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Chris Brown Bio Christopher Maurice "Chris" Chris Browm (born May 5, 1989) is an American recording artist and actor. He made his recording debut in late 2005 with the self-titled album Chris Chris Browm at the age of 16. The album featured the hit single "Run It!", which topped the Billboard Hot 100, making Chris Browm the first male artist to have his debut single top the chart. The album has sold over two million copies in the United States and was certified double Platinum by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA). Chris Browm's second studio album, Exclusive was released worldwide in November 2007. It spawned two successful singles; his second U.S. number one hit, "Kiss Kiss" featuring T-Pain and "With You", which peaked at number two on the Billboard Hot 100. Chris Browm has released a deluxe version of his album called the The Forever Edition. The first single from it, "Forever", was released in May 2008 and reached number two on Billboard Hot 100. Exclusive has been certified Platinum by the RIAA. In addition to his solo commercial success, Chris Browm has been featured on several hits such as "No Air", a duet with singer Jordin Sparks, "Shortie like Mine" with the rapper Bow Wow and "Shawty Get Loose" alongside Lil Mama and T-Pain. The songs have peaked on number three, number nine and number ten on the Billboard Hot 100 respectively. Due to his dance routines, Chris Browm has been compared to renowned R&B artists such as Usher and Michael Jackson, citing both as large influences on his music. In 2009, Chris Browm pleaded guilty to felony assault for his involvement in an altercation with singer Rihanna, and was sentenced to five years probation and six months of community service. 1989–2004: Early life and career beginnings Christopher Maurice Chris Browm was born on May 5, 1989, in the small town of Tappahannock, Virginia to Joyce Hawkins, a former day care center director, and Clinton Chris Browm, a corrections officer at a local prison. The youngest child of the couple, he has an older sister who works in a bank. Since his childhood, music was something which always had been present in Chris Browm's life, though none of his familiars were related to music; he used to listen soul albums that his parents had owned, but eventually, Chris Browm began to show interest in the hip-hop scene. Chris Browm taught himself to sing and dance at a young age, often citing Michael Jackson as his inspiration. He then began to perform in his church choir and in several local talent shows. While mimicking an Usher performance, his mother recognized his vocal talent and they began to look for opportunities of a record deal. At the same time, Chris Browm had been through personal issues. His parents had already been divorced, and he said his mother's boyfriend made him terrified all the time, due to the domestic violence his mother endured from her boyfriend. At the age of 13, Chris Browm was discovered by a local production team who visited his father's gas station while searching for new talent. The singer then, moved to New York. In 2004, Tina Davis—then-senior A&R executive at Def Jam Recordings—discovered him while he was working with some local producers. She loved what she heard and saw when Chris Browm auditioned in her office at Island Def Jam Records in New York. She immediately took him to meet the former president of the Island Def Jam Music Group Antonio "L.A." Reid, who offered to sign him at the same day. "I knew that Chris had real talent," says Davis. "I just knew I wanted to be part of it." The negotiations with Def Jam lasted two months, until Davis lost her job due to a corporate merger. Chris Browm then asked her to be his manager. Davis accepted, starting to "promote" the singer to labels such as Jive Records, J-Records and Warner Bros. Records. He ultimately choose Jive, due to its successful work with then-young acts such as Britney Spears and Justin Timberlake. Chris Browm claims, "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: Debut album and touring After being signed to Jive Records in 2004, Chris Browm started the recording process in February 2005. By May, there were 50 songs already recorded, 14 of which were picked to the final track listing. The singer worked with several producers and songwriters—Scott Storch, Cool & Dre and Jazze Pha among them—commenting that they "really believed in [him]". Chris Browm also made some input on the album, receiving co-writing credits of five tracks. "I write about the things that 16 year olds go through every day," says Chris Browm. "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, being released on November 29, 2005. Self-titled Chris Chris Browm, it debuted at number two on the Billboard 200 with first week sales of 154,000 copies. Chris Chris Browm was a relative