R Kelly

CHICAGO -- Sex scandals have derailed countless pop-star careers, but R. Kelly's has remained robust, even with his long-delayed trial on 14 counts of child pornography looming. Jury selection began Friday. The singer, 41, has sold more than 12 million records and videos since the charges first surfaced in June 2002. Last year he scored three top-10 R&B singles, and his 2007 album, "Double Up," sold nearly a million copies despite an industry-wide economic slump.

R. Kelly avoided having his bond revoked Friday in his child pornography case, but a Chicago judge admonished him for missing a court hearing earlier in the week. The R&B superstar apologized to Cook County Judge Vincent Gaughan. The judge ordered Kelly to cancel a Jan. 13 concert to ensure he makes a Jan. 14 court date. Kelly missed a court appearance Wednesday because his tour bus was stopped for speeding in Utah on Tuesday.

R. Kelly has quite the reputation. The veteran Chicago-based R&B singer has earned as many headlines for allegations of having sex with a minor as he has for his consistently stellar music, which recently earned him two Grammy nods, including one for his innovative music-video saga "Trapped in the Closet." His repute as a powerhouse performer remains well warranted, as he demonstrated with an over-the-top, highly sexed, two-hour-set Friday night at the Forum.

Jasmyne Cannick and other black activists plan to station themselves across the street from the Forum on Friday to protest a concert that night by R. Kelly, the R&B superstar and celebrity defendant, but Cannick is already resigned to the fact that her picket line will be outnumbered by scalpers. "It's like pulling teeth to get people to talk about this," Cannick said. "It's a challenge to get the black community to even discuss it. . . .

NEW YORK -- R. Kelly's closet is getting bigger -- and more bizarre. The singer premiered the sequel to his twisted and craftily campy "Trapped in the Closet" video serial with a red-carpet extravaganza in New York on Wednesday night. Kelly's soap opera, which began in 2005, includes a gay pastor, cheating spouses, a convict named 'Twon and a well-endowed midget.

FOR R&B fans too modest to follow R. Kelly to the outer metaphorical orbits of his "Sex Planet," a charming new single by Jamaican-via-Miami singer Sean Kingston is making more wholesome inroads into the Top 40. The 17-year-old Kingston's "Beautiful Girls" is unlike anything else on the radio; a wide-eyed mix of throwback R&B, dancehall lilting and a bit of Phil Spector if he'd preferred a vocoder to firearms.

IT'S all about the numbers this week for embattled R&B star R. Kelly, who grabs the No. 1 slot on the nation's album sales chart with "Double Up," his sixth collection to reach the top spot. The two-CD set, which sold 386,000 copies in its first week in stores, charts the extremes of Kelly's impulses, from the comparatively chaste hit single "I'm a Flirt" to the crudely outrageous sci-fi allegory "Sex Planet" to his ballad in homage to the survivors of the Virginia Tech massacre, "Rise Up."

WHATEVER view one takes of R. Kelly -- that he is obscene, insane, outlandish, played out, musical kingpin or joker -- one thing is irrefutable: America deserves him. Five years after being indicted on charges of child pornography, dozens of hits into a career spent raunching up R&B, Kelly's enjoying yet another climb up the charts with his eighth solo album, "Double Up."

You'll be talking about: R. Kelly's "Double Up." For people who thought "Trapped in the Closet" was the ironic high point of this troubled but brilliant artist's career, we have two words: "Ignition Remix." Kells has a pop gift, and we're glad he's stopped that bizarre operatic saga and gotten back to the business of making fun musical gems. (Tuesday). You won't believe you're talking about: "Pirate Master."

On R. Kelly's new single, "I'm a Flirt," the R&B lothario refers to himself as "a dog on the prowl" as he warns the world about his wanton ways. The buoyant song, whose lyrical content is somewhat tame by the singer's legendarily lascivious standards, has been creeping up the Billboard charts and just might become one of the defining summer jams of 2007. But "I'm a Flirt" isn't R.