PnB Rock spoke about a recent brush with Los Angeles gang members in an interview with DJ Akademiks that was recorded just days before his death.
The Philadelphia rapper was shot and killed during a robbery at Roscoe’s House of Chicken & Waffles in South Los Angeles, California on Monday afternoon (September 12).
The 30-year-old was at the restaurant with his girlfriend when an armed suspect approached the couple and demanded jewelry before fatally shooting the rapper. Rock was pronounced dead at 1:29 p.m. local time.
Shortly after his death, DJ Akademiks shared an interview he conducted with PnB Rock earlier this month for his Off the Record podcast, in which he recalled being confronted by gang members while out shopping on Fairfax with his girlfriend and daughter.
“Somebody tried me on Fairfax, like, mid-pandemic,” he began. “N-ggas was talking loud as shit wanting me to hear their conversation and it’s like, ‘I’m with my peoples — my daughter and my girl. Why are they talking about this gangsta shit? What the fuck is going on?’
“So I’m like, ‘Man, we outta here.’ My girl like, ‘Nah, we ain’t — what’s wrong?’ I’m just going off of the vibes. She ain’t peep it, she be thinking I’m tripping. She peeped that I’m serious so she’s like, ‘Alright, we out.'”
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Rock, his girlfriend and his daughter jumped in their car and drove off, but his girlfriend stopped just a few blocks away after seeing a store she wanted to go in. That’s when he realized the gang members had followed them in a car that was heavily tinted and, as Rock put it, giving off “heat.”
“I ain’t go in the store for two seconds, the same people come from out the car, hop in the store hype as shit, say some gang banging shit,” he continued. “I recognized the energy. He started talking to me on some gangsta shit. I’m like, ‘Bruh, do you know me from somewhere?’ He like, ‘N-gga, yeah I know who you is!’ Trying to get me to, like, get into some shit.
“So I flagged him off and just walked out the store ’cause I already know where this shit ’bout to go … You don’t want to be nervous and make it seem like something ’bout to happen. You want [your girl and your kids] to be as calm as possible to make it seem like everything is cool, ain’t nothing about to happen to us.”
He added: “So I just kept it cordial like, ‘Come on, baby. We out. These n-ggas on some real shit.’ When they got to the car, that’s when I let n-ggas know like, ‘I’m not on that.’ And I ain’t gonna say what happened, but n-ggas know that I’m just not on that.”
PnB Rock also touched on the growing trend of violent crime in Los Angeles — the city where fellow rappers Nipsey Hussle, Pop Smoke and Drakeo The Ruler have also lost their lives in recent years — noting he tended to avoid the places where he’s likely to be targeted.
“I never got robbed, never in my life. I ain’t gon say never ’cause I’m not superstitious or nothing like that, but I haven’t been robbed,” he said.
“I don’t really be outside like that to be in the mix of the dumb shit. I’m going to the shop, I’m going to get some drip, I’m going probably to the bank. I’m at places where n-ggas probably ain’t really gonna be at on no gangsta shit.”
He added: “N-ggas be getting they shit took and it don’t be spoken about … It’s just the new generation. Everybody on some demon shit. ‘Demon time,’ this, ‘demon’ that.”
Get yall facts right he didn’t get killed in inglewood
It’s not new. Truest thing he spoke in here is that it happens all of the time to all kinds of people, but what he was wrong about is that it has been happening a long time. Athletes are some of the ones that get got the most, but they know not to try any confrontation. They make enough money that they write that shit off. People buy back chains. That happens too. He also was naive to think anywhere in LA was safe. Criminals are part of the city backdrop. They just blend in with everybody else and be at everywhere you think they’re not.
Shut up dork. You’re from Nebraska or some shit. LA is very safe in the right part of town. Nothing happens on Rodeo Drive or in Century City. This moron was in two different parts of down run by gangs. Fairfax and South Central. Ain’t no one murdering you for a chain in Malibu. This guy was perpetually slipping and didn’t realize it.
Right. Must be why all of these robberies of white folks have been happening in broad daylight. SMH. You got it though dummy.
yeah it is los angeles not like seattle or maybe toronto. i think we will never know just who was involved and where. seriously. i can’t say much more i just think there is more to this than what it seems you know. another fallen victim to the game look i don’t really know shit so i can say these things. i am poking my head out the door it doesn’t have to be like this.
You talking like it won’t go down there. Gonzoe got killed last summer in Seattle as a matter of fact.
Cool. Some no one got killed in Seattle. This is about LA, where BIG and several others have been murdered. Keep Maclamore and Sir Mix dummy. You’ve got to be a scary ass bitch to get murked in Seattle. LOL
Gonzoe wasn’t a nobody. He’d been in the scene since the 90’s and worked with other fellow LA acts you may or may not have heard of such as umm 2Pac or another one known as Tha Dogg Pound? Yep, just another nobody dead and gone. Lol, smdh…
False masculinity…why would you go to the hood in LA man? No f’ing way bro…RIP homie, I really do feel for him and his family though…this stuff is DEAD serious man…
Never make the same mistake twice. It could be deadly.
Stay out the hood!!! Unless you visiting ya grandma or something there is no reason to be there.
All these cosplay bloods and crips come to LA thinking they somehow fit in. You don’t get it. You’re not about it. No one respects, cares or has ever heard of you’re Hogwarts fairytale blood or crip shit you made up. Leave your chain in the Hotel safe and wear a Gshock. Keep $500-$1000 or so on you to hand to someone if they put a gun in your face. Don’t post on Socials. Out of Towners are victims. Shit… LA motherfuckers are victims fucking around like that. Hire police for security if you’re going to be out and about as a celebrity. No one is fucking with cops. Every town has a Westside. Your bullshit isn’t what Pac and all the rappers are yelling about. Stop pretending.
Or mabey leave LA as it is completely crumbling to the ground on damn near every level with this woke ideology… Chicago apparently getting $0 bail for essentially any crime committed including murder. Hope you you youngsters are ready for civil war, if your smart get your family and get to a safer place while you got the chance
Civil war talk been going on…. It’s not woke ideology that’s the issue, there were problems before it became a popular term to use. Can’t blame a new generation for an old problem
The common denominator is the girlfriend who always on the scene and chasing clout…imagine that.
Prtotect Lil B at all cost!!