle for the records of São Paulo 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 screamed lyrics on top of the classic Brazilian genre of baile funk. This captures the driving sound of neighborhood block parties. On his new record, Radio Libertadora!, Vieira cranks up the intensity, incorporating everything from techno kick drums to the sound of the Islamic call to prayer into his unruly bruxaria mix. The result is a notably frenetic and punishingly loud forty-minute listening experience. Submit to the noise and Vieira's bold productions become strangely freeing.
6. Mohinder Kaur Bhamra – Disco Punjabi
Religious vocalist Mohinder Kaur Bhamra's early-80s release of disco beats and Punjabi folk melodies is a reissued treasure. Recorded by her son, music producer Kuljit Bhamra, Punjabi Disco's ten tracks deliver an remarkably compelling blend of the metallic sound of electronic keyboards and drum machines with her ornate classical Indian singing style. Drum machine patterns mimics the rolling tones of the traditional drums, while synth lines replicates the traditional 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 boasts a driving funky bass rhythm. It's a party blend created over a decade before the rise of Asian Underground music.
Number Five: Enji – Sonor
From Mongolia singer Enji's gentle latest record, Sonor, develops her jazz-inflected sound to offer some of her most wide-ranging music to date. Stepping outside her training in traditional Mongolian "long song" singing, the record's 11 tracks veer from the gentle Norah Jones-esque melodies of slow-burning 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 80s Mongolian pop hit Eejiinhee Hairaar. Utilizing a live band rather than her standard setup of guitar and bass, Sonor's sound manages to stay close, drawing the listener into the gentle soundscape of her singular voice.
Number Four: Derya Yıldırım & Grup Şimşek – If There Is No Tomorrow
Inspired by 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 merges the electric jangle of the electrified saz with drifting Mellotron and R&B-inflected lines. It's a nostalgic vibe grounded in Yıldırım's strong falsetto and shaped by producer Leon Michels' analogue tape sound. Yet, on classic Turkish songs such as the nursery rhyme Hop Bico and 1960s song Ceylan, the group ventures into dynamic new territory. They craft smooth, downtempo grooves and soaring vocals that give a new, off-kilter twist to the Turkish psych sound.
Number Three: Lido Pimienta – The Beauty
Gregorian chants, Czech harpsichord folksong and orchestral strings converge on Colombian singer Lido Pimienta's extraordinary latest work. Arranging music for the 60-piece Medellín Philharmonic Orchestra, Pimienta and producer Owen Pallett traverse everything from the Gregorian chants 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. Ultimately, it is Pim