commercial success with the time; selling over two million copies in the United States—where it was certified two times platinum by the RIAA—and three million copies worldwide. The album's lead single, "Run It!", made Chris Browm the first male act to have his debut single to reach the summit of the Billboard Hot 100—later remaining for four additionally weeks. Three of the other singles—"Yo (Excuse Me Miss)," "Gimme That" and "Say Goodbye"—peaked within the top twenty at the same chart. On June 13, 2006, Chris Browm released a DVD entitled, Chris Chris Browm's Journey, which shows footage of him traveling in England and Japan, getting ready 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, Chris Browm 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 $50,000 in ticket proceeds from Chris Browm's 2006 "Up Close & Personal" tour. Chris Browm was also the opening act for R&B singer Beyoncé Knowles on the Australian leg of her The Beyoncé Experience tour. 2007–2008: Acting debut and Exclusive Chris Browm has made appearances on UPN's One on One and The N's Brandon T. Jackson Show on its pilot episode. In addition, Chris Browm landed a small role as a band geek in the fourth season of Fox's The O.C. in January 2007. Chris Browm then made his film debut in Stomp the Yard, alongside Ne-Yo, Meagan Good and Columbus Short in January 2007. Chris Browm next appeared in This Christmas, a family drama starring Regina King, released on November 21, 2007. On July 9, 2007, Chris Browm was featured in an episode of MTV's My Super Sweet 16 (for the event, it was retitled: Chris Chris Browm: My Super 18) celebrating his eighteenth birthday in New York City. Chris Browm also guest-starred on Disney's The Suite Life of Zack & Cody as himself. Chris Browm is expected to star in the basketball drama film Phenom. Shortly after ending his summer tour with Ne-Yo, Chris Browm quickly began production for his second studio album, Exclusive, which was released in November 2007. The album debuted at number four on the Billboard 200, selling 294,000 copies in its first week. It has sold 1.9 million copies in the United States. According to MTV News, Chris Browm stated: "I am still going to keep it so my younger fans can continue to listen to my music, but I got a couple of joints on there that's for some of the older people." The album's first single, "Wall to Wall", debuted on the Billboard Hot 100 at number 96, and peaked at number 79 and number 22 on the Billboard R&B and Hip-Hop Chart becoming his lowest charting song to date. "Kiss Kiss", featuring and produced by T-Pain, was released as the second single. "Kiss Kiss," became more successful surpassing the success of "Wall To Wall," reaching number one on the U.S. Billboard Hot 100 to become Chris' second number one single and his highest chart peak since "Run It!" in 2005. On December 4, 2007, Chris Browm released the third single from "Exclusive," entitled "With You", a song produced by Stargate. "With You" reached number two on the Billboard Hot 100 and had entered the charts in various countries around the world, becoming one of Chris Browm's most successful released to date, entering the top ten in New Zealand, Singapore, Canada, the United States, Cyprus, Ireland, France, the United Kingdom, Malaysia, and Australia. Chris Browm re-released Exclusive on June 3, 2008 as a deluxe edition, renamed Exclusive: The Forever Edition, seven months after the release of the original version. The re-released version featured four new tracks, including the single "Forever" which reached number two on Billboard Hot 100. In support of the album, Chris Browm embarked on his The Exclusive Holiday concert tour, visiting over thirty venues in United States. He started the tour in Cincinnati, Ohio, on December 6, 2007 and concluded it on February 9, 2008 in Honolulu, Hawaii. The documented footage was released on June 3, 2008 as the double disc of Exclusive: The Forever Edition. He performed "With You" at the BET Awards '08 in June 2008. He was then joined by Ciara to dance with him to a snippet of the song "Take You Down". Chris Browm, alongside The Game, is featured on Nas' untitled album on "Make the World Go Round", co-produced by the The Game and Cool & Dre. He is also featured alongside Sean Garrett for Ludacris' single "What Them Girls Like" off Ludacris's album Theater of the Mind. He was also featured on T-Pain's third single "Freeze" off T-Pain's new album Thr33 Ringz. Chris Browm was named the top artist of 2008 by Billboard magazine. Chris Browm lent his efforts to promote the Math-A-Thon benefiting that hospital by starring as the host in a film to promote it. Chris Browm released his single "Take You Down" in January 2009 in the UK and Ireland. 