Several weeks later, her manager called to say Rihanna was coming to New York and wanted to see me, which somewhat surprised me. The fact that she was making my house her first stop in New York showed me that apparently our relationship was stronger than I had realized. It wasn’t until then that I saw just how close we’d become.

She flew into town on a private jet, but the paparazzi still found her. She came straight to my apartment and they swarmed outside my building. I didn’t ask her too much about what happened. We talked mostly about what her next career step would be. I ordered some Caribbean food and we listened to music. I played her a couple of demos, but there wasn’t a lot of talk — most of our communication was telepathic. My only advice to her was to turn to music — it sounded cliché but that was what had gotten me through dark times. She stayed for hours. She already had her own A&R team — which I wasn’t part of, although I was the head of the company. We decided to start working together more.

 

She had stayed at my house so long, I was late for a meeting with Bon Jovi at a private club up the street. I delicately extricated myself and told her to feel free to stay at my house after I left. Later, Erica told me she stayed another couple of hours.

Sometimes an artist needs help making art, sometimes an artist needs help making a hit, and sometimes an artist just needs help.”

I don’t think L.A. couldn’t have ended it on a more precise note- just like we always say, here at ILoveOldSchoolMusic: entertainers may oftentimes appear larger than life, but the reality is that they are not without flaws, they’re simply perfectly flawed human beings who sometimes need help, just like the rest of us. It’s a beautiful thing that L.A. was able to be the support system that Rihanna needed at that time. Both she and Chris were very young adults then and hopefully they’ve been able to grow and learn from that terrible incident.