Cut one side off,” he says. Just do it.’ You don’t tell him no.”“That’s the whole thing with me doing the comedy show,” Brown says. This Detroiter has an almost superhuman control … Because Daniel was a fan of Danny Brown way before any other fan was. Even if it was just working in an office. https://www.timeout.com/chicago/music/danny-brown-interview It’s evident that this isn’t his favorite part of the job, but he gets it done, saying little and conserving his energy.“There are so many great moments with him and how he interacts with people,” Beckles says. “Just being able to have another outlet, it’s more securing because if I get to a point where it fully supports me, that would be so cool. Every night, he’ll play beats — the more challenging to rap over, the better — and wait until the words come. “It wasn’t just them saying to the little black kid, oh, you can rap! "Brown doesn't fully refute the typical hip-hop narrative that the music saved his life–many of his drug-dealing friends are either dead or in jail—but ask him what he'd be doing if not one of the most beloved and overanalyzed rappers out there and he's quick to clarify he'd still be living a life surrounded by music. He slowly stands up, stretches, and prepares to head out to work for a venue packed with Chicago fans. I ask if he feels more comfortable in his own clothes. ""Every album of his shows you a new mission statement, an artistic state of mind, a sort of manifesto," A-Trak offers. Nobody in hip-hop sounds like Danny Brown. he recalls asking Nas. "Every product was carefully curated by an Esquire editor. I mean, he’s brought the ideologies of being a rock star to hip-hop. It’s the worst,” Danny Brown says. He is described by MTV as "one of rap's most unique figures in recent memory". He’s been on our radar for plenty long enough, and XXX is unquestionably fantastic, but Brown’s recent career-highlight LP Old is diamond-quality. “Even when there’s not a concept, there’s a concept,” he says.Brown likens his relationship with Q-Tip to that of a writer and director. You don’t win like that.”As we speak, Brown has yet to hear the finished product. I just wanted them damn braids off, you know?”Brown grew up in the city’s near north side, a ruinous landscape he details plot by plot in “Fields”: “And where I lived/It was house, field, field/field, field, house/Abandoned house, field, field.” His father, a house-music DJ just 16 years his senior, kept the young Brown ahead of the curve in trends, outfitting his son with Timberland boots and Wu-Tang Clan records before the rest of the neighborhood kids got hip to them. "Brown lets out a childlike chuckle, his silver diamond grill glistening with every gawky smile he flashes. His approach to vices is not one of glorification, but of recalling hip-hop’s role as the CNN of the streets.It’s early February and a polar vortex is wreaking havoc on the United States.