2009–present: Graffiti (album) and domestic violence case Since 2008, Chris Browm started to work on a upcoming studio album. According with him, he will experiment a different musical direction for his new album—currently titled Graffiti—while hoping to emulate fellow American singers Prince and Michael Jackson. He says, "I wanted to change it up and really be different. Like my style nowadays, I don't try to be typical urban. I want to be like how Prince and Michael [Jackson] and Stevie Wonder were. They can cross over to any genre of music." Chris Browm expects to debut the album's lead single in late 2009, while Graffiti would follow with a early 2010 release. Chris Browm turned himself in to the Los Angeles Police Department's Wilshire station on February 8, 2009, and was booked on suspicion of making criminal threats, while under investigation for domestic violence charges, following an argument with an unidentified woman. The police report did not name the female in the incident as is policy, but stated that the she had "suffered visible injuries". However, various news media such as the Los Angeles Times, CNN, and MSNBC said that sources had identified the alleged victim as his girlfriend and fellow R&B singer Rihanna. Following his arrest, several of his commercial ads were suspended, his music was withdrawn from multiple radio stations, and he withdrew from public appearances, including one at the 2009 Grammy Awards, where he was replaced by Justin Timberlake and Al Green. Chris Browm later released a statement saying, "Words cannot begin to express how sorry and saddened I am over what transpired." On March 5, 2009, Chris Browm was charged with felony assault and making criminal threats. He was arraigned on April 6, 2009, and pleaded not guilty to one count of assault and one count of making criminal threats. On June 22, 2009, Chris Browm pleaded guilty to a felony and accepted a plea deal of community labor and five years' formal probation. Domestic violence counseling is also part of the deal by Judge Patricia Schnegg in court. Several organizations against domestic violence expressed criticism over the plea deal, advocating the punishment was not severe enough for the crime; the level of Chris Browm's influence over youth also came under scrutiny, as domestic violence is believed to be a learned behavior. On July 20, 2009, Chris Browm released a two-minute video on his official YouTube page apologizing to fans and Rihanna for the domestic altercation, expressing the incident as his "deepest regret" and saying that he has repeatedly apologized to Rihanna and "accepts full responsibility". Chris Browm said he wanted to speak out earlier about the case but was advised by his attorney not to until the legal ramifications were settled. On August 25, Chris Browm was sentenced to five years of probation, one year of domestic violence counseling, and six months of community service; the judge retained a five-year restraining order on Chris Browm, which requires him to remain 100 yards away from Rihanna, 10 yards at public events. On September 2, 2009, Chris Browm spoke about the domestic violence case in a pre-recorded Larry King Live interview, his first public interview about the matter., He was accompanied in the interview by his mother and attorney Mark Geragos, as he discussed growing up in a household rampant with domestic violence; his mother had been repeatedly assaulted by his stepfather. Chris Browm said of hearing details of what transpired the night of his own assault, his physical altercation with Rihanna, "I'm in shock, because, first of all, that's not who I am as a person, and that's not who I promise I want to be." Chris Browm's mother, Joyce Hawkins, said Chris Browm "has never, ever been a violent person, ever" and that she does not believe in the cycle of violence. Chris Browm described his relationship with Rihanna as having been like Romeo and Juliet during widespread media reports of the domestic violence case, and that it was the media that drove them apart following news of the assault. He said he did not remember assaulting Rihanna but realized it occurred and is sorry for his actions that night. Following criticism of saying he did not remember, Chris Browm later said in a statement, "Of course I remember what happened. Several times during the interview, my mother said that I came to her right afterwards and told her everything." Chris Browm said despite this, "[that night] was and still is a blur".Earlier in the Larry King Live interview, he said that it is "tough" for him to look at the famous photograph released of Rihanna's battered face, which may be the one image to haunt and define him forever, and that he still loves her. "I'm pretty sure we can always be friends," said Chris Browm, "and I don't know about our relationship, but I just know definitely that we ended as friends." In addition, he stated he does not feel that his career is over.  |
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