Chris Brown
Christopher Maurice Brown is an American singer, songwriter, rapper, dancer, and actor. A hip-hop and pop-influenced R&B musician who works in a variety of genres, he has been called the "King of R&B" by some contemporaries. His lyrics often address emotional and hedonistic themes. His singing and dancing skills have often been compared favorably to those of Michael Jackson.
In 2004, Brown signed with Jive Records. The following year, he released his first album, Chris Brown, which reached double Platinum certification by the end of 2006. Brown topped the Billboard Hot 100 chart with his debut single, "Run It!", making him the first male artist since 1995 to do so. His second album, Exclusive, was commercially successful worldwide and spawned his second Billboard Hot 100 number-one single, "Kiss Kiss".
In 2009, Brown faced significant controversy and media attention when he pleaded guilty to felony assault of his girlfriend, the singer Rihanna. He was sentenced to five years probation with six months community service. The same year, he released his third album, Graffiti, which was considered to be a commercial failure. He released his fourth album F.A.M.E., which was his first album to top the Billboard 200. The album contained three commercially successful singles—"Yeah 3x", Diamond certified "Look at Me Now" and "Beautiful People"—and earned him the Grammy Award for Best R&B Album. His fifth album, Fortune, released in 2012, topped the Billboard 200.
Following the releases of X and Royalty, both peaking in the Top 10 of the Billboard 200, his eighth album, Heartbreak on a Full Moon, a double-disc LP consisting of 45 tracks, was certified Gold for combined sales and album-equivalent units of over 500,000 after one week, and later certified double Platinum. Brown's ninth album, Indigo found similar success, debuting atop the Billboard 200. It included the single "No Guidance" which broke the record for longest-running number one on Billboard R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay chart. Its chart success was outdone with the single "Go Crazy" released the following year, which broke Brown's own record for longest-running number one. In 2022, his Indigo album spawned a sleeper hit with its song "Under the Influence", which was re-released as a single.
Brown has sold over 140 million records worldwide, making him one of the world's best-selling music artists. He has gained a cult following, and is one of the highest-grossing African American touring artists of all time. Brown holds the record for the most Top 40 hits of any R&B singer in history, the most RIAA Gold-certified singles of any male singer in history, and the most RIAA multi-Platinum singles of any male singer in history. In 2019, Billboard named Brown the third most successful artist of the 2010s decade in R&B and hip-hop music, behind Drake and Rihanna. Brown has won 209 awards from 534 nominations over the course of his career. He has also pursued an acting career. In 2007, he made his feature film debut in Stomp the Yard, and appeared as a guest on the television series The O.C. Other films include This Christmas, Takers, Think Like a Man and Battle of the Year.
Early life, family and education
Christopher Maurice Brown was born on May 5, 1989, in Tappahannock, Virginia, to Joyce Hawkins, a former day care center director, and Clinton Brown, a corrections officer at a local prison. He has an older sister, Lytrell Bundy, a bank employee. Music was always present in Brown's life beginning in his childhood. He would listen to soul albums that his parents owned, and eventually began to show interest in the hip-hop scene.His parents had divorced when he was 6 years old, and his mother's boyfriend terrified him by subjecting her to domestic violence. In a 2017 self-documentary film, Welcome to My Life, Brown recalls the couple's abusive relationship. Brown said that when he was six, his mother's partner shot himself in the head, but did not die. The gunshot blinded him, the physical impairment only adding to his rage. Donnelle vented his anger and frustration on Brown's mother. "I had to hear my mom get beat up every night. I'd pee on myself, just scared to even walk out into the hallway, because I didn't want to see nothing".
Brown taught himself to sing and dance at a young age and often cites Michael Jackson as his inspiration. He began to perform in his church choir and in several local talent shows. Brown said, during a 2023 interview with Shannon Sharpe, that he started to take in consideration music as his job after winning a talent show during a summer camp when he was 11 years old, performing Sisqó's "Thong Song": "The camp leaders, they laughed, but everybody kinda went crazy in there and I was like 'I think I can do this'." When he mimicked an Usher performance of "My Way", his mother recognized his vocal talent, and they began to look for the opportunity of a record deal.
