What He Won’t Do.

After Being Disrespected At The Palladium, Danny Brown Vows Never To Return To Dallas.

Back in March, when we interviewed Detroit rapper Danny Brown to preview his then-upcoming performance at 35 Denton, we made sure to ask him about his soon-to-follow tour in support of Donald Glover’s Childish Gambino project — mostly because we wondered how Brown’s oft-abrasive rap style would be received by Glover’s suburban, Community-adoring crowds. In our conversation, Brown downplayed that the pairing was a weird one. But, last night at the Palladium in Dallas, it proved to be.

Sources at last night’s show tell Central Track that the crowd was largely uninterested with Brown’s performance, flat-out rejecting his many attempts to engage them in call-and-response participation and loudly chatting over his songs. Toward the end of Brown’s set, things got worse: The restless audience began chanting “Gambino! Gambino!” — expressing their desire for the headliner’s performance over Brown’s — just before the rapper performed “Blunt After Blunt,” which would turn out to be his last song of the night.

Soon as that song ended, Brown stormed off the stage, cutting his set short.

Today, he’s taken to Twitter to express his disappointment in Dallas fans, even going so far as to vow to never return to perform in the city — only to then get called the n-word by at least one white attendee of last night’s show.

The whole thing’s just pretty ugly, not to mention disrespectful — of race and art alike. Shame, too, since Brown destroyed up at 35 Denton, and since his 2011 breakthrough, XXX, is pretty much universally accepted in rap and music critic circles as one of the best releases in recent memory. And, y’know, there’s the fact that actions like these — put forth, we understand, by just a few — put a stain on the entirety of this city.

As fans and supporters of Browns here at CT HQ, we’d hate for Brown to stick by his word. But, on the other hand, we wouldn’t blame him if he did.

We’re better than this, Dallas. If we aren’t, we need to learn to be — and fast. And for a number of reasons, all of which are right.