Khara is an Old Slavonic word meaning “the smile of God.”  Truly, God must have been smiling to allow such a weirdly joyful music to come together.  Mandragora brings together a bardic style of rock & roll infused with traditional music from their native Khakassia, whose native inhabitants share a lot of cultural affinities with the Kyrgyz people.  Other influences in this record include Tuvan throat-singing by Alexey Khovalyg, a talkbox expertly handled by band leader Alexander Medvedev, and Alexander Pakhtaev adding such as the morin khuur or horse-head fiddle common in this part of Russia and Central Asia.

This is pretty solid ethno-rock, and it’s particularly good to see Russia’s ethnic music scene beginning to thrive, as this is the place I started learning about what is commonly called ‘world music’ in my youth.  It’s high time I paid a visit to see such music performed with my own eyes again.

Special thanks to the good souls at Sketis Music for enlightening me to this release.