The psychedelic wisdom and supremely strange sounds of Devendra Banhart, high priest of the new L.A. scene BY VANESSA GRIGORIADIS Photograph by Lauren Dukoff n a warm winter afternoon in the los feliz hills of East Los Angeles, Devendra Banhart is flitting around his new house, a Seventies-style saltbox once ­inhabited by Graham Nash. He’s fairylike, a rail-thin five feet 11 and 130 pounds, with an elegant, small-boned face, liquid brown eyes and thin-line tattoos splashed across various extrem- ities, including a wriggling serpent etched on each foot – “the bifurcated path that leads to one place,” he explains (more on this later). Banhart doesn’t have a car at the moment, because he gave away his biodiesel Mer- cedes to a friend, and he’s just hoofed it back from lunch with the raven- haired singer of a local band, West Indian Girl. It seems like the two of them are together, but he shakes his head. “I feel like an old lady, like the artist

42 • Rolling Stone, january 21, 2010 Rolling Stone, JanuaryMonth 00, 21, 2009 2010 • 00 4 3 DEVENDRA BANHART

Agnes Martin, who I heard was celibate out of this – but alone, sorry. You should’ve chuckles. “In retrospect, Bonnaroo is not on my biological father’s side other than her whole life,” he says. “She was like, ‘In seen me a minute ago! I just smoked some a bad place to be roofied, because they are him,” Banhart says. “I just found out my my last life, I probably did a lot of boning, hydro kush, man. It was sick.’ ” gentle and kind, those mountain-lovers.” grandmother’s name last year.” His fa- so this time I’m focusing on my artwork.’ ” Then he shifts uneasily in a chair. Banhart was born in Texas in 1981; ther ­wanted to make things right, buy- For most of this decade, Banhart has “You know, the last show we played in when he was a toddler, he says, his father ing Banhart an airplane ticket to any- been considered the leader of the “freak L.A., we had all electric instruments, and was sent to prison for five years (he de- where in the world. Banhart, who had folk” scene, an amorphous collection of I played a fucking keyboard, but the re- clines to elaborate on the charges, only begun recording demos, chose Paris, in earthy bands and singers like Joanna views said, ‘They brought their brand of saying that the crime was not violent). hopes that all the girls would look like Newsom, Vetiver and Animal Collective. folk music to the House of Blues.’ I thought His first name was bestowed by Prem Jean Seberg in Breathless. He brought Banhart plays both the shaman and the that was amazing. Wow.” He covers his Rawat, an Indian guru popular in the $600 and a borrowed four-track recorder. idiot savant, a ­bushy-bearded sex symbol eyes with one hand. “What do I have to do Seventies; his middle name, Obi, was di- When he ran out of money, he stood out- of new-school hippiedom who once dated to not be that guy?” vined when his mother saw Alec Guin- side a Sonic Youth concert to find some- Natalie Portman. But ­recently he’s gathered ness come onscreen in Star Wars while one who would let him crash on a couch; a new group of musicians around him – t his core, banhart is an her son was kicking in the womb. “Prem after he outstayed too many welcomes, he from Beck to the Strokes’ Fabrizio Moretti urban aesthete, an art- Rawat ­teaches what Jesus says, essential- began sleeping in the subway. Then, he and Julian Casablancas – who have created school kid and street skater ly, that the kingdom of heaven is within,” heard that Vashti Bunyan’s 1970 psyche- a kind of proto-Gotham in the eucalyptus- influenced by the Incredible Banhart says. “The only rule is that the delic-folk classic Just Another Diamond scented hills east of Hollywood. String Band, Tropicália and women choose their mates, and the men Day was going to be reissued on CD for What Will We Be, Banhart’s latest album, the Fugs. He’s also the son of a fashion are only allowed to be castrated on Thurs- the first time. He put it in his Discman for ranges from Led Zeppelin cater­wauls to a model from Caracas, Venezuela, who was days. And then of course there’s the triple- a month. “When I was hungry and didn’t ballad in the lost language of California’s such a free spirit that she’d pull stunts like circumcision thing, which means you sew have food, or was tired and couldn’t sleep, Pit River Indians. It’s also Banhart’s most peeing next to the car when dropping him open the tip. . . .” I was happy because I was listening to that well-crafted rock rec­ord yet: Over six al- off at school. “I was mortified,” he says. After his parents split up, Banhart’s record,” he says. “It changed my life.” bums, Banhart has moved away from col- “ ‘What if someone sees my mom’s vagina mom high-tailed it back to Caracas, where 1 Banhart returned to California and lections of warbling free-form ditties about pissing in the street?’ ” A conversation with she looked for work as a nutritionist while, after an encouraging letter from Young spiders and re­incarnation toward shorter, him can be like picking through his gar- he says, trying to ensnare a guy to sup- God Rec­ords in Brooklyn, boarded a plane sharper songs. “Devendra has grown more bage can, looking for scraps of paper on port them. They were middle-class, at for New York with another $600 and his patient,” says his drummer, Greg Rogove. which he’s scribbled some thoughts. In the least by the standards of a highly corrupt guitar. “In my head, I was going to be Lou “The early recordings were very extem- course of five minutes, he will careen from South American city. “One end of the city Reed, a sea urchin in the sewers,” he says. poraneous, but now he takes some time whispered excitement about Harmony is ­toilet-paper shanties, and the other is The reality was an expensive city in which with lyrics and works on structure with Korine’s forthcoming film Trash Hump- fecundate, glorious, verdant majesty, but he knew no one. At an underground music the band.” ers to reciting a William Blake poem to three families own that part, and they live 2 festival, he repeated his Paris act, asking That’s not to say that Banhart isn’t still a admiration for R. Kelly (“Somehow his in Malibu,” says Banhart. “I think I ap- 4 around for an apartment he could cook at hippie – he just wants to be very clear that music is so good, I like to imagine the little preciate nature so much because that part Freaky Styley or clean in return for ­shelter. The best offer he’s not the cartoon version of one, a space girl said, ‘Please pee on me’ ”). He says that stood above us constantly, this beautiful was a squat in an abandoned salsa club in Banhart – with case making tinctures and baking bread. What Will We Be is inspired by tissue. “I place, this powerful thing.” A telecommu- ex-girlfriend Natalie Greenpoint, Brooklyn. “It had a toilet that In fact, the thought that he might be clas- was blowing my nose on some Kleenex, and nications expert who traveled the world for Portman (1) and at you had to fill up with the sink to flush and Coachella in 2009 (2) a room in the back covered with all sorts – moved to Venezuela of horrible graffiti,” he says. “It was very “People are always giving me weed,” Banhart with his mother (3) scary.” The brightness drains from his face. when he was four. At “When you’re homeless, no one gives a fuck rt rt a Santa Monica High (4), about you. When you don’t have a single says. “I don’t want to let them down, so I’m like, nh Banhart took up dollar, no one gives a fuck about you. That a ba