At age 16, Brown dropped out of Essex High School in Virginia in late 2004 or early 2005 to relocate and pursue a music career.
Career
2002–2004: Career beginnings
At age 13, Brown was discovered by Hitmission Records, a local production team that visited the gas station where his father worked, while searching for new talent. Around the same time, he performed with one of his production managers' son, named TJ, for hip-hop artist Puff Daddy, but the rapper refused to sign him to his record label Bad Boy Records. Hitmission's Lamont Fleming provided voice coaching for Brown. The team helped to arrange a demo package, under the name of "C. Sizzle", and approached contacts in New York. Tina Davis, senior A&R executive at Def Jam Recordings, heard the demo package that Brown's local team had sent to Def Jam, and among the artists contained in the CD she was impressed by Brown with his track "Whose Girl Is That". Davis later had Brown auditioning in her New York office, and she immediately took him to meet the former president of Island Def Jam Music Group, Antonio "L.A." Reid, who offered to sign him that day, but Brown refused his proposal because Reid would not talk to his mother. Brown moved to Harlem, New York City, to seek a record deal. The negotiations with Def Jam continued for two months, and ended when Davis lost her job due to a corporate merger. Brown asked her to be his manager, and once Davis accepted, she promoted the singer to other labels such as Jive Records, J-Records and Warner Bros. Records. "I knew that Chris had real talent," says Davis. "I just knew I wanted to be part of it." Brown attended Essex High School in Virginia until late 2004, when he moved to Harlem.According to Mark Pitts, in an interview with HitQuarters, Davis presented Brown with a video recording, and Pitts' reaction was: "I saw huge potential... I didn't love all the records, but I loved his voice. It wasn't a problem because I knew that he could sing, and I knew how to make records." Brown ultimately chose Jive due to its successful work with then-young acts such as Britney Spears and Justin Timberlake. Brown stated, "I picked Jive because they had the best success with younger artists in the pop market, I knew I was going to capture my African American audience, but Jive had a lot of strength in the pop area as well as longevity in careers."
2005–2006: ''Chris Brown'' and acting debut
After signing to Jive Records in 2004, Brown began recording his debut album in February 2005. By May, there were 50 songs already recorded, 14 of which were picked to the final track listing. He has worked with producers and songwriters Scott Storch, Cool & Dre, Sean Garrett, Jazze Pha, and others, and has said that they "really believed in ". Brown co-wrote half of the tracks. "I write about the things that 16 year olds go through every day," he said in 2009. "Like you just got in trouble for sneaking your girl into the house, or you can't drive, so you steal a car or something." The whole album took less than eight weeks to produce. In 2023, Brown described working on his first album as a "learning experience", recalling that he felt "insecure" about releasing "Run It!" as his first single.The album's lead single, "Run It!", was a great commercial success, making Brown the first male act since Montell Jordan in 1995 to have his debut single to reach the summit of the Billboard Hot 100—later remaining for four additional weeks. Three other singles, "Yo ", "Gimme That", and "Say Goodbye", were successful, peaking in the top 20 on the same chart. Released on November 29, 2005, the Chris Brown album debuted at number 2 on the Billboard 200 with first week sales of 154,000 copies. Decca Aitkenhead of The Guardian wrote that it was "a smooth slice of commercial R&B". Chris Brown sold over three million copies in the US and was certified three times Platinum by the RIAA; worldwide, it sold six million copies.
On June 13, 2006, Brown released a DVD entitled Chris Brown's Journey, which shows footage of him traveling through England and Japan, preparing for his first visit to the Grammy Awards, behind the scenes of his music videos and bloopers. On August 17, 2006, to further promote the album, Brown began his major co-headlining tour, The Up Close and Personal Tour. Due to the tour, production for his next album was pushed back two months. St. Jude Children's Research Hospital received $10,000 in ticket proceeds from Brown's 2006 Up Close & Personal Tour. Brown has made appearances on UPN's One on One and The N's Brandon T. Jackson Show on its pilot episode.
