The 10 Top Global Records of This Past Year
As the year draws to a close, we reflect on the global releases that defied expectations. Presenting a selection of ten notable albums that characterized 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 cyclical drumming could sound like it isn't the most accessible listening experience. But, Indian drummer and composer Sarathy Korwar turns this persistent pulse into a unexpectedly magnetic work. Guiding an ensemble of three drummers, Korwar creates a intricate percussive dialect over the record's 10 movements. The work references the phasing techniques of Steve Reich combined with classical Indian rhythmic patterns, all anchored in the recurrence of a continual, thrumming figure. The longer one listens, this refrain starts to mirror the trance-inducing cycles of ritual music, pulling the listener deeper into Korwar's singular percussive world.
Number Nine: Yasmine Hamdan – I Remember I Forget
After an eight-year break, Arab singer-songwriter Yasmine Hamdan returns with a contemplative album of songs. The work builds upon the Arabic-language, dub-tinged style that established her as a fixture in the Middle Eastern independent music landscape since the nineties. Hamdan's vocal delivery is soft and introspective, delivering soft melodies atop the string arrangements of a track like Hon and the deep trip-hop beat of Vows. During more energetic moments such as Shadia and Abyss, she employs a trembling, yearning vibrato against north African synth lines and skittering electronic percussion. The album's sound is sparse and subtle, yet this simplicity offers the perfect setting for Hamdan's emotive songwriting to resonate. It is that justifies the wait.
Number Eight: Debit – Desaceleradas
From Mexico electronic artist Debit excels at uncanny reinterpretations of historical sounds. For her latest release, Desaceleradas, she zeroes in on the 90s style of cumbia rebajada – a decelerated, dubby version of the shuffling Latin American musical style. Debit decelerates this sound down to a crawl, processing its characteristic synths and off-beat rhythm via veils of murk and static to create a novel, foreboding beat. At turns atmospheric and discomfiting, Debit transforms the celebratory party music of cumbia into a persistent, spectral echo.
7. DJ K – Liberator Radio!
Maximalism is the key term for the music of Brazilian producer Kaique Vieira, also known as DJ K. Coining his own genre of "bruxaria" (witchcraft), Vieira layers a tumult of sirens, explosive bass tones and screamed lyrics on top of the classic Brazilian genre of baile funk. This recreates the energetic sound of favela street parties. On his second album, Radio Libertadora!, Vieira escalates the energy, throwing in everything from driving techno rhythms to the sound of the Islamic call to prayer into his frantic bruxaria mix. The result is a notably frenetic and punishingly loud 40-minute sonic journey. Give in to the assault and Vieira's unapologetic productions become strangely exhilarating.
6. Mohinder Kaur Bhamra – Disco Punjabi
Sikh devotional singer Mohinder Kaur Bhamra's early-80s release of disco music and Punjabi folk melodies is a reissued gem. Produced by her son, music producer Kuljit Bhamra, Punjabi Disco's ten tracks present an strikingly compelling blend of the metallic sound of 1980s synthesisers and drum machines with her fluid Indian classical vocal technique. Electronic percussion mirrors the undulating tones of the traditional drums, while synth lines replicates the classic sound of the harmonium on tracks such as Pyar Mainu Kar. Elsewhere, Latin-inflected grooves is prominent on Soniya Mukh Tera, and Nainan Da Pyar De Gaya channels a fast-paced funky bass rhythm. It's a club-ready hybrid created more than ten years before the Asian Underground explosion.
5. The Mongolian Artist Enji – Resonance
Mongolian singer Enji's delicate fourth album, Sonor, builds upon her jazz-inflected sound to deliver some of her most wide-ranging music to date. Moving away from her background in traditional Mongolian "long song" singing, the record's eleven songs travel from the gentle Norah Jones-esque melodics of slow-burning number Ulbar to the German-language narration 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 usual setup of guitar and bass, Sonor's sound manages to stay close, inviting the listener into the tender soundscape of her distinctive voice.
4. Derya Yıldırım and Her Band – If There Is No Tomorrow
Drawing on the 1960s legacy of Anatolian rock pioneered by groups such as Moğollar, Turkish-born, Germany-based singer Derya Yıldırım's latest work alongside her group fuses the electric jangle of the amplified traditional lute with drifting keyboard and soulful tunes. It's a retro-70s aesthetic grounded in Yıldırım's powerful high register and influenced by producer Leon Michels' analogue tape aesthetic. Yet, on Turkish standards such as the nursery rhyme Hop Bico and 60s classic Ceylan, the group ventures into vibrant new territory. They create slinking, downtempo grooves and powerful vocals that give a fresh, off-kilter interpretation to the Anatolian psychedelic style.
3. Lido Pimienta – La Belleza
Gregorian chants, Czech harpsichord folksong and symphonic arrangements converge on Colombian singer Lido Pimienta's remarkable fourth album. Orchestrating music for the sixty-member Medellín Philharmonic Orchestra, Pimienta and producer Owen Pallett explore 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 reggaeton-inspired beats of the brass and woodwind-led El Dembow del Tiempo. Ultimately, it is Pim
