Devendra Banhart – New York Times feature – WNYC Soundcheck – Tour Dates

Devendra Banhart and his eighth album, Mala, has reinvigorated his followers and introduced him to a new group of music listeners. The record has been receiving rave reviews in the US and abroad, with the New York Times giving Banhart & his “freak folk” cohorts a recent feature. The article focuses on the early ’00s sub-genre and its artists like Grizzly Bear, Animal Collective, and Joanna Newsom and how they managed to transcend the stigmas of their genre classification with subsequent releases – with Banhart‘s Mala serving as “the best example to date of made-over freak folk”. Read the feature here. Banhart made it to SXSW this year and performed songs off his latest album to eager crowds, the shows being his first in the US since taking a four-year hiatus to focus on his visual arts. While there, he shared his dry wit with WNYC‘s Soundcheck and revealed his intention in writing “Your Fine Petting Duck”, saying it was done to try to accomplish what it would “sound like if you had The Shaggs meet New Order“. Listen to it here.

If you missed him at SXSW, he’ll be sharing his songs throughout the US this spring – tour dates below:

5/4 – Belly Up – Aspen, CO
5/5 – Gothic Theatre – Denver, CO
5/8 – Crescent Ballroom – Phoenix, AZ
5/9 – Belly Up Tavern – San Diego, CA
5/11 – SoHo – Santa Barbara, CA
5/12 – Pappy & Harriet’s – Pioneertown, CA
5/14 – Observatory – Santa Ana, CA
5/18 – Rio Theatre – Santa Cruz, CA
5/21 – Regency Ballroom – San Francisco, CA
5/23 – Crystal Ballroom – Portland, OR
5/25 – Sasquatch Festival – Seattle, WA
5/26 – Commodore Ballroom – Vancouver, WA
5/30 – Mill City Nights – Minneapolis, MN
5/31 – Park West – Chicago, IL
6/1 – St. Andrew’s Hall – Detroit, MI
6/3 – Danforth Music Hall – Toronto, ON
6/5 – Corona – Montreal, QC
6/7 – Wilbur Theatre – Boston, MA
6/12 – Union Transfer – Philadelphia, PA