Mandrake Handshake – Earth-Sized Worlds Review

It’s not easy to find a unique place for yourself in music these days but you have to say that Mandrake Handshake are giving themselves a chance. A collective made up of between seven to ten players (Including they say a “dedicated, flamboyant’ tambourine player”), the high concept for this, their debut album is ‘Welcome to Space Beach’, one on which they showcase a sound they’ve dubbed flowerkraut.

Now we all know each other, on with the show. And it is a show – nobody’s taking themselves too seriously, but then again falling back to pastiche would’ve rendered the exercise a waste of time. Opener Time Goes Up, with it’s threads of lounge, post-punk and Samba all somehow going together, is a bold enough statement of intent however, whilst Charlie’s Comet sees things melodically de-weird themselves.

Having effectively given themselves plenty of license, there’s a little bit of mildly brain frying soup courtesy of Barrans and the Aquarian leaning King Cnut. The highlight though Hypersonic Super-Asterid, the kind of lengthy jam you suggest first brought all these ideas front and centre and a motorik construct in which they work best. Mandrake Handshake have found themselves a ledge on Earth-Sized Worlds – who knows what party their interstellar overdrive will take them to next.

You can read a full review here.