Brian "Brain" Mantia

Drummer Brian "Brain" Mantia has played with some of rock's more cult/fringe artists (Praxis, Primus, Tom Waits, Buckethead, Godflesh), as well as more mainstream/renown ones (Guns N' Roses). Raised in the South Bay city of Cupertino, CA, Mantia became interested in such ?groove heavy' artists as James Brown, Led Zeppelin, and Jimi Hendrix early on, but it wasn't until he was 16 years old that Mantia began playing drums. Shortly thereafter, Mantia acquired the nickname "Brain" while playing in a high school concert band, due to his obsession with the complex Anthony Cirone book, "Portraits in Rhythm." Mantia continued to perfect his drumming skills, by studying at such music schools as the Percussion Institute of Technology in Hollywood. The mid ?80s saw Mantia join the Bay Area funk-rock band, the Limbomaniacs, who broke up later in the decade, but reformed to issue a lone full-length in 1990, Stinky Grooves.







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