(AllHipHop News) Shabba Ranks has paid tribute to his longtime producer Bobby Digital, who has died at the age of 59.
According to The Guardian, Bobby Digital, real name Robert Dixon, passed away in hospital in Kingston, Jamaica on May 21 after a battle with kidney disease.
Paying tribute to the man who produced his international hits, Peenie Peenie, Just Reality and Wicked Inna Bed, Ranks called him a “True Legend.”
To one of the finest who ever did it, a musical endorsement from God to the world, RIP True Legend Bobby Digital Dixon pic.twitter.com/0LEB7Fhtrv
— Shabba Ranks (@EmperorRanks) May 23, 2020
He tweeted: “To one of the finest who ever did it, a musical endorsement from God to the world, RIP True Legend Bobby Digital Dixon.”
A pioneer of dancehall music, Dixon transformed contemporary reggae also enjoying hits with Garnett Silk, Sizzla Kalonji and Morgan Heritage.
He is also considered a key instigator of the Reggaeton genre that swept Latin America in the early 1990s and is still popular today, as some of the earliest Reggaeton hits sampled Ranks.
Bunny Lee, the head of Trojan Records also offered praise for the late star, telling Jamaica’s Loop News: “He was one of the greatest producers ever in dancehall and reggae music. He was a great colleague, and a great friend, and one of the most brilliant minds in reggae music.
“He was the one who brought Shabba Ranks to the world, and he started off Garnet Silk too. Bobby just had a distinctive feel for the music, a brilliant mind, and he was truly one of reggae’s greats. He will be missed.”
Bobby Digital is survived by his wife, Merva, three children, two grandchildren, a sister and two brothers.
