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The Residuals Challenge is an online trend where people record their version of Chris Brown's song.
R. Kelly has received mixed reactions to the release of his Residuals version. Picture: Joshua Lott/Getty Images
What seems like an attempt to re-launch R. Kelly’s career has received mixed reaction after the R&B singer participated in the Residuals Challenge that saw him release his version of the Chris Brown song from prison.
The song was released on Instagram by producer Rodney L. East. The Residuals Challenge is an online trend where people record their own version of Chris Brown’s Residuals.
The challenge was started by R&B singer Tank, who said he did it to honour Chris Brown’s 2024 album 11:11 (Delux) being the album in the genre and Residuals being the best R&B song in the world.
While others in the comment section were speaking about the ‘return of the king of R&B’, some were disgusted that the singer, who is serving a 31-year sentence for child sex crimes, was taking part in the challenge.
@tank I issue you a challenge in honor of @chrisbrownofficial 11:11 being the best r&b album in the world and “Residuals” being the best r&b song in the world! You up for the challenge? I AM! #ResidualsVerseChallenge ♬ original sound – Tank
In the song, R. Kelly thanks his fans for being “the realest” and defends himself for his crimes. “Though I’m in this place, I know I don’t deserve this.”
R. Kelly’s version
The 58-year-old singer, whose real name is Robert Kelly, is serving a combined 31-year prison sentence for child pornography, sex trafficking and racketeering convictions.
Dear @TheRealTank look what you started….The King of R&B needs to make a comeback. It’s no reason he should be in prison for 30 years and Matt is still in Congress for allegedly doing something similar. R. Didn’t murder anyone and people who actually committed murder (George…
— TP (@tap3000) March 11, 2025
Some netizens have seen the release of Residuals as a way of soft-launching his career.
If the above is the case, it wouldn’t be a first. Last year, Chis Brown’s former manager of a dozen years, Tina Davis, shared how music was used to clean Brown’s public image after physically abusing pop star and then-girlfriend Rihanna.
add an extra 10 years!!!!
— éL🌸 (@Pianopella) March 11, 2025
“No one would play him [Brown] on the radio, and at that point, you had to have a radio. There were no DSPs [Digital Service Providers] and different other platforms for you to use,” said Davis.
In 2009, Brown pleaded guilty to felony assault on Rihanna and was sentenced to a five-year probation and six months community service.
The same year, Brown released his third album, Graffiti, which was considered to be a commercial failure. Because of this, the singer’s team, led by Davis, became creative about sterilising Brown’s image through the release of good mixtapes.
Chris Brown's former manager of 12 years, Tina Davis, reveals parents used to drop off their daughters at hotels, hoping they would get into a relationship with Chris Brown so he would marry them, and shares the strategy they used to get him back on the radio after the Rihanna… pic.twitter.com/guBPlKtQzf
— The Art Of Dialogue (@ArtOfDialogue_) November 13, 2024
“It was hard to try and get him over that hump, to get people to change their minds. Because before it [Rihanna abuse] happened, everyone loved him; kids…parents were dropping off their kids at hotels like ‘go get Chris Brown’,” averred Davis, who is the first woman to head the A&R department at Def Jam Records.
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Kelly taking a leaf out of Brown’s book
The music executive said Brown was viewed as a sweetheart to the world prior to the abuse revelations. “[Parents] were like ‘he’s a good kid, I want you to go marry him’,” she said.
Davis said they needed to figure out a way to get Brown back on radio.
“And the way that we did it was we put him on features for everything. Anybody that called us, he jumped on…there was a feature on everything.”
During this time, Brown was doing a slew of mixtapes, which are traditionally distributed freely to build up hype for an artist, with US rapper Tyga.
“We were like, that’s the strategy. We’re going to do a whole bunch of mixtapes and just keep flooding the business and put music out. But we’re also on everybody[’s song] that calls us, so every time a big artist puts a record out, they have to play it…so after a while, every other record was featuring Chris Brown,” she said.
“That’s how we were able to get back at radio, and then Deuces came right after that.”
Hit song Deuces was a ditty the industry couldn’t resist after its release in 2010. Through it, Brown cemented his return to the zeitgeist of mainstream media.
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