This 10 Greatest Worldwide Albums of This Past Year

Looking back on the musical landscape of worldwide music that expanded horizons. We explore ten exceptional albums that defined the year in music.

10. Sarathy Korwar – There Already Is Beauty

A continuous, 40-minute suite of insistent percussion might not seem the most approachable listening experience. Yet, south Asian percussionist and producer Sarathy Korwar converts this insistent rhythm into a hypnotically captivating piece. Guiding an ensemble of three drummers, Korwar develops a dense percussive language across the record's 10 movements. The album references minimalist concepts from Steve Reich as well as traditional Indian musical phrasing, all anchored in the reiteration of a continual, thrumming figure. As the album progresses, this refrain evokes the trance-inducing cycles of ritual music, luring the listener further into Korwar's distinctive percussive universe.

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

Coming off an eight-year break, Arab vocalist and composer Yasmine Hamdan makes a comeback with a melancholy album of songs. The work builds upon the Arabic-language, dub-influenced aesthetic that established her as a fixture in the region's indie music scene since the 1990s. Hamdan's voice is quiet and introspective, delivering tender melodies atop the bowing strings of a track like Hon and the deep trip-hop groove of Vows. During more energetic moments such as Shadia and Abyss, she uses a quivering, longing vibrato over electronic lines with North African flavors and rattling electronic percussion. The album's sound is minimal and understated, yet this simplicity offers the perfect environment for Hamdan's expressive compositions to shine through. This is a record that justifies the long anticipation.

8. Debit – Slowed Down

Mexican producer Debit excels at uncanny reimaginings of archival audio. On her most recent project, Desaceleradas, she zeroes in on the 90s style of cumbia rebajada – a slowed, dub-inflected version of the rhythmic Latin American dance music genre. Debit slows this sound down to a crawl, running its characteristic synths and off-beat rhythm through veils of distortion and noise to generate a fresh, foreboding rhythm. Sometimes atmospheric and unsettling, Debit converts the joyous dancefloor sound of cumbia into a persistent, ghostly echo.

7. The São Paulo Producer DJ K – Liberator Radio!

Sheer intensity is the operative word for the records of Brazilian producer Kaique Vieira, also known as DJ K. Inventing his own genre of "bruxaria" (witchcraft), Vieira piles a cacophony of sirens, explosive bass tones and shouted lyrics over the enduring Brazilian genre of baile funk. This emulates the energetic sound of neighborhood block parties. On his follow-up release, Radio Libertadora!, Vieira ramps up the intensity, adding everything from techno kick drums to samples of the Islamic call to prayer into his chaotic bruxaria mix. The result is a especially hyperactive and deafeningly intense forty-minute listening experience. Give in to the assault and Vieira's unapologetic productions become unexpectedly freeing.

6. Mohinder Kaur Bhamra – Disco Punjabi

Sikh devotional singer Mohinder Kaur Bhamra's record from 1982 of disco music and Punjabi folk melodies is a reissued gem. Recorded by her son, music producer Kuljit Bhamra, Punjabi Disco's ten tracks deliver an strikingly engaging fusion of the metallic sound of early synthesizers and programmed drums with her fluid Indian classical vocal technique. Drum machine patterns mirrors 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 is prominent on Soniya Mukh Tera, and Nainan Da Pyar De Gaya boasts a driving funky bass rhythm. It's a dancefloor fusion pioneered more than ten years before the Asian Underground explosion.

Number Five: The Mongolian Artist Enji – Sonor

Mongolian vocalist Enji's soft new release, Sonor, expands on her jazz-influenced sound to offer some of her broadest music to date. Moving away from her training in traditional Mongolian "long song" singing, the record's eleven songs range from the soft Norah Jones-esque melodics of slow-burning number Ulbar to the German-language narration lyrics and trilling guitar lines of Unadag Dugui. The album also includes a energetic, funk-tinged 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 remains intimate, pulling the listener into the gentle acoustics of her unique voice.

4. Derya Yıldırım and Her Band – If There Is No Tomorrow

Drawing on the 60s heritage of Anatolian rock established by groups such as Moğollar, Turkish-born, Germany-based singer Derya Yıldırım's new album with her band Grup Şimşek fuses the metallic twang of the amplified traditional lute with drifting Mellotron and R&B-inflected lines. It's a retro-70s aesthetic anchored in Yıldırım's strong falsetto and shaped by producer Leon Michels' analogue tape aesthetic. However, on Turkish standards such as the nursery rhyme Hop Bico and 1960s song Ceylan, the group finds dynamic new territory. They develop smooth, slow-burning grooves and powerful vocals that give a fresh, off-kilter spin to the Turkish psych sound.

Number Three: Lido Pimienta – La Belleza

Gregorian chants, Eastern European folk melodies and orchestral strings all come together on Colombian singer Lido Pimienta's extraordinary latest work. Orchestrating music for the sixty-member Medellín Philharmonic Orchestra, Pimienta and producer Owen Pallett explore a vast range including the Gregorian chants of opener Overturn (Obertura de la Luz Eterna) to the dramatic counterpoint melodies of Aún Te Quiero and the rhythmic reggaeton-inspired beats of the woodwind-heavy El Dembow del Tiempo. Yet, it is Pim