Personal Lifeīrown married four times over the course of his life and had six children. After the incident, he was sentenced to a 90-day drug rehabilitation program. He had another run-in with the law in 1998 after he discharged a rifle and led the police in another car chase. Re-emerging from prison rehabbed, Brown returned to touring, once again delivering inspired and energetic concerts, albeit on a schedule much reduced from his heyday. The incident led to Brown spending 15 months in jail before being released on parole in 1991. The police had to shoot out Brown's tires to end the chase. The culmination of his personal troubles came in 1988, when he entered an insurance seminar high on PCP and bearing a shotgun before leading police on a half-hour, high-speed car chase from Augusta, Georgia, into South Carolina. However, after becoming one of the first musicians inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1986-the year of its inception-in the late 1980s, Brown slowly slid into a mire of drug addiction and depression. His 1985 song "Living in America," featured prominently in Rocky IV, was his biggest hit in decades. Throughout the 1970s, Brown continued to perform ceaselessly and recorded several more hits, most notably "Sex Machine" and "Get Up Offa That Thing." Although his career fell off during the late 1970s due to financial troubles and the rise of disco, Brown made an inspired comeback with a multifaceted performance in the classic 1980 film The Blues Brothers. Rap Brown of the Black Panthers, "I'm not going to tell anybody to pick up a gun." A staunch believer in exclusively nonviolent protest, Brown once declared to H. In 1966, he recorded "Don't Be a Dropout," an eloquent and impassioned plea to the Black community to place more focus on education. In the mid-1960s, Brown also began devoting more and more energy to social causes. 2 on the pop albums chart and firmly establishing his crossover appeal.īrown went on to record many of his most popular and enduring singles during the mid-1960s, including "I Got You (I Feel Good)," "Papa's Got a Brand New Bag" and "It's a Man's Man's Man's World." With its unique rhythmic quality, achieved by reducing each instrument to an essentially percussive role, "Papa's Got a Brand New Bag" is considered the first song of a new genre, funk, an offshoot of soul and a precursor of hip-hop. Initially opposed by King Records because it featured no new songs, Live at the Apollo proved Brown's greatest commercial success yet, peaking at No. On a single night-October 24, 1962-Brown recorded a live concert album at the Apollo Theater in Harlem. His saxophonist, Pee Wee Ellis, once said, "When you heard James Brown was coming to town, you stopped what you were doing and started saving your money." He performed five or six nights a week throughout the 1950s and '60s, a schedule that earned him the title "The Hardest-Working Man in Show Business." Brown was a flashy showman, incredible dancer, and soulful singer, and his concerts were hypnotizing displays of exuberance and passion that left audiences in raptures. In addition to writing and recording music, Brown toured relentlessly.
He soon followed with a string of hits that included "Lost Someone," "Night Train" and "Prisoner of Love," his first song to crack the Top 10 on the pop charts, peaking at No.
1 on the R&B charts, cracked the Hot 100 Singles chart and kick-started Brown's music career. Needing a creative spark and in danger of losing his record deal, in 1958, Brown moved to New York, where, working with different musicians whom he also called the Flames, he recorded "Try Me." The song reached No.