Vic Mensa Cancels Detroit Show Over Venue’s Racist Tweet
Vic Mensa’s music has gone in a much more conscious direction as of late. He just dropped his There’s A Lot Going On EP, and damn has that title become the understatement of the year over the past few days. The project is full of scathing commentary on race relations and police brutality in his native Chicago and the entire country. He then dropped an additional conscientious one-off with “Free Love,” and called out Justin Timberlake for cultural appropriation.
Adding to this streak of more mindful music and action outside of the booth, Mensa has cancelled a show at Populux after a racist tweet went out from the Detroit venue’s Twitter account following the shooting in Dallas. “blameobama all you libtards caused these deaths. #dallasshooting #fuckblacklivesmatter,” the account tweeted with a picture of Birdman on a hot sauce bottle and the words, “Put some Respeck on it.” The tweet has since been deleted.
Mensa announced he would no longer be performing at Populux via the following tweet and screenshot of Populux’s offending remarks. Industry veteran Jamilio also expressed his distaste in solidarity.
Will not be performing at @PopuluxDetroit on #BackWithAVengeance due to the racist comments they tweeted yesterday. pic.twitter.com/6IUyYzEly2
— still alive (@VicMensa) July 8, 2016
@VicMensa @PopuluxDetroit smh. Going to reach out to all my colleagues to pull their shows from there also
— jamilio (@jamilio) July 8, 2016
Populux has since issued an apology via Twitter stating that their account was hacked.
We sincerely apologize about the views expressed in some tweets that went out last night. Our account was hacked.
— Populux (@PopuluxDetroit) July 8, 2016
However, social media outrage continued and the venue felt the need to share a longer, more expressive apology via Facebook.
Other artists had already began pulling out of their shows at the venue as well, but it seems most will perform in light of the apology.
UPDATE: According to The Detroit News, Populux has closed for the immediate future while they investigate who posted the inflammatory tweets.