Quotes from Devendra Banhart

I'm deeply conservative and I'm profoundly boring.

I can't tell you how many times I've had a friend tell me, in this tender and discreet voice, 'It's just you and me bro, and I want to tell you the truth: make a record of you and an acoustic guitar. Please. That's what everybody actually likes.' That's so funny to me.

I'm getting older and I'm just coming to terms that I'm stuck with me so I better try to like myself.

I know that there are energies that vibrate frequencies that are so subtle you could say that they exist in a different territory or realm or sphere, and people mistake these frequencies for ghosts.

I sit around and try to play along to certain songs that I really love. It helps you explore new territory.

I come from a school of artists, the Mission School in San Francisco, and there are a lot of artists I look up to.

I was born in Texas, you know. I was born in Houston.

When the Internet came along, the first thing I did was look up Wu-Tang so I could print out their symbol and glue it onto my skateboard.

It's very powerful to shut down your computer and escape into the real world.

I don't think I'm getting better, quote unquote, as a singer or guitar player. But I'm more comfortable in this particular space. I get better at being a bad singer, so to speak.

It's embarrassing to quote Gandhi or something, but being the change you want to see in the world is pretty powerful.

Well I am a Gemini.

I want to do a record with Adam Green of all German schlager songs.

Good art doesn't really have an expiration date on it.

A soul singer is always singing to their crowd. They're always singing about their woes to you. And I really appreciate that when a singer is making you feel... when they're directing it at me. When they're including me.

I've always thought it'd be nice to be seaweed, kind of just floating about.

And because my teeth don't bite, I can take them out dancing I can take my little teeth out and show them a real good time

This is my definition of selling out: When you change what you do or do what you do as a reaction to someone else's expectations or lack of expectations.

I might have some delusions of grandeur.

I've got a long list of things I consider to be selling out. But amongst that list, one of them is when you make art without putting your guard down.

No one's fearless. We're all full of fear. But can your fear guide you or lean into it, embrace it.

If you're ever wondering what to wear, just dress like a pumpkin, you're good to go.

There are plenty of things in vaults that didn't sell in its time. So much stuff. But slowly these companies start to get a hint that these things have some value.

I didn't want to make a record that was just guitar and voice, that was just the technology available to me. At the time, I remember thinking, "I am making a Faust album." That didn't translate.