Mandrill

An eclectic band from Brooklyn, NY most often categorized as "funk", though their influences range from rock, blues, jazz, and African and Latin music as well. Their early albums (Mandrill, Mandrill Is, Composite Truth, Just Outside Of Town, and Mandrilland) are sometimes wild and experimental and sometimes danceable and fun, often times both at once. Their approach is somewhat comparable to early Funkadelic. Like Funkadelic, by their 1975 album called Solid they had settled into a smoother, more traditional funk sound, losing much but not all of their progressive edge. The band was seven members: Carlos Wilson (trombone, vocals), Lou Wilson (trumpet, vocals) and Ric Wilson (sax, vocals). The brothers were born in Panama and grew up in the Bedford-Stuyvesant area of Brooklyn. Claude 'Coffee' Cave II (keyboards, percussion, vocals, Bundy Cenac on bass for one album "Mandrill" replaced by Fudgie Kae Solomon in 1972 (bass, vocals), Charles Padro (drums, percussion, vocals) for two albums, replaced by Neftali Santiago in 1972 (drums, percussion, vocals), Omar Mesa (guitar, vocals) replaced by Doug Rodriguez in 1974 (lead guitar, vocals). This completed the Mandrill line-up from the Polydor years 1970–1975 which make up the Mandrill sound. Other members of the band in later years included Juaquin Jessup (lead guitar, percussion, vocals) and Tommy Trujillo on guitar. Their songs have been sampled by many hip-hop acts such as Johnny D, Public Enemy, DJ Shadow, Shawty Lo, Big L, Kanye West, Jin, Eminem, and 9th Wonder. They combined funk with many other styles like Latin, salsa, rock, blues and soul. Some of their songs have been used in the soundtracks of films: The Greatest (1977) directed by Tom Gries and Monte Hellman; and The Warriors (1979) directed by Walter Hill. The band continues to perform live; their signature song is arguably "Fencewalk." Composite Truth (1973) was the band's most commercially successful album. 2. Croatian band "ManDrill" started their version of alternative-funk in 1997. In 1998. they won an unsigned band contest "Ri Rock", and started gigging frequently. ManDrill music changed through the years and document of that is debut album "Embryo" (2002). After a few lineup changes, the band finally released their second album, "P" in 2006, havig a very succesful hit, "Ljubio, valjao". With the popularity came the lawsuit for the name - that's when ManDrill had to change the name to Mandrili. Under that name they released their third and most succesful album (ranked top five Croatian albums for 2008) "Tibet". They're still very active with the following lineup: Kristian Ćoza - Vocals, Tomislav Radinović - Guitars, Robert Jovanović - Bass, Dalibor Peršić - Drums