2007–2008: ''Exclusive''
In January 2007, Brown landed a small role as a band geek in the fourth season of the American television series The O.C.. Brown then made his film debut in Stomp the Yard, alongside Ne-Yo, Meagan Good and Columbus Short on January 12, 2007. In April 2007, Brown was the opening act for Beyoncé, on the Australian leg of her The Beyoncé Experience tour. On July 9, 2007, Brown was featured in an episode of MTV's My Super Sweet 16 celebrating his eighteenth birthday in New York City.Shortly after ending his summer tour with Ne-Yo, Brown quickly began production for his second album, Exclusive. The album's lead single, "Wall to Wall" was released, but it only peaked at number 79 on the US Billboard Hot 100 chart, and number 22 on the US Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs chart; his lowest charting single at the time. However, "Kiss Kiss", featuring and produced by T-Pain, released as the album's second single, received huge success, reaching number 1 on the US Billboard Hot 100 chart, and becoming Brown's second number 1 single following "Run It!" in 2005. "With You", produced by Stargate, was released as the third single from Exclusive, and had even bigger worldwide success than "Kiss Kiss", becoming one of the all-time best-selling singles, and reaching number 2 on the US Billboard Hot 100 chart. Exclusive was released in the US on November 6, 2007. According to The Guardian the album demonstrated "his agility in fusing R&B with the era's auto-tuned strain of pop-leaning hip-hop". The album debuted at number 4 on the US Billboard 200 chart, selling 294,000 copies in its first week, becoming a bigger commercial success than his previous outing. Exclusive was certified four times Platinum by the RIAA.
In November 2007, Brown starred as a video host for St. Jude Children's Research Hospital's Math-A-Thon program. He showed his support by encouraging students to use their math skills to help children with cancer and other catastrophic diseases. On November 21, 2007, Brown appeared as a leading role in This Christmas, a family drama starring Regina King. He also contributed to the soundtrack of the movie, that contains his cover versions of "Try a Little Tenderness" and "This Christmas", the latter has been certified Platinum by the RIAA. To further support the album Exclusive, Brown embarked on his The Exclusive Holiday Tour, visiting over thirty venues in US. The tour began in Cincinnati, Ohio, on December 6, 2007, and concluded on February 9, 2008, in Honolulu, Hawaii. In March 2008, Brown was featured on Jordin Sparks' single "No Air", which received worldwide success, peaking at number 3 on the US Billboard Hot 100 chart. He also made a guest appearance on David Banner' single "Get Like Me" alongside Yung Joc. The song peaked at number 16 on the Billboard Hot 100, and number 2 on the US Hot Rap Songs chart. In 2008, Brown did of a commercial spot for Doublemint gum, creating a jingle commissioned by an advertising company working for Wrigley. Brown first created the short version for the commercial, then extended and expanded it into a full song, "Forever", during another recording session. "Forever" was later released as a single anticipating Brown's re-issue of Exclusive. The song was noted for being Brown's first record to venture into the dance-pop genre, becoming one of his biggest singles, reaching number 2 on Billboard Hot 100. Billboard wrote positively of the single, stating in its 2008 review that Brown "has proved as 2008's pop/R&B prince that he has talent and charm to command the charts for as long he chooses". The re-issue, titled Exclusive: The Forever Edition, was released on June 3, 2008, seven months after the original version, featuring four new tracks, and pushed the album's success further. In August 2008, Brown guest-starred on Disney's The Suite Life of Zack & Cody as himself. Towards the end of 2008, Brown was named the Artist of the Year by Billboard magazine, with the songs "With You", "Forever" and "No Air" resulting three of the top 10 most sold singles of 2008 in the US.