The Ten Best International Albums of 2025

Looking back on the musical landscape of global releases that pushed boundaries. We explore ten remarkable albums that defined the year in music.

Number Ten: Sarathy Korwar – There Already Is Beauty

An album consisting of a single, extended movement of insistent drumming could sound like it isn't the most approachable listening experience. But, Indian drummer and composer Sarathy Korwar turns this insistent rhythm into a hypnotically captivating piece. Directing an ensemble of three drummers, Korwar creates a dense percussive vocabulary over the record's ten sections. His composition draws from minimalist concepts from Steve Reich as well as classical Indian rhythmic patterns, all anchored in the reiteration of a continual, pulsing figure. Over its duration, this refrain starts to mirror the ceremonial rhythm of ritual music, pulling the listener deeper into Korwar's unique percussive world.

9. Yasmine Hamdan – I Remember I Forget

Following an long absence, Arab singer-songwriter Yasmine Hamdan makes a comeback with a contemplative set of songs. The work builds upon the Arabic-sung, dub-influenced sound that cemented her status in the Arab alternative scene since the nineties. Hamdan's voice is soft and thoughtful, delivering delicate melodies atop the string arrangements of a track like Hon and the deep trip-hop beat of Vows. On livelier tracks such as Shadia and Abyss, she uses a wavering, longing vibrato over Maghrebi-inspired synth melodies and rattling electronic percussion. The album's sound is lean and restrained, yet this austerity creates the ideal setting for Hamdan's emotive songwriting to resonate. The album proves to be well worth the wait.

Number Eight: The Mexican Producer Debit – Slowed Down

Mexican electronic artist Debit has a knack for eerie reworkings of historical sounds. For her latest release, Desaceleradas, she zeroes in on the 1990s variant of cumbia rebajada – a slowed, dub-inflected version of the rhythmic Latin American musical style. Debit slows this sound down to a crawl, filtering its signature synths and syncopated rhythm through veils of distortion and hiss to produce a new, sinister beat. Sometimes atmospheric and discomfiting, Debit converts the exuberant party music of cumbia into a enduring, ghostly echo.

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

Sensory overload is the key term for the music of Brazilian producer Kaique Vieira, AKA DJ K. Coining his own genre of "bruxaria" (witchcraft), Vieira piles a tumult of sirens, pummeling bass tones and screamed lyrics on top of the classic Brazilian dance style of baile funk. This captures the driving sound of favela street parties. On his follow-up release, Radio Libertadora!, Vieira ramps up the ferocity, throwing in everything from four-on-the-floor techno beats to the sound of the Islamic call to prayer into his frantic bruxaria mix. The result is a especially frenetic and punishingly loud 40-minute sonic journey. Give in to the cacophony and Vieira's brash productions become strangely liberating.

6. The Singer Mohinder Kaur Bhamra – Disco Punjabi

Sikh devotional singer Mohinder Kaur Bhamra's 1982 album of disco music and Punjabi folk melodies is a reissued treasure. Produced by her son, music producer Kuljit Bhamra, Punjabi Disco's ten tracks offer an strikingly compelling fusion of the sharp sound of electronic keyboards and programmed drums with her fluid classical Indian vocal technique. Electronic percussion 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. At other times, Latin-inflected grooves comes to the fore on Soniya Mukh Tera, and Nainan Da Pyar De Gaya features a fast-paced walking disco bassline. It's a club-ready hybrid created over a decade before the Asian Underground explosion.

Number Five: The Mongolian Artist Enji – Sonor

From Mongolia vocalist Enji's soft fourth album, Sonor, expands on her jazz-influenced sound to offer some of her broadest music so far. Stepping outside her training in traditional Mongolian "long song" singing, the record's selection of pieces range from the soft jazz-pop melodies of downtempo number Ulbar to the German spoken-word lyrics and twanging guitar lines of Unadag Dugui. The album also includes a lively, 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 remains close, pulling the listener into the gentle acoustics of her singular voice.

Number Four: Derya Yıldırım and Her Band – Yarın Yoksa

Drawing on the psychedelic tradition of Turkish psychedelia pioneered by groups such as Moğollar, German-Turkish singer Derya Yıldırım's new album with her band Grup Şimşek fuses the metallic twang of the electrified saz with woozy keyboard and R&B-inflected lines. It's a retro-70s aesthetic grounded in Yıldırım's commanding falsetto and shaped by producer Leon Michels' warm, tape-saturated sound. But, on classic Turkish songs such as the nursery rhyme Hop Bico and 60s classic Ceylan, the group ventures into vibrant new territory. They develop smooth, downtempo grooves and powerful vocals that lend a novel, off-kilter spin to the Turkish psych sound.

Number Three: Lido Pimienta – The Beauty

Gregorian chants, Czech harpsichord folksong and orchestral strings merge on Colombian singer Lido Pimienta's remarkable fourth album. Orchestrating music for the 60-piece 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 counterpoint melodies of Aún Te Quiero and the syncopated dembow rhythms of the woodwind-heavy El Dembow del Tiempo. Ultimately, it is Pim