Mala

Mala was released on March 12, 2013, and was Banhart's debut for Nonesuch Records. Banhart and Noah Georgeson produced it and Greg Calbi mastered it. Georgeson, Greg Rogove, Josiah Steinbrick and Rodrigo Amarante helped him on the record.

Pitchfork's Ian Cohen wrote that it was Banhart's best record in nearly a decade, "largely because it's his loosest and funniest". He heard songs that were short and spare, and called "The Ballad of Keenan Milton" a lovely instrumental. In the Guardian, Kate Mossman described it as a "quiet little triumph" and noted the use of vintage hip-hop equipment and an ode to the medieval mystic Hildegard von Bingen.