r skateboarding and

d gesture of ‘Play me a song. That was nice. the guitar.

‘I’m going to go smoke this – but alone.’ ” even 3 You want to stay on the couch?’ That’s what was saving my life. A bit of kindness.” sified that way in pop culture makes him I thought, ‘This used to be a tree.’ So I told business took over as his father, toting back uncultured hicks who acted like gang- beat me up: ‘Where’s that superfag? Let’s As a companion, he bought a mouse he

“snowball into an avalanche of self-aware the tree in the past, ‘Thanks for letting me CDs for the kid from across the globe, like ourtesy of d sters because Snoop Dogg just came out,” get him!’ It was very scary.” named Mr. Journey. “It was lonely; he was insecurity and terror,” he says. “I’d like to blow my nose on your future.’ I don’t know Ali Farka Toure and Fela Kuti. “None of my he says. Were they racist to him? “Are you He transferred to Santa Monica High two bucks,” says Banhart. He made a card- apologize to the hippies for being consid- if the tree knew it was going to be Kleenex, friends’ parents were listening to this kind kidding me?” he asks, eyes blazing. “Are and started skateboarding on the famed board box for Mr. Journey and gave him ered someone who can speak on their be- but maybe it did. It could exist in the fourth of stuff,” says Banhart. “I felt it was very ex- you taking a shit in my mouth?” Santa Monica Courthouse steps. “I got real- a thimble of whiskey. “He wasn’t into me, half,” he adds, spacing out his words so dimension, where time is one line.” otic, this esoteric knowledge.” Alienated and confused – and already ly into the music on skate videos, like [leg- though,” he says. “I ­eventually let him go.” es; La uren Dukoff; c they come off as a little ironic, though he This is all good-natured babble, because In 1994, when Banhart was 13, his step- ag pretty “artsy-fartsy,” he says – he ­decided endary skater] Steve Olson used ‘Quick- Young God signed Banhart a few months m isn’t joking in the slightest. “I don’t wear Banhart – while also being a fragile, ner- father scraped together enough cash to to conduct a social experiment over the sand’ from Hunky Dory, by David Bowie,” later, and since then, he’s toured more or patchouli, and I smell too good to be a hip- vous fellow – is the nicest person you’ll ever take the family out of Hugo Chávez’s revo- course of one week. On Monday, he wore says Banhart. (He recently shot his own less constantly and watched his audience pie.” He shudders at the mention of yoga meet, gracious, generous and deeply kind. lution and move them to California, where kner/Getty I a suit. “The kids were like, ‘That’s kind of skate video.) He picked up the guitar and grow from record-collector dudes who and thinks that macrobiotic food is “the “Devendra is a very Ginsberg-ian char- they settled into a guesthouse near Mali- c weird. Men in Black!’ I thought, ‘Oh, that’s hung out on the beach promenade at mom- would rag on him for not being a folk pur- el Bu a

