Mandré

Michael Andre Lewis, an Omaha, Nebraska native, performed under the Motown-supported alias Mandré as a one-man funk outfit throughout the late 1970s and early 1980s. Before realizing his masked persona, he maintained close ties to Buddy Miles, collaborated with LaBelle and Johnny Guitar Watson, and directed the ensemble Maxayn as a showcase for partner Maxayn Lewis. After assuming George Duke’s chair in Frank Zappa’s group—first documented on Zoot Allures (1976)—Lewis joined Motown and delivered three adventurous albums for the imprint: Mandré (1977), Mandré Two (1978), and M3000 (1979). By Motown’s commercial yardstick these titles underperformed. Full-page trade ads that declared “The Masked Marauder Is Among Us” promoted the debut, which also contained an unhinged reading of Zappa’s “Dirty Love,” yet the record stirred scant response. Its instrumental disco-funk cut “Solar Flight (Opus I)” received airtime at David Mancuso’s Loft parties and held a six-week position on Billboard’s Soul Singles chart. Only the third album registered on the Soul LPs chart. Lewis’s own FutureGroove label issued Mandré 4 (1982), but a false warehouse fire alarm activated sprinklers and destroyed most of the limited pressing, so few copies circulated. He retired the helmet—designed by costume maker Bill Whitten, later responsible for Michael Jackson’s white glove—while remaining active behind the scenes and participating in emerging studio technology, notably the development of Roger Linn’s LinnDrum. In 2010 the Netherlands-based Rush Hour label reissued Mandré 4 in multiple formats. Lewis died two years later in Shreveport, Louisiana. Digital editions of the Motown albums surfaced in 2014, the same year Poland’s Fever Dream label manufactured compact-disc copies of the debut.