DISCO MYSTIC

Asha Puthli was the quintessential creative multihyphenate before the term was invented. Now, unexpectedly, the 79-year-old musician is making a big comeback with new music, collabs, and a Glastonbury performance.

- BHANUJ KAPPAL

IT'S NOON ON a weekday, but Asha Puthli is still in bed when she answers my Zoom call. She's in her nightgown, her hair tied up in a small knot at the front, gently rubbing the sleep out of her eyes. She had a late night, she explains, and is running on four hours of sleep. For a moment, she looks like any other 79-year-old, a little tired and a little groggy. Then she turns on the charm with a thousand-watt smile. "I did my Sardarji hairdo for you, especially," she jokes, delightfully droll. "My little munda look."

Over 50 years ago, Puthli moved from Mumbai to New York armed with a dance scholarship, a demo tape of Indo jazz fusion compositions, and dreams of being a jazz singer. On the strength of her prodigious vocal talent, endless gumption, and bagfuls of roguish charm, she achieved that and more. Through the 1970s and early 1980s, she put out a string of records that ranged from avantgarde jazz to glam, pop, and soul, all infused with a sense of cosmic spirituality and playful whimsy. A regular fixture at Andy Warhol's Studio 54, she was a fashion icon, dressed by Michaele Vollbracht and Manolo Blahnik and photographed by Richard Avedon and Francesco Scavullo. She starred in films by Ismail Merchant, James Ivory and Bruno Corbucci, became besties with trans actress Holly Woodlawn-immortalized in the Lou Reed hit "Walk on the Wild Side"--and inspired the sartorial and performance style of Debbie Harry.

Despite strong sales in Europe, Puthli's music never quite made it into the American mainstream. She retreated into semi-retirement in the 1980s, burnt out from constant clashes with a music industry that wasn't quite ready yet for a brown-skinned diva. But her music stayed in rotation, gaining cult status amongst crate-diggers and underground dance music fans. In the 1990s and early noughties, her music was sampled by hip-hop stars like The Notorious B.I.G. and 50 Cent, finding its way to a new set of listeners.