The 10 Best Worldwide Albums of This Past Year
Looking back on the musical landscape of international releases that expanded horizons. Presenting a selection of ten remarkable albums that characterized the year in music.
10. Sarathy Korwar – There Is Beauty, There Already
An album consisting of a single, extended movement of repetitive drumming could sound like it isn't the most accessible musical proposition. But, south Asian drummer and composer Sarathy Korwar turns this persistent pulse into a unexpectedly magnetic album. Directing an ensemble of three drummers, Korwar creates a dense percussive dialect throughout the record's ten parts. The work references the phasing techniques of Steve Reich combined with classical Indian rhythmic patterns, everything tethered in the recurrence of a persistent, driving figure. As the album progresses, this refrain starts to mirror the hypnotic repetition of ceremonial music, luring the listener further into Korwar's singular percussive realm.
9. The Lebanese Artist Yasmine Hamdan – I Forget, I Remember
After an long absence, Lebanese vocalist and composer Yasmine Hamdan re-emerges with a contemplative set of songs. The work builds upon the Arabic-sung, dub-tinged aesthetic that made her a staple in the Arab alternative scene since the 1990s. Hamdan's voice is gentle and introspective, delivering tender 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 adopts a trembling, longing vocal technique over north African synth lines and skittering electronic percussion. The production is sparse and subtle, yet this austerity creates the perfect setting for Hamdan's expressive compositions to shine through. This is a record that justifies the long anticipation.
Number Eight: Debit – Slowed Down
From Mexico producer Debit specializes in uncanny reworkings of traditional music. On her new album, Desaceleradas, she zeroes in on the 1990s variant of cumbia rebajada – a slowed, dub-inflected version of the rhythmic Latin American musical style. Debit drags this sound to a near-halt, filtering its characteristic synths and off-beat rhythm through layers of murk and hiss to generate a fresh, sinister rhythm. Periodically atmospheric and discomfiting, Debit morphs the exuberant party music of cumbia into a enduring, ethereal echo.
Number Seven: DJ K – Radio Libertadora!
Sensory overload is the defining principle for the music of Brazilian producer Kaique Vieira, AKA DJ K. Inventing his own genre of "bruxaria" (witchcraft), Vieira piles a onslaught of sirens, pummeling bass tones and screamed lyrics over the longstanding Brazilian genre of baile funk. This captures the propulsive sound of neighborhood block parties. On his new record, Radio Libertadora!, Vieira cranks up the intensity, incorporating everything from four-on-the-floor techno beats to samples of the Islamic call to prayer into his chaotic bruxaria mix. The result is a particularly frenetic and overwhelmingly noisy forty-minute sonic journey. Give in to the cacophony and Vieira's brash productions become oddly liberating.
6. Mohinder Kaur Bhamra – Disco Punjabi
Religious vocalist Mohinder Kaur Bhamra's record from 1982 of disco music and Punjabi folk melodies is a newly appreciated masterpiece. Produced by her son, music producer Kuljit Bhamra, Punjabi Disco's ten tracks deliver an strikingly engaging fusion of the metallic sound of electronic keyboards and drum machines with her ornate classical Indian vocal technique. Electronic percussion echoes the wavelike tones of the tabla, while synthesiser melody replicates the traditional sound of the reed organ on tracks such as Pyar Mainu Kar. Elsewhere, bossa nova rhythm comes to the fore on Soniya Mukh Tera, and Nainan Da Pyar De Gaya channels a up-tempo funky bass rhythm. It's a dancefloor fusion created over a decade before the global breakthrough of South Asian electronic music.
Number Five: The Mongolian Artist Enji – Resonance
From Mongolia vocalist Enji's gentle fourth album, Sonor, expands on her jazz-influenced sound to present some of her most wide-ranging music so far. Moving away from her background in traditional Mongolian "long song" singing, the record's 11 tracks veer from the gentle 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 sprightly, funk-tinged cover of the 1980s Mongolian classic Eejiinhee Hairaar. Showcasing a ensemble rather than her typical setup of guitar and bass, Sonor's sound is still personal, drawing the listener into the gentle soundscape of her singular voice.
4. Derya Yıldırım and Her Band – Yarın Yoksa
Inspired by the psychedelic tradition of Turkish psychedelia pioneered by groups such as Moğollar, German-Turkish singer Derya Yıldırım's third record with her band Grup Şimşek merges the metallic twang of the electrified saz with dreamy keyboard and R&B-inflected lines. It's a nostalgic vibe anchored in Yıldırım's powerful falsetto and influenced by producer Leon Michels' warm, tape-saturated sound. But, on Turkish standards such as the nursery rhyme Hop Bico and 1960s song Ceylan, the group ventures into lively new territory. They craft smooth, downtempo grooves and powerful vocals that lend a novel, off-kilter spin to the Turkish psych sound.
3. Lido Pimienta – La Belleza
Gregorian chants, Eastern European folk melodies and symphonic arrangements all come together on Colombian-born singer Lido Pimienta's stunning fourth album. Orchestrating music for the sixty-member Medellín Philharmonic Orchestra, Pimienta and producer Owen Pallett journey through everything from the liturgical vocals 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
