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DJ Black Coffee opens up about his relationship with Riky Rick & his guilt at how he died

'I could not take Riky’s death. I was destroyed because I blamed myself so much'

Chrizelda Kekana TshisaLIVE Editor
DJ Black Coffee and Riky Rick had a brotherly relationship, which the DJ opened up about at Riky's memorial service.
DJ Black Coffee and Riky Rick had a brotherly relationship, which the DJ opened up about at Riky's memorial service.
Image: Instagram/DJ Black Coffee

DJ Black Coffee gave Riky Rick’s fans and close friends a special look the intricacies that made up his friendship with the late rapper at the memorial service on Friday.

The DJ opened up about how hard he took the rapper’s death.

“I never write speeches, I always try to speak from the heart but not today. I don’t have the heart to speak... I was unfortunately not around on Tuesday, I wish I was. I had to watch everything on line and it was hard,” he said before taking a deep breath.

Black Coffee lambasted publications that published Riky’s leaked last letters to his wife and children.

“I wanna speak about something that didn’t sit well with me and that is seeing Riky’s last words on a newspaper.”

 “I mean, why was something as delicate and special as Riky last words on a newspaper? Written by a black man? Why are we embarrassing ourselves so much? Why are we not at this point building ourselves as black people and making sure that we slowly become the generation that we’ve always wanted to be?”

“Riky didn’t deserve that. Riky was a beautiful human being. Everywhere he went he spread love,” Black Coffee said.

The DJ spoke about how Riky was always giving off positive vibes and how he showed unconditional love to people. He also spoke about how he was the life of the party even though he was struggling privately and remembered how the rapper reached out for help from him.

“In November, after a night out with Riky and some few friends, early in the morning I woke up and got a message from Riky. He was like ‘OG, Sorry to do this to you but I need to talk to you. I’m going through so much. I don’t wanna let people down, can we please meet.’ I was like, this guy, last night he was the life of the party and I didn’t see anything … and I was like, 'OK cool, let’s meet.'”

The DJ said they couldn’t meet immediately and even though he followed up with Riky, the meeting never happened. In retrospect, Coffee said he believed Riky didn’t want the follow-up meeting.

“I realised that Riky actually didn't want to meet. He just wanted to let me know where he was and how he was feeling. Riky knew that there’s nothing I can do for him. Riky had his own relationship with God, they spoke to each other.”

Before concluding, Black Coffee talked about his own emotional rollercoaster.

“Last week Wednesday, going through my own emotional turmoil, in my moment of weakness, I put up a tweet. And I then realised that people are now concerned, asking what’s going on … I didn’t want that, then I deleted the tweet. Thursday I woke up to Riky’s news and the first thing I thought of was my tweet. Riky saw my tweet and I was the strong OG Riky called. He called me … and now the strong OG is weak.

“I could not take Riky’s death. I was destroyed because I blamed myself so much. I even blame myself for not trying hard enough to see him. I thought I should have done better. Maybe I should have called his mom.”

The DJ said he is now comforted by old interviews and interactions that have showed him that Riky knew he wasn’t going to be here for long.


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