So great his impact, Brown was part of the original class of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, enshrined alongside peerless peers Chuck Berry, Ray Charles, Sam Cooke, Fats Domino, the Everly Brothers, Buddy Holly, Jerry Lee Lewis, Little Richard and Elvis Presley.
Drugs. Guns. Domestic violence. Lawsuits. Brown's volatile offstage life included a prison stint following a PCP-fueled interstate police chase. Good thing the Hardest Working Man in Show Business hired equally hard-working men in the legal business.
Brown had no problem shaking it up onstage with the youngsters. Here, he shows a starstruck Will.I.Am and Justin Timberlake how to make like a sex machine up during a 2005 benefit concert.
A consummate showman, Brown performed dozens of concerts a year into his seventies. Even after he was hospitalized for the final time before Christmas, the singer vowed to make a New Year's Eve gig.
Coming full circle, Brown wraps up his career where it first kicked off: at Harlem's Apollo Theater. Arriving in a horse-drawn golden casket, the singer laid in state inside the theater, where nearly 40 years earlier he made his stage debut.