Devendra Banhart

Often regarded as the godfather of the nu-folk scene, Devendra Banhart's traditional, finger-picking, singer-songwriter style comes with psychedelic, avant-garde and country influences, while his lyrics meander through strange and wonderfully oddball worlds. Born on May 30, 1981, in Houston, Texas, and raised in Caracas, Venezuela by his mother, he returned to America and Los Angeles when he was 14. He dropped out of college to busk and drift around Paris before releasing his first recordings through Michael Gira's label Young God Records. Sometimes described as freak folk, sometimes a psychedelic minstrel, his third album Niño Rojo (2004) brought him wider acclaim when the track "At the Hop" was used to advertise Cathedral City cheese and "Little Yellow Spider" featured in a commercial for Orange. Moving to British label XL, he released the acclaimed Cripple Crow (2005) and Smokey Rolls Down Thunder Canyon (2007) albums and briefly made the headlines for dating Hollywood movie star Natalie Portman. Often dismissed as a new-age bearded hipster, Devendra Banhart's artwork has been displayed in the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art and his compilation record of like-minded artists, The Golden Apples of the Sun (2004), is seen as kick-starting the New Weird America movement. In 2009, he released What Will We Be, a record which received him a Grammy nomination for Best Recording Package. Mala was announced in 2012 and marked his first release on new label Nonesuch. Over the following years, he would deliver two more albums for the label, 2016's Ape in Pink Marble and 2019's Ma, before making his official debut for Mexican Summer with his 2023 eleventh studio album, Flying Wig. Produced by Welsh avant-pop artist Cate Le Bon, the album was preceded by the singles "Twin" and "Sirens."

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