Devendra Banhart

Devendra Banhart emerged as a central figure in the early-2000s freak folk scene, distinguished by his instinctive approach to songcraft and a voice that trembled with quiet intensity. His work blended the sylvan aura associated with T. Rex-era Marc Bolan and lyrics that balanced emotional depth with unexpected openness, allowing his spare, acoustic material to evolve from the close-miked, low-fidelity sound of the well-received 2004 album Rejoicing in the Hands into the more refined productions and wide-ranging stylistic explorations heard on the eclectic 2007 release Smokey Rolls Down Thunder Canyon as well as the divergent 2019 set Ma and the electronics-driven 2023 album Flying Wig, the latter shaped through work with Cate Le Bon.

Born in Houston, Texas, in 1981, Banhart spent his childhood in Caracas, Venezuela, and Los Angeles. Music and drawing occupied him from an early age, yet these pursuits only became daily practices during his short enrollment at the San Francisco Art Institute in the late 1990s. Poet and SFAI instructor Bill Berkson urged him to pursue varied creative forms, prompting Banhart to begin capturing songs on inexpensive, secondhand four-track recorders. The resulting fragments—often incomplete or shaped by stream-of-consciousness methods—were never initially meant for public release. Encouraged by peers, he circulated a handful of rough demos while departing SFAI to busk and travel, routes that carried him from the Bay Area to Paris before returning him to Los Angeles. At that stage he was appearing live with regularity, though nothing had appeared under an official imprint. Michael Gira of Swans changed that situation by issuing Banhart’s earliest recordings on the Young God label in October 2002. The collection Oh Me Oh My… drew immediate praise and frequent parallels to songwriting figures noted for eclecticism and melancholy, among them Tim Buckley, Syd Barrett, and Marc Bolan. The Black Babies EP followed in 2003, with the first proper full-length, Rejoicing in the Hands, arriving in April 2004 and its companion Niño Rojo appearing on Young God that September. Both records earned broad approval, enlarging Banhart’s following. He moved to XL for the expansive September 2005 album Cripple Crow, his most ambitious and sonically wide-ranging effort to date. Smokey Rolls Down Thunder Canyon extended that direction and was tracked at the home studio Banhart had established in Topanga Canyon. A subsequent shift to Warner Bros. yielded the comparatively direct 2009 album What Will We Be. Mala, issued in 2013, tightened the previously sprawling elements of Banhart’s varied sensibility into a more unified sequence, a restraint carried further on the leaner 2016 release Ape in Pink Marble. In 2018 he recorded a version of Joan of Arc’s “Shown and Told.” February 2019 brought both the poetry volume Weeping Gang Bliss Void Yab-Yum and the single “Bright Future Ahead,” co-written with Los Angeles musician Kera, with proceeds directed to the trans-led organization Trans Lifeline. Later that year his tenth studio album, Ma, appeared on Nonesuch. In 2020 he issued the companion EP Vast Ovoid, a limited-edition vinyl offering three new songs alongside a Helado Negro remix of the Ma track “Love Song.” During spring 2020 Banhart began remote sessions with longtime associate Noah Georgeson while both isolated amid the initial COVID-19 outbreak. Their earlier connection had formed around shared recollections of new-age influences, and they had often discussed making an ambient record tinged with those aesthetics. The project finally materialized with contributions from harpist Mary Lattimore, pianist Tyler Cash, pedal-steel player Nicole Lawrence, and additional musicians, as well as spoken passages from several of Banhart’s Buddhist teachers. The resulting album, Refuge, surfaced in August 2021. Banhart’s following proper studio full-length, Flying Wig, was produced in 2023. Although he listened chiefly to the Grateful Dead during its creation, the record—tracked with producer and creative visionary Cate Le Bon—ultimately evoked the bent rock songs of Brian Eno filtered through synth-laden city pop.