Our apologies to all the deserving local artists out there -- this week, SPM had the opportunity to talk with one of the most dynamic and divisive artists in modern American music. Devendra Banhart has emerged at the forefront of the recent upsurge in neo-folk music, and his albums feature everything from experimental jams to simple ballads, complimented by Banhart's wavering singing. The excerpts below are from one of the most interesting interviews this journalist has ever encountered (not included: Banhart's thoughts on the secrets of the Grateful Dead, corn on the cob, and the geographical intimacy gained from life on the road).
Devendra Banhart: Wow!
SPM: Wow?
Banhart: I don't normally answer the phone like that, but right when I answered the phone, these two birds flew away together -- one was white, and one was black, and they flew away at the same time.
SPM: Wow. Well, hopefully that's a good sign.
Banhart: "Wow" should really be used a lot more. And the best part is, when you turn it upside down it spells "Mom."
SPM: A friend and I were arguing over whether some of your lyrics were in Portuguese...
Banhart: I wish! They are indeed in Spanish, but the title of one of the songs is in Portuguese. All the rest is in Spanish.
SPM: You get coined a "freak-folk" artist a lot.
Banhart: Freak-folk is the dumbest shit ever. It's the most unimaginative, crude, insulting label to call the music that my friends have made. None of us said it. It's the worst tag or label to be called. I never, ever, ever called anything any of my friends, or not friends, have done, freak-folk.
SPM: What do you call it instead?
Banhart: I do try to give alternatives to people who do make music that's a lot different from other stuff out there. We're basically informed by world music, and a lot of the people know each other, so we influence each other a lot, too. I like to label it new, new age music. Why don't we just say we make new music in the genre of hip-hop?
SPM: Post-folk?
Banhart: I'm definitely not a purist, but I'm not post-anything. I'm not a good enough musician to be post-anything.
SPM: Do the purist types ever confront you?
Banhart: All the time! I hear so much shit all the time, so much negativity from these songwriters who feel like they can sing better and write better than me. Which is funny, because I think they probably can.
SPM: You mention such a wide range of artists when you talk about influences on your own songs. Are you a big record collector?
Banhart: I find that artwork and photographs and the feelings of vinyl are so integral to the experience of listening to the music, and with my favorite records, those are so much a part of the music for me. With all of that, everything has to be connected to each other.
SPM: How do you feel about music spreading electronically?
Banhart: File-sharing on the Internet is incredible. Nowadays, everyone talks about the Sex Pistols like they are some kind of force of nature. But in those days, you couldn't get that album anywhere. I meet kids in Colombia who know more about music than anyone in New York. It's far better than TV, I'll tell you that.
SPM: So why do people in the United States have no idea who is playing music in South America?
Banhart: Laziness. They have the wrong friends or something, I don't know (laughs). It's egoistic for me to say I lament that, but I do. When I listen to a classic world record like Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan, and I'm intoxicated, I lament it. Because it's intoxicating, it's music that's made to be intoxicating, and it's a bummer more people haven't heard him.
SPM: I guess some people just don't have the energy to go out of their way to find it.
Banhart: Yeah. A lot of people just listen to music they can't avoid -- in the supermarket, on the subway, in the mall. And you sometimes forget, some people aren't into music, some people are into, like, golf. And I listen to music, but I don't know shit about golf.
Reach the reporter at benjamin.horowitz@asu.edu.
