PRESS
Devendra Banhart, Nino Rojo
Big Takeover Magazine, Issue #55 | by Jack Rabid
Devendra’s visions are full of fancy and fantasy
This is the companion CD to Rejoicing in the Hands which was reviewed in the last issue and was recorded at the same sessions. There isn’t much difference other than there are a few more orchestrated tunes, a cover of a song by Ella Jenkins and inclusion of a trippy video. This is folk music from a determined optimist, who finds and transmits beauty in new ways while connected to the rock continuum by a voice that echoes the pre T-Rex vocals of Marc Bolan. Poet John Keats said "If something is not beautiful, it is probably not true", and while Devendra’s visions are full of fancy and fantasy, these simple sincere songs seem to drip from his lips without pretension or having to drag dirt from life’s gutter to have his words seem authentic.