Asha Puthli

Asha Puthli (born 1945) is an Indian-born American singer-songwriter, producer, and actress. She moved to New York from Mumbai with a dance scholarship, and in 1970, she was signed to CBS Records and subsequently released several solo albums. Her recordings cover blues, pop, rock, soul, funk, disco, and techno music. She also starred in films by Merchant Ivory and Bruno Corbucci. In 2025, Puthli was inducted into the Women Songwriters Hall of Fame.

Early life and education Ahsa Puthli was born in Mumbai (then Bombay) in 1945. Her father was a businessman, and her mother was a homemaker. They had fought in the Indian independence movement and owned Bombay Woollen Mills. Her aunt is Indian freedom fighter Kamaladevi Chattopadhyay.

Like many upper-middle-class Hindu children at the time, she attended English-speaking Catholic schools. Puthli began training at an early age in Indian classical music and opera. She listened to jazz and pop music on the radio, which led to her interest in fusion. At thirteen, she won a contest in which she sang "Malagueña". The victory encouraged her to begin improvising with a jazz band at local tea dances. Ved Mehta described her singing in his book Portrait of India. She went to a university in Mumbai.

Career Puthli appeared in her first film, shot by Indian director Mani Kaul, in 1968.

Puthli, who had studied Bharatanatyam and Odissi, was able to make her way backstage and secure an audition in New York for the Martha Graham School's modern jazz dance course when the American modern dancer Martha Graham's dance troupe visited India on tour.

As an ambassador of the Tea Council, Puthli toured the United States in 1970, inviting young artists to participate in a competition the council called a "search for the new sound."

In 1970, John H. Hammond at Columbia had read Ved Mehta's portrait of her in Jazz in Bombay. For the album, Puthli sang on two songs, "What Reason Could I Give" and "All My Life".

She also sang lead vocals on the Peter Ivers Blues Band's cover version of "Ain’t That Peculiar", which was reviewed favorably in Cashbox, Rolling Stone, and Billboard. The single, released in 1972, entered the Billboard charts. Take It Out On Me, the band's album featuring Puthli, was finally released in 2009. Warhol superstar Holly Woodlawn was her close friend and roommate, and together they starred in Bad Marion's Last Year (1971), directed by Gene Ayres. Her music reflected her interest in pop, rock, soul, and funk. She gravitated toward the glam world of Elton John and T. Rex. Her debut Asha Puthli (1973) was produced by Del Newman, and it included cover versions of songs by JJ Cale and Bill Withers. She hired Pierre LaRoche (makeup designer for David Bowie and Freddie Mercury) and photographer Mick Rock to shoot the cover. The album included a disco version of "I Am a Song" by Neil Sedaka.

Her third solo album, The Devil is Loose (1976), was called an instant classic by The New York Times. Music critic Robert Palmer called her singing "extraordinary". Thom Jurek of AllMusic called it " a masterpiece of snakey, spaced-out soul and pre-mainstream disco."

Puthli interviewed Gayatri Devi, the Maharani of Jaipur, for Warhol's Interview magazine in 1977.

Her sense of fashion brought her visibility. She was a fixture at Studio 54 and dressed by designers Michaele Vollbracht and Manolo Blahnik and photographed by Richard Avedon and Francesco Scavullo.

By the end of the decade, she returned to acting and had a lead role in Bruno Corbucci's The Gang That Sold America (1979).

In 2020, she was a featured collaborator on Italian singer Gabriel Grillotti's single "Je Crois C'est Ça L'amour."

In 2021, British independent label Mr Bongo Records reissued her 1976 album The Devil is Loose, and followed it up with a 20-track anthology in 2022. She also performed at the We Out Here music festival at St. Giles, England, in August 2024.

On July 23, 2025, Puthli once again headlined Central Park Summerstage in New York City. On March 7, 2026 she performed as a guest artist with Gorillaz (along with Anoushka Shankar and Black Thought) on Saturday Night Live.

On March 8, 2026, Asha Puthli and Say She She released the collaborative single "Pawa!".

Musical style Praised as a "fusion pioneer" by The New York Times, Puthli's recordings cover blues, pop, rock, soul, funk, disco, and techno.

Influence and recognition Puthli's song "Space Talk" from the 1970s, a popular tune with David Mancuso's "The Loft" crowd, has been sampled by P.Diddy, The Notorious B.I.G., Dilated Peoples, Governor featuring 50 Cent, and Redman; and her cover of George Harrison's "I Dig Love" was sampled in 2005 for the chart-topping track "Reload It" by UK MOBO Award-winner Kano. She has co-writer credits with Jay-Z, P. Diddy, The Neptunes, Jermaine Dupri, SWV, and The Notorious B.I.G. on the track "The World is Filled" from the multi-platinum album Life After Death.

In 2025, Puthli was honored by the Women Songwriters Hall of Fame.

Personal life In 1970, as her U.S. student visa was about to expire, Puthli approached a man outside the Museum of Modern Art in New York and proposed marriage. She later married Marc Goldschmidt, and they had a son born in February 1975 before their divorce in 1981.

Discography

Albums Asha Puthli (CBS, 1973) She Loves to Hear the Music (CBS, 1975) The Devil Is Loose (CBS, 1976) L'Indiana (CBS, 1978) 1001 Nights of Love (Autobahn/Philips, 1979) I'm Gonna Kill It Tonight (Autobahn, 1980) Only the Headaches Remain (Woorell, 1982) Hari Om (Sony, 1990) Lost (Kyrone, 2009)

As guest The Complete Science Fiction Sessions, Ornette Coleman (Columbia, 2000) Science Fiction, Ornette Coleman (Columbia, 1972) Mirror, Charlie Mariano (Atlantic, 1972) Squadra Antigangsters (Cinevox, 1979) Easily Slip Into Another World, Henry Threadgill (Novus, 1989) Export Quality, Dum Dum Project (Times Square/Groovy, 2001) Mpath - Wanderer, Gardner Cole (Triloka, 2003) Accerezzami, Fausto Papetti (2003) Asana Vol 3: Peaceful Heart, Bill Laswell (Meta, 2003) Fear of Magnetism, Stratus (Klein, 2005) Asana OHM Shanti, Bill Laswell (Meta, 2006) Asha's Kiss, Raveena (Asha's Awakening, 2022) The Mountain, Gorillaz (Parlophone, 2026)