DEVENDRA BANHART PUTS ON HAIRS

Given that Devendra Banhart has named his 11th studio album Flying Wig, you might be tempted to think the dashing but idiosyncratic musician is hair-obsessed. After all, he chose to work with Cate Le Bon, creative visionary and producer, on the basis of her willingness to cut his hair the first time the duo met, despite the fact that the only tools on hand were a knife and fork. Add to that his ascendency in the early aughts as the most successful—and hairiest—member of the Freak Folk Movement; it was a rare review that didn’t call him hirsute (a word precious few have ever uttered aloud), focusing more on his straggly, unkempt beard and shock of dark hair than on the lo-fi brilliance of his mystical and mercurial songs.

But these days you could hardly call the artist-cummusician hirsute, freaky, or folk. His ebony locks are expertly cut; the beard is trimmed, with subtle streaks of gray. He looks less raging hippy and more GQ-ready (the publication, in 2019, named him the Most Stylish Man of the Decade). Maybe that’s why his pal Isabelle Albuquerque gave him a human-hair wig for his birthday pre-pandemic, to counteract the seismic tonsorial shift.