Man On The Side: Chris Brown parties with Pinoy fans

When Manila last saw Chris Brown, he was a chart-topping 19-year-old who was being hailed as an heir apparent to Michael Jackson. He performed back-to-back with then-girlfriend Rihanna, attracting tens of thousands of concertgoers in an open field at the Fort. Both artists were just beginning their ascent towards pop superstardom.

Seven years, plenty of girlfriends, a few controversies, and one daughter later, Brown is none the worse for wear. He returned to the country for a solo show Tuesday night at the Mall of Asia Arena. He was supposed to have performed last New Year’s Eve at the Philippine Arena, but a lost passport dashed the hopes of his loyal fans.

Brown made no mention of the cancelled show throughout his almost two-hour long set, but fans didn’t seem to mind. As soon as he appeared, the crowd was on its feet, cheering him on. “Can we party tonight?” he asked, to which the answer was unintelligible squeals.

Looking much skinnier than when he first broke into the music scene, the Grammy-winning artist initially wore an oversized, distressed white shirt, skinny jeans, Nike kicks, and shades. Commanding the barebones stage and with only a few back-up dancers as his entourage, he started with the song ‘X,” and quickly moved on to an almost non-stop mix of his recent and old hits, including “Came To Do” and “Love More,” “Wall To Wall” and “Run It,” and “Deuces” and “Strip.”

Hardly pausing even to catch his breath in between songs, the R&B crooner also showed off his dance moves that, to me, looked like a cross between a Michael Jackson master class and a tribal mating ritual. However way it looked, there was no denying his terpsichorean skills; in many instances, a sway of the hips or a jiggle of the torso was all it took to send females in the audience into a screaming frenzy.

Decibel levels went up each time Brown lifted his shirt up to show off his toned tummy. It seemed like half the women in the crowd were going to pass out when he eventually took his shirt off during “Turn Up the Music.” Brown performed topless for the rest of the evening.

Older, slower ballads like “With You,” “Take You Down,” and “Yo (Excuse Me Miss)” were relegated to a short a cappella medley, but there was also a stretch when Brown and his back-up dancer posse turned the stage into a Saturday afternoon at the park, taking turns in the spotlight while moving to the music.

Local celebrities apparently are big fans of Brown; everywhere you turned your head at the Standing-VIP section, there were artistas with their own barkadas mouthing the words and jumping along with the artist onstage. For his part, Brown tried to ingratiate himself to the audience when he yelled, “You know I love my Filipinos.”

Judging by the way people were dancing in wild abandon inside the MOA Arena, and the incessant screams at everything Brown said and did, it seemed like the feeling was mutual, controversies and a missed concert be damned. — BM, GMA News

Paul John Caña is a magazine writer and live music geek. He is also co-founder of libreto.org, an online collective of writers and artists. Email him at pjcana@gmail.com or follow him on Twitter and Instagram @pauljohncana.