most insipid shit ever,” an opinion forged as acter, in that Allen gave away everything bu. “I think he saved my life, and saved my h the reaction, interesting.’ ” The next day, and-pop record stores soaking up music. ist, to everyone from the Black Crowes’ c a busboy at Angelica ­Kitchen in New York, he had over and over, and a whole group mom’s life,” Banhart says of his stepdad. i he put on baggy jeans and Timberlands, “Blues wasn’t something a major label was Chris Robinson and Karl Lagerfeld. But “cleaning carrot-ginger dressing off the did good work because of him,” says Jay “My pop is the most important person in A; M slicked back his hair and affixed a pearl trying to sell with shitty-ass production – it he’s still living for that little bit of kind- plates of the most neurotic human beings Babcock, editor of L.A. psychedelia mag- my life.” But Banhart was shocked by what earring to his left ear. “Dudes that hated was Mississippi John Hurt, and it really got ness. “It’s important to find something

on the planet.” He doesn’t even smoke pot: azine Arthur. Banhart is sunshiny and he found when he enrolled in Malibu High. a u/ABACA US me were like, ‘ ’Sup, dawg?’ ” he says. “Girls to me,” he says. “Or I’d get a ska compilation magical, beautiful and spiritual in every- “Unless, you know, Pootie Tang or White ­charismatic, even smiling as he tells a story “In Caracas, I was watching your movies, who never talked to me: ‘Hey, who’s that with the Skatalites, Alton Ellis and Horace thing,” he says. “And I know I’m sounding Chicks is on.” He lets out a light laugh. about getting unwittingly dosed at Bonn- and they were documentaries to me,” he guy?’ ” The next day, he wore a basketball Andy. All these dudes, I’d just go from one like a hippie right now, but I am interested “People are always giving me weed after aroo in 2007. “Halfway through the set, I says. “ ‘Cool, The Lost Boys, isn’t that how uniform and gave himself a fake tribal tat- to the next, finding out who they were.” ­artistically in things that are imbued with a shows, and I don’t want to let them down, rhymed ‘hot’ with ‘pot,’ and then I realized it is? Corey Haim!’ ” He shakes his head. too; after that, he cut open the inseams of After high school, Banhart landed an mystical sense to them. That’s the vein and so I’m like, ‘I’m going to go smoke the shit something was wrong,” he says. “A golf cart “This was America, the most fetishized, his black jeans, painted his legs red and art-school scholarship but dropped out bane of my life, what I’m attracted to and came to take me away while I yelled out, idolized country in the world, and the kids drew all over his shirt. On Friday, the cli- two years later, after a letter from his bi- move toward.”

