Tanya Stephens Credits Late Producer Bobby Digital For Pushing Her To Aim For Perfection

Tanya Stephens has credited the legendary studio engineer and music producer Bobby ‘Bobby Digital’ Dixon, as being instrumental in making sure she refined her skills and maintained a high standard where her recorded music was concerned.

According to the Some Kinda Madness artist, the late producer had a zeal for perfection, would strike no compromise when it came on to music production, and exercised no fear or favour toward artists, when it came on to the quality of music they recorded at his Digital B label.

“Bobby Digital a di one man weh can record any badman artiste and seh ‘mi nuh like dat.  Guh back an guh dweet agen’, an dem jus dweet,” she reminisced of the producer, who was also credited as one of the originators of the dancehall genre, and as a mentor and teacher to many artists and producers in Jamaica.

“And it made me a little bit more of a perfectionist as far as the quality a mi work, an di quality a mi vocals.  Because Bobby neva accept nuttn substandard from mi; neva accept nuttn mediocre.  Not a line, not a note.  I had to get it right.  And because of dat, mi come prepared fi get it right, with mi aim of getting it pan one teck.  Because mi want fi please him an mi want fi economize pon time and effort an mi want him fi want mi fi come back.   And so, it made me that much better an artiste…,” the These Streets artist explained.

Tanya had also heaped praises on Bobby Digital a few months ago during an interview on The Entertainment Report Podcast, pointing out that working with him was like a training ground, but that his ingenuity appears to be overlooked by many.

“Bobby Digital was uncompromising… and that is something that I really connected with.  And he would have you go back a million times to have you fix one word.  Back then it wasn’t like now where everything is lazy and you have Pro Tools and you have Logic Pro and these things.  Back then, we had 24-track tape.  You know nobody has the time for that kind a tediousness to take, takes, takes,” she said.

“It was like training ground working with him. I think because he wasn’t extremely social, it escapes a lot of people who are deep into the music, how much of a genius he was.  But, working wid him, put me on a different level.  Because he conquered a whole different landscape.  Dave and Tony (Kelly) were like new school.  Bobby was foundation.  So Bobby is the Promised Land kind riddim kinda badness and the fat heavy bass the bely-bottom music…,” she added.

Tanya recorded three songs with Bobby Digital, among them her huge hit Handle the Ride on the Lecturer riddim in 1997 and the One Style on the Asylum Riddim and My Type on the Heavenless riddim, both in 1998.

Also known as Digital B, Bobby Digital, died in May 2020 at the age 59, from a kidney-related illness.

The producer, who had an illustrious career spanning the genres of Dancehall, Lovers Rock, and Roots Reggae, was the mastermind behind Sizzla Kalonji’s hit-laden Da Real Thing album in 2000.

He also produced Shabba Ranks’ smash-hit songs such as Wicked In A Bed, Peenie Peenie, Just Reality and Live Blanket, as well as Cocoa Tea and Admiral Tibet’s Serious Times and Garnet Silk’s It’s Growing.

Bobby Digital also produced classics such as Sizzla’s legendary ode to his mother, Black Woman and Child, and Morgan Heritage’s Don’t Haffi Dread, which included the song and album, as well as some of Tony Rebel’s greatest hits, including Teach the Children, Sweet Jamaica and Dog deh yah more than Bone.  

Dixon was given the moniker ‘Bobby Digital’ during the mid-1980s when producer King Jammy, with whom he worked at the time as an engineer, started to experiment with digital rhythms.   Due to him being the digital engineer for Jammy at the time, he was regarded as among the greats who pioneered the stylizing of the computerized phase of Jamaican music.

At King Jammys, Bobby was the engineer for Frankie Paul’s I Know The Score and Sara, Pinchers Denise; and Admiral Bailey Jump Up.

Bobby Digital’s breakthrough as a producer came with the ascension of Shabba Ranks, as he had production credits on the deejay’s As Raw As Ever, which won the Best Reggae Album Grammy back in 1992.

The Olympic Gardens native had started working with King Jammys in 1985, following which he moved on to establish his Heatwave Studio and Digital B label in 1988, followed by his Heatwave Sound System.