by Asondra R. Hunter

With eyes fixated on something or someone I cannot yet see, Bobby Brown, the most dashing member of the now disbanded R&B group, New Edition, is standing by the window inside the hotel meeting room. Pulling on a Newport, as if the smoke actually has some sort of nutritional value, the singer's body language tells me that he's happy to be faced with his last of the day, yet his agreeable facial expressions don't bear a hint of hurried ness. "1 like smoking," he says "It keeps my hands occupied."

His mind appears to be preoccupied. Jerking his arm suddenly, as if he might have just been stung by a Bobby starts tapping dangerously on the window trying to attract the attention someone below. As I move in toward~ the window, I see his famous wife Whitney Houston, and their daughter Bobbi Kristina, sitting happily in a heavily-tinted luxury utility vehicle Whitney, who appears to be en some downtime from rehearsal, to her watch in a "When are you to be done?" manner, then turns on her hi beam smile. "In a minute," he motions.

Several minutes later, we are still talking about "Forever," his new solo and the "new and improved" "My wife, see her downstairs in truck, came to meet me. She wants to go shopping," says the MCA recording star. He sounds like a B-boy whose arm is being twisted into wearing a zoot suit to the Grammy Awards. "Let's talk," says Bobby, "before me and my wife go and do this shopping thing ...'

UPSCALE: I listened to your new album and heard a lot of mature ballads. Are you still the same Bobby?
Bobby: It's all just Bobby, really. I have many facets, and I love the album because it has tender ballads and up-tempo cuts. I'm still writing and producing a lot. As far as what people will expect, I think people tend to read into things too much. Everybody's thinking that I'm hardcore, but that's an image.

UPSCALE: Are you outgrowing your hard-core image?
Bobby: Rock stars never outgrow their images. Look at Mick Jagger or Keith Richards. In the beginning, the media was calling me a "Bad Boy" all the time, because of the way I act and feel on stage. None of them have ever taken the time to get to know me when I climb off stage.

UPSCALE: The media has had a field day talking about you and your wife. How do you find the courage to read the newspaper knowing that some gossip columnist might be using you as bait to catch more readers?
Bobby: They don't know how to separate the stage Bobby from the Bobby who lives a life off stage. I could really care less what they think about me, but at the same time, I do have something to prove.

UPSCALE: What exactly are you trying to prove?
Bobby: That I have more hits in me. I have a lot more to say. I'll be this way until it doesn't feel right because I love ballads and real singing. The album has a lot of slow songs that talk about how I feel about my wife because that's the way I was feeling while I was writing.

UPSCALE: You've made some mistakes throughout your life. But, trouble seems to follow you, doesn't it?
Bobby: You know why? Trouble must like being in my shadow or something (he laughs while lighting up another cigarette.)

UPSCALE: Can you tell me how the fight with the man in Orlando got started? According to the papers, you started the fight.
Bobby: People shouldn't believe the lies, first of all. It's not worth it. And the reason why I tried to kill that man is because he spit on me. That's the dirtiest thing you can do to a man. He got $30,000 dollars, so I guess he's happy. Every since I was a child, I've been taught to defend myself and to protect my family. If someone disrespects my wife or a member of my family, they are gonna hear from me. Once people hear that I fight, then they wanna sue me after I whoop up on that a#!. They wouldn't have been sitting up in a hospital if they didn't approach me in a wrongful manner. Deal with me as a man. I'm not disrespectful to anyone who's not disrespectful to me. My father said, "If someone hit you, then hit them back harder." That's the nature of the black family.

UPSCALE: We worked so hard getting respect, so when someone tries to take it away without permission, we feel threatened and violated. A natural reaction to that is to stand up for ourselves, physically. But, Bobby do you ever try talking a person out of fighting you?
Bobby: I’m a fighter by nature. I’m from the projects and fighting was an everyday thing there. You fought when you needed to, and I ain't no punk. People wanna pick fights, but if I tallied up the fights I’ve walked away from, it would outweigh the ones I’ve gotten into.

UPSCALE: Do you have any regrets as far as your behavior in public?
Bobby: I wouldn't change anything that I've done. I think God has let me live this long because we all have to go through lessons and learn how to grow from our mistakes. Yeah, I've made mistakes, but nothing that I'm ashamed of. UPSCALE: Tell me a little bit about how it was growing up in the Brown household? What do you remember most about congregating with your brothers and sisters on those sunny Saturday afternoons?
Bobby: In my immediate family, I have four sisters and two brothers that I grew up with. There was a lot of laughing at the Brown house -- just giggling, acting silly. We had a lot of fun. My mother was very funny, and my father was incredible. He used to work hard all week and drink on the weekends. He looked like Chuck Berry; sometimes I thought he was Chuck Berry. He'd get to drinking and then he'd want to entertain us. He'd get his guitar and he could play a little bit. My family, no matter what's going on in our lives, always found a reason to laugh. Everyone has the same laugh too -- even our kids.

UPSCALE: Speaking of kids, how many do you have of your own?
Bobby: I have four kids and they're one of the reasons why I realize that you can't play around forever. A person's gotta grow up sometime and' deal with his responsibilities.

UPSCALE: How would you describe yourself as a parent?
Bobby: I will give my kids the sun if I could. I want my family to be like mine when I was coming up.

UPSCALE: Is your family still close?
Bobby: We just had a family reunion, actually -- my wife and her family, and most of my family. It was good to see everyone in one place at one time. It's not always that I have time to just sit around and play catch up with my family. I'm very busy trying to do this music thing.

UPSCALE: You've been in the business how long now? Bobby: Sixteen years.

UPSCALE: And you're how old? Not what your bio says but your true age.
Bobby: We ain't tellin' all that? No, I don't mind tellin' ya, I'm 27.

UPSCALE: Do you ever feel like you're getting older and everyone around you is getting younger?
Bobby: I'm still youthful. I can still dance.

UPSCALE: This business thrives off of youthfulness, which is sad.
Bobby: And at 65, that's when you're supposed to retire. Walk into the office trying to get a deal and they say, "We'll give you a call. We like the tape though." You know they ain't callin'. If they do call, they callin' to take your song from you so they can record it for another artist. You'll be sayin', "But I can sang." I like to be up front.

UPSCALE: You do like to be up front don't you? You seem like that kid at the barbecue who was dancing up on top of the picnic table.
Bobby: That was me. I'm like a big kid at heart.