By Gina Ponce

Chris Brown has been facing a career crossroads for a while, catering to two different generations and trying to figure out just how far he can go with sexual innuendos and uninhibited lyrics. Now, coming to the end of what has arguably been the most transformative year of the 20-year-old’s life, Brown has openly set out to establish his manhood.

The pop/R&B hitmaker hit the scene in 2005 – fresh out of 10th grade – and when he delivered his self-titled debut, the ability to relate to his young cohorts was immediately recognized. But Brown tested the limits, as most teenagers do, on his second album Exclusive, with the intimate single “Take You Down” giving a hint of where his 18-year-old mind was headed.

“I wanted to be grown kinda, I’ll be honest,” Brown admits. “My first album was like, ‘OK cool, everybody sees me as this little kid that just dances and sings,’ and I was like that’s good, but I wanna transition. With the [first] album it was just like, ‘OK I’m gonna record some hot songs and hopefully as long as I’m talkin’ about girls and as long as the girls like me that’s all it is.’ That’s where my head was at when I was 16; now it’s on a bigger scale, but at that time I really didn’t have a clue. I was just rollin with the punches. My next album after that one I was 18, and when anybody turns 18 they think they’re grown. So the ‘Take You Down’ record kinda gave me a chance to be a little more adult, be more sexual, talk about what guys my age do. I just wanted to get a better sense of me ‘cause you can hear it on the first album, but the sophomore album is where you gotta kinda prove yourself.

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