This 10 Greatest Worldwide Releases of This Past Year
Looking back on the musical landscape of global releases that defied expectations. Presenting a selection of ten notable albums that defined the year in music.
Number Ten: Sarathy Korwar – There Is Beauty, There Already
A continuous, 40-minute suite of cyclical drumming might not seem the most approachable listening experience. But, Indian drummer and composer Sarathy Korwar turns this persistent pulse into a hypnotically captivating work. Directing an group of three drummers, Korwar creates a complex percussive dialect across the record's ten sections. The work draws from the phasing techniques of Steve Reich as well as classical Indian rhythmic patterns, all anchored in the recurrence of a continual, driving refrain. Over its duration, this refrain begins to emulate the ceremonial rhythm of ritual music, pulling the listener deeper into Korwar's distinctive percussive world.
9. The Lebanese Artist Yasmine Hamdan – I Forget, I Remember
Following an long absence, Lebanese singer-songwriter Yasmine Hamdan re-emerges with a contemplative album of songs. She expands on the Arabic-language, dub-tinged style that established her as a fixture in the Arab alternative scene since the nineties. Hamdan's voice is quiet and ruminative, delivering delicate melodies over the string arrangements of a track like Hon and the rolling trip-hop groove of Vows. On livelier tracks such as Shadia and Abyss, she adopts a quivering, longing vibrato over electronic lines with North African flavors and skittering electronic percussion. The production is lean and subtle, yet this simplicity creates the ideal setting for Hamdan's deeply felt songwriting to take center stage. The album proves to be truly deserving of the long anticipation.
8. The Mexican Producer Debit – Slowed Down
From Mexico electronic artist Debit specializes in uncanny reinterpretations of archival audio. On her most recent project, Desaceleradas, she turns her attention to the 1990s variant of cumbia rebajada – a slowed, dub-inflected version of the shuffling Latin American dance music genre. Debit slows this sound down to a crawl, running its characteristic synths and off-beat rhythm via sheets of distortion and noise to generate a new, menacing groove. At turns atmospheric and discomfiting, Debit converts the exuberant dancefloor sound of cumbia into a persistent, ghostly echo.
Number Seven: DJ K – Radio Libertadora!
Sheer intensity is the key term for the records of São Paulo producer Kaique Vieira, also known as DJ K. Inventing his own genre of "bruxaria" (witchcraft), Vieira stacks a tumult of alarms, pummeling bass tones and shouted lyrics on top of the enduring Brazilian dance style of baile funk. This emulates the driving sound of favela street parties. On his new record, Radio Libertadora!, Vieira cranks up the energy, throwing in everything from driving techno rhythms to samples of the Islamic call to prayer into his frantic bruxaria mix. The result is a especially manic and overwhelmingly noisy forty-minute sonic journey. Surrender to the assault and Vieira's unapologetic productions become unexpectedly freeing.
Number Six: Mohinder Kaur Bhamra – Disco Punjabi
Sikh devotional singer Mohinder Kaur Bhamra's 1982 album of disco music and Punjabi folk melodies is a reissued gem. Recorded by her son, music producer Kuljit Bhamra, Punjabi Disco's ten tracks present an strikingly compelling fusion of the synthetic sound of 1980s synthesisers and drum machines with her fluid Indian classical singing style. Electronic percussion echoes the undulating tones of the traditional drums, while synthesiser melody parallels 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 up-tempo disco bass groove. It's a dancefloor fusion delivered more than ten years before the rise of Asian Underground music.
Number Five: Enji – Resonance
Mongolian vocalist Enji's delicate latest record, Sonor, expands on her jazz-influenced sound to deliver some of her broadest music yet. Departing from her training in traditional Mongolian "long song" singing, the record's 11 tracks range from the gentle jazz-pop melodics of downtempo number Ulbar to the German-language narration lyrics and trilling guitar lines of Unadag Dugui. The album also includes a energetic, funk-inflected cover of the 80s Mongolian pop hit Eejiinhee Hairaar. Featuring a live band rather than her usual setup of guitar and bass, Sonor's sound is still close, pulling the listener into the gentle soundscape of her distinctive voice.
Number Four: Derya Yıldırım & Grup Şimşek – Yarın Yoksa
Drawing on the 1960s legacy of Anatolian rock established by groups such as Moğollar, Turkish-born, Germany-based singer Derya Yıldırım's latest work with her band Grup Şimşek blends the electric jangle of the amplified traditional lute with drifting Mellotron and classic soul melodies. It's a retro-70s aesthetic anchored in Yıldırım's powerful falsetto and shaped by producer Leon Michels' analogue tape aesthetic. But, on Turkish standards such as the nursery rhyme Hop Bico and 60s classic Ceylan, the group finds lively new territory. They develop slinking, downtempo grooves and soaring vocals that impart a novel, off-kilter twist to the Turkish psych sound.
Number Three: The Colombian Artist Lido Pimienta – La Belleza
Catholic requiem mass music, Eastern European folk melodies and orchestral strings all come together on Colombian-born singer Lido Pimienta's remarkable fourth album. Orchestrating music for the sixty-member 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 syncopated reggaeton-inspired beats of the brass and woodwind-led El Dembow del Tiempo. It is Pim
