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On the first day of World Cup fever I was feeling pretty miserable, not because of football, nor the fact that I had done a 65 hour week, but I'd been to the dentist who had pulled two of my molars out. Feeling totally not up for it, I was dragged out to see this band play. We headed off to the gig, me still in pain and well pissed off. I was expecting the usual thrashy punky not-quite Verve thing, all hollowing about inner city blues, being miserable, not having fun and playing the same 4 miserable chords to the same miserable songs all night. Well, I stand corrected. The energy was phenomenal, one minute I was in Dublin, the next I was down by the Ganges, through Cazbahs to the Orient, around the globe and finally back to a bunch of Celts. FANTASTIC!
The quality of sound and the tightness of this band hit me straight away. Tooth or no bloody tooth I was up to investigate on the floor, Ill say it again - on the floor. Mandragora are a definite must, appealing to all ages, sex types and cultures accross the globe and truly on the vibe. The unsung hero, the anchor man simply known as Alun (soundman) had all the complex sounds, rhythms and beats totally nailed down and boxed off. Nice one Alun!
I caught up with Simon (the percussionist) to find out more: "Our music spans a variety of influences and styles; from techno and world music to dub, drum and bass and all things psychedelic, spun together in their own unique way to create the perfect narcotic cocktail for the new millenium." Couldn't have put it better myself!
It's proven. Moles cause growers problems. Bath's bunkeresque "flower box" therefore seemed fruitless soil for Brighton's 'Mandragora' to propogate their new album 'Pollen' - a window ledge stage and shed-like acoustics threatened to evict tunnel-trancers, blinking, to the surface.
Results transformed assumptions. Mandragora expanded the event horizon, realising a fusion of trance/techno drives, ethereal ethnic samples and elemental dub, that split spacetime, or at least induced flashbacks. The nexus of this effect centres in Mandragora's manipulation of an assemblage of apparatus that NASA must surely know is missing.
Conclusion: I've made mountains out of molehill. Dancefloor evidence is corroborated by authority on phenomena; John Peel, who, along with Marc Radcliffe, cites Mandragora as a significant new anomaly. Further published reports and a collaboration with green-fingered "Mr Nice" Howard Marks affirms the sounds from the acoustic ground. Grow It Everywhere...
Southen Daily Echo - 13/12/97
They've been held at gunpoint by the mafia in the Ukraine, played to 5000 crazed Europeans in Italy, been mud soaked on stage at Glastonbury and are bringing their diversely influenced sounds to Neurology's Christmas Bash in Southampton.
Named after the man-shaped hallucinogenic root, Mandragora offers a new album, Pollen, which features a myriad of influences. There's the real hectic blue grass violin mixed with a Lebanese folk song in a dancy, dubby tune, Abuzeluf, currently on John Peel's playlist. Arthur, of the Crazy World Of Arthur Brown does guest vocals along with numerous appearances from home-bred musicians on everything from bongos to the Turkish Saz.
A separate single, Rewind, everything's OK, samples their interview with Howard Marks, the infamous ex-cannabis dealer-cum-author who has been giving lectures about his life and times. Three of the four band members are Brighton boys - Simon Williams does the stuff with the sampler, synth and guitar, Simon Cowburn puts out the percussion, Alan Jenkins is on bass and new for this project is Mick Reed, also of Nine Invisibles (from Leeds) on drums.
The groups main enjoyment, apart from gathering sounds that we would seldom be able to hear, is playing to a crowd who are, in Simin W's words 'Right Up For It'.
This promises to be a night where the boundaries in music and on the dancefloor are stretched.