Mandré

Active through the past due ’70s and early ’80s, Mandré was a Motown-supported alias of one-man funk music group Michael Andre Lewis. Before making his helmeted funk hero possible, the Omaha, Nebraska indigenous was a close associate of Pal Miles, caused LaBelle and Johnny Electric guitar Watson, and led the music group Maxayn, a system for partner Maxayn Lewis. After he changed George Duke in Frank Zappa’s music group, as heard initial on Zoot Allures (1976), Lewis agreed upon to Motown and produced three out-there albums for the label: Mandré (1977), Mandré Two (1978), and M3000 (1979). By his label’s regular, these were not really commercially effective recordings. The debut, marketed with full-page trade mag advertisements that announced “The Masked Marauder Can be IN OUR MIDST,” and having a duly nutty cover of Zappa’s “Dirty Appreciate,” generated small curiosity. Its “Solar Trip (Opus I),” an instrumental disco-funk exploration, was performed at David Mancuso’s Loft celebrations and taken care of a six-week stick to Billboard’s Spirit Singles chart. Just the third record touched the Spirit LPs graph. Few noticed Mandré 4 (1982), released on Lewis’ FutureGroove label, because of a fake warehouse fire security alarm that tripped sprinklers and ruined the majority of its little pressing. Lewis hung up his helmet — which have been developed by costume developer Costs Whitten, who afterwards produced Michael Jackson’s well-known white glove — but continuing to function behind the moments and was deeply associated with rising studio technology, like the style of Roger Linn’s LinnDrum. The Netherlands-based Hurry Hour label reissued Mandré 4 on different formats this year 2010. Lewis passed away two years afterwards in Shreveport, Louisiana. Digital reissues from the Motown albums made an appearance in 2014, the same season the Polish Fever Fantasy label pressed compact disk copies from the debut.