Give Chris Brown a few more years to perfect "Grown Folks Music"

Buy Chris Brown--Exclusive (CD w/ DVD) from Amazon!
Few debut artists are able to find a way to keep themselves relevant for the period up until their next release, but Chris Brown has managed to do just that. Due to his debut self-titled album having four singles, his popular tour with Ne-Yo, and being nominated for a host of awards--including two Grammys--you almost forget that Exclusive, Brown's sophomore effort, is the first original music we've heard from Chris in two years.

Chris Brown will be 19 in about six months, and apparently he feels its time for him to start making grown-folks music. Exclusive still contains a lot of the bubblegum that will send fourteen-year-old girls rushing to their local CD store; but it also contains loads of sexual references--that will send fourteen-year-old girls rushing to their local CD store.

The album opens with the Brian Michael Cox produced "Throwed". It sounds like it would be some sort of comparison between being infatuated with a girl and being intoxicated (as if squeaky-clean Chris Brown would risk making such a reference), but actually the "throwed" reference is basically arbitrary. "Shawty she got me throwed" I guess that means he likes her? Other than that, Cox's beat is among the best on the album.

The hit-single "Kiss Kiss" is next, and like most hit-singles on mainstream releases, it's the best song on the album, by far. It features T-Pain who, talentless as he may be, always seems to make a song better. Actually T-Pain doesn't even sing in this song, he provides a rap verse which, in all fairness, is pretty terrible. Like everything T-Pain does, though, the verse (and song in general) is extremely fun and catchy, despite being technically awful.

The next song "Take You Down" is where we first hear Chris Brown's attempt at "grown folks music": "It ain't my first time but baby girl we can pretend/hey lets bump and grind girl tonight we'll never end"
The track has a whining horn in the background of the chorus, which combined with the sexual subject matter reminds me of TLC's "Red Light Special. "Take You Down" is not nearly as good as the TLC classic, however; it ostensibly attempts to bank on the mere novelty of Chris Brown singing about sex, rather than the actual merit of the re-hash melody or boring lyrics.

Swizz Beatz contributes two tracks to the album, the lead single "Wall to Wall", and "I'll Call Ya" which can't decide whether it want to be a bouncy club joint or a mellow love song. Has anyone else noticed that Swizz Beatz has been making the same beat over and over again for like 5 years? You know the one with the bouncy drums, the tambourine and the "Hup!" and "Woop!" in the background? I've read somewhere that Swizz can make a beat in 10-15 minutes. Let's just say I completely believe that.

"With You" is produced by the Stargate production team, who also produced Beyonce's "Irreplaceable"; and these guys are even worse offenders than Swizz. I literally had to stop this album, and put on "Irreplaceable" to confirm that it wasn't the exact same beat.

Notice how I'm not really talking about Exclusive's singing or lyrics? That's really because there is not much to talk about. The subject matter is pretty standard for an R&B/HipHop/Pop album (girls), and Chris Brown is a decent singer, although he's gonna have to do something about those whiny high notes. There are lot of guests on this album, some who, like T-Pain, are entertaining; but most of which don't really help the album. On "Picture Perfect", will.i.am breaks the monotony of Chris Brown's usual chorus-verse-chorus-verse-bridge-chorus structure that's found on nearly every song, but screws it up by dropping an absolutely horrific rap verse at the end of the song. Guest Big Boi and producers Dre & Vidal both come great on "Hold Up", and to be honest, I think the song would be better without Chris Brown, although it's not too bad as is. Lil Wayne and Kanye West both drop par verses on "Gimme What You Got" and bonus track "Down" respectively, but nothing to spectacular.

"Nothing too spectacular' is a good way to describe this album. There are a couple of solid tracks like "Kiss Kiss" and "Hold Up", and there's really nothing terrible on the album. But there's nothing great, either.

The Report Card

Production: C
There are definitely a couple of nicely produced tracks like will.i.am's "Picture Perfect", but the majority of the album is pretty drab.

Flow/Lyrics: C
Chris Brown is a cool singer, but he effectively says nothing at all for about an hour on this album.

Originality: D
The beats are re-hashes for the most part, designed to be catchy hit-makers. There's no real experimentation, just a lot of formulaic singing, writing, and producing.

Overall: C-
It's not terrible, but it's not really good either.