‘Orphan limbs!’ I woke up in a bed with in Malibu were rich, living in mansions – kwise from top left: Antoine C max: a frilly dress. “I’ve never been so ner- ological father. (They rarely speak to each It’s a couple of weeks later, and we’re sit-

Vanessa Grigoriadis wrote the c

Shakira cover story for RS 1091. a Subway sandwich near my head.” He yet they were totally racist, ­close-minded, Clo vous in my life,” he says. “Kids wanted to other these days.) “I’ve never met anybody ting in his house again as [Cont. on 63]

44 • Rolling Stone, January 21, 2010 Rolling Stone, January 21, 2010 • 45 DevEndra banhart What Will We Be, he found, oddly, that he couldn’t open [Cont. from 45] he orders Ha- his mouth. “Couldn’t eat a Bra- waiian pizza. “I don’t normally zil nut,” he says. A doctor gave eat meat, but Hawaiian pizza him muscle relaxants, but it is so friendly, so peaceful,” didn’t help. A friend recom- he says, sitting at his kitchen mended ayahuasca, the vi- table in a crisp white shirt but- sionary vine of shamans that toned all the way up and one produces an eight-hour trip to red sock, the other green (“I’m unknown realms – and, sud- an accountant who really­ loves denly, his mouth popped open. Mexico,” he says, explaining Two snakes, like the double the outfit). He’s tired from two helix of DNA, are a symbol of weeks of afternoon rehearsals the animating spirit of aya- with his band for their tour. huasca, which is considered “You know, our practices have by some to contain the essence been three days for a decade,” of life. The tattoos on his feet he says. “We’d just have the honor the experience. “But first three shows be shit – I you must be very careful when mean, I’m sure all of our shows talking about this, because it is will always be shit – but for essential to do ayahuasca with the first time, we’ve dissected a shaman,” explains Banhart. who does what in which part.” “You know, one of my realiza- He smiles. “It’s such a beauti- tions was, ‘The baby doesn’t ful feeling the first time you realize it’s a baby.’ I kept say- get it right, when everything ing that over and over.” is locked in and the harmony That’s as clear as he gets works, because you can’t be about his spiritual beliefs. anywhere else but there.” “I’m ­really just excited about For this album he worked the banana aspect of God,” he with an outside producer, says, a smile playing on his lips. Band of Bees’ Paul Butler, but “They are ­perfectly wrapped he ­second-guesses himself a up for me, I peel them open, lot, often because he doesn’t and there’s delicious fruit full areyou ready? want his music to be too easy to of potassium. Then I throw it understand. These days, Ban- away, and it disappears back hart is trying to write down his into the Earth. Wow.” ideas, to focus his thoughts. He It’s quiet here tonight, with brings out a small yellow lined Banhart’s roommate out on To talk about a world notepad. “ ‘Our children’s chil- a date. (When asked what he dren will be astonished by our considers romantic, he says, that used to have: ­gas-related inhibitions,’ ” he “Napoleon telling Josephine, reads, out loud. “See, I wrote ‘I’ll be home in two weeks. that down because in the fu- Don’t bathe.’ ”) But he still • Polar bears ture, there might be a park- doesn’t feel completely com- ing space and a farting space – fortable. Recently, he ­visited • More snow machines where you go and an old house with peeling fart, to make hundreds of paint and crooked windows, hours of energy.” and he realized that this beau- • Abundant trout He flicks the pages, through tiful home, which he’s been a lot of notes about science: renting for just two months, quantum physics, general rel- is too fancy for him – partic- • Cooler summers ativity, the Large Hadron Col- ularly his bedroom, where he lider. “I’m genuinely ­interested gazes out the plate-glass win- These gifts of nature could disappear if we Inspiring in science,” he says. “I feel that dows at an expanse of Los don’t reduce the impacts of global warming. Americans Angeles skyline. “I can finally I’m working in a realm that is Cutting carbon emissions that cause global to protect moving toward the mystery, ­afford to live in a nice house, arming by at least 2% a year will make a wildlife and science is trying to dis- but it’s just not me,” he says, big difference. We can all do our part. sect the mystery.” This is Ban- stabbing a finger at some of for our hart’s “bifurcated path” – the the Seventies-chic fixtures. Start now by switching to energy-efficient light children’s idea that the ecstasy of music “Look at those lamps. They’re bulbs, appliances and cars. Or plant a tree. and the rationality of science from . . . Disasterville.” He future. are both valid ways of fath- shudders. “I don’t know – the We need to create a healthier future our kids oming the universe, especially best songs I wrote were in the will thank us for. since they draw us ever closer squat.” Until he moves out, to the conclusion that humans though, he wants to switch Find more 2% tips at and the Earth are more in- bedrooms, to a tiny space off tertwined than we thought the kitchen. “That room is a nwf.org/personalsolutions possible. In fact, a week be- cave, a hovel,” he says. “That’s fore Banhart began recording where I want to be.”

63

RSA229205.pgs 12.24.2009 11:17