Our 10 Finest Worldwide Albums of This Past Year
Looking back on the musical landscape of global music that pushed boundaries. Here is a countdown of ten exceptional albums that defined the year in music.
Number Ten: The Percussionist Sarathy Korwar – There Already Is Beauty
The concept of a 40-minute, uninterrupted piece built on repetitive percussion might not seem the most accessible musical proposition. Yet, south Asian drummer and composer Sarathy Korwar transforms this driving beat into a strangely alluring piece. Guiding an group of three drummers, Korwar creates a intricate percussive vocabulary over the record's 10 movements. The album draws from Steve Reich's phasing motifs combined with classical Indian rhythmic patterns, everything tethered in the repetition of a continual, driving figure. Over its duration, this refrain starts to mirror the hypnotic repetition of devotional music, pulling the listener deeper into Korwar's singular percussive universe.
Number Nine: Yasmine Hamdan – I Forget, I Remember
Following an eight-year break, Arab vocalist and composer Yasmine Hamdan returns with a melancholy set of songs. She expands on the Arabic-sung, dub-influenced style that cemented her status in the Arab alternative scene since the 1990s. Hamdan's voice is soft and ruminative, delivering delicate melodies over the string arrangements of a track like Hon and the rumbling trip-hop beat of Vows. On livelier tracks such as Shadia and Abyss, she uses a wavering, longing vocal technique against north African synth lines and clattering electronic percussion. The album's sound is minimal and restrained, yet this austerity offers the perfect canvas for Hamdan's deeply felt lyricism to take center stage. This is a record truly deserving of the long anticipation.
Number Eight: Debit – Slowed Down
Mexican producer Debit excels at uncanny reinterpretations of traditional music. For her latest release, Desaceleradas, she focuses on the 1990s variant of cumbia rebajada – a decelerated, dubby take of the shuffling Latin American dance music genre. Debit decelerates this sound to a near-halt, filtering its signature synths and syncopated rhythm via layers of sludge and hiss to create a new, sinister rhythm. At turns ambient and discomfiting, Debit morphs the exuberant dancefloor sound of cumbia into a enduring, ethereal echo.
Number Seven: The São Paulo Producer DJ K – Liberator Radio!
Sheer intensity is the defining principle for the music of São Paulo producer Kaique Vieira, AKA DJ K. Inventing his own genre of "bruxaria" (witchcraft), Vieira piles a cacophony of sirens, explosive bass tones and shouted lyrics over the classic Brazilian dance style of baile funk. This emulates the propulsive sound of urban celebrations. On his second album, Radio Libertadora!, Vieira escalates the intensity, throwing in everything from techno kick drums to samples of the Islamic call to prayer into his unruly bruxaria mix. The result is a particularly manic and deafeningly intense 40-minute sonic journey. Submit to the noise and Vieira's bold productions become strangely liberating.
6. The Singer Mohinder Kaur Bhamra – Punjabi Disco
Religious vocalist Mohinder Kaur Bhamra's 1982 album of disco beats and Punjabi folk melodies is a newly appreciated masterpiece. Recorded by her son, music producer Kuljit Bhamra, Punjabi Disco's ten tracks offer an unusually engaging blend of the sharp sound of electronic keyboards and programmed drums with her melismatic classical Indian singing style. Electronic percussion mimics the wavelike tones of the traditional drums, while synth lines parallels the traditional sound of the reed organ on tracks such as Pyar Mainu Kar. Elsewhere, bossa nova rhythm 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 delivered more than ten years before the rise of Asian Underground music.
Number Five: Enji – Resonance
Mongolian vocalist Enji's soft new release, Sonor, expands on her jazz-influenced sound to offer some of her most diverse music yet. Departing from her training in traditional Mongolian "long song" singing, the record's selection of pieces travel 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 ensemble rather than her typical setup of guitar and bass, Sonor's sound is still close, pulling the listener into the tender soundscape of her distinctive voice.
4. Derya Yıldırım and Her Band – Yarın Yoksa
Inspired by the 1960s legacy of Anatolian rock pioneered by groups such as Moğollar, German-Turkish singer Derya Yıldırım's third record alongside her group blends the metallic twang of the amplified traditional lute with dreamy keyboard and classic soul melodies. It's a retro-70s aesthetic anchored in Yıldırım's powerful high register and shaped by producer Leon Michels' analogue tape sound. But, on classic Turkish songs such as the nursery rhyme Hop Bico and 1960s song Ceylan, the group finds vibrant new territory. They create slinking, downtempo grooves and powerful vocals that impart a fresh, unconventional twist to the Turkish psych sound.
3. Lido Pimienta – The Beauty
Catholic requiem mass music, Czech harpsichord folksong and symphonic arrangements converge on Colombian-born singer Lido Pimienta's remarkable latest work. Arranging music for the 60-piece Medellín Philharmonic Orchestra, Pimienta and producer Owen Pallett traverse 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 dembow rhythms of the brass and woodwind-led El Dembow del Tiempo. It is Pim
