INTERVIEW: RZA Speaks On 'Digi Snax'

Yesterday RZA and I chopped it up and spoke on his upcoming album Digi Snax, the associated tour, ODB4CL2 and sugar highs.

The latest installment in the Bobby Digital saga comes out July 1st (Koch) and it's called Digi Snacks. What can we expect and how does it relate to the previous BD albums?
The title says it all really, Digi Snacks. It's a snack for the people. Like sometimes you're looking for your scooby snacks? Well, here's your Digi Snack. (laughs). It's a little tease to get you back into that world of Bobby Digital.

Now if this is a little tease to take you back into that world, what direction should we imagine the next episode taking us into?
Oh we're taking you into a lot of different directions. We're working on a comic book, but I don't really want to talk about that yet. We're planning to bring a lot more fun to the game. You know how you love Hip Hop, and you wanna play it at the house but your girl is around and you have to turn it down?

Yes, I definitely had that moment with 'Domestic Violence' off of the first Bobby Digital album. It didn't go over so well. (Watch the classic video for 'Domestic Violence here.)
Because it's too much of the truth! (laughs) Well, the next episode, I'll have some more of your shit (laughs), but this time around I also have a couple of tracks on there that your girl will actually wanna turn up. We focused on just having fun with it. A lot of stuff I've done before is heavy and serious and this time I was like "f*ck it". Lets have some fun.


Photo part of 'Rock The Bells' series. More here.
What kind of people should we be thinking of as far as collaborators on Digi Snax? People from inside of the Wu-Tang Clan circle or more so outside?
I want to kind of keep that a surprise so when you pick up the album you'll have that experience. But Bobby Digital kind of lives in his own world, you know? He has his own crew. People like Holocaust always show up, and others like him. But there's some surprises for sure.

Even though it went platinum, I feel the first Bobby Digital album was somewhat under-appreciated when it came out. It's been ten years and I was wondering how you felt about the life-span and initial reception of that album.
You know, sometimes an album comes out and people miss it the first time around, but they discover it later on. It's like movies, a lot of the classic old flicks maybe didn't do that well originally. Some people got into it early, and they talked about it to their people, and slowly they'd come around to love it. I feel Bobby Digital is like that.

Just to switch gears for a second, what can you tell us about your contributions to Raekwon's upcoming album Only Built 4 Cuban Linx 2.
Well, I don't really know how that's going because Raekwon is in charge of that project. I haven't talked about it in like a whole year. All I can say it's going to quite a bit of Gambino. (laughs) We did a lot of songs together, and I'm on there in my Bobby Steels persona and there's some dope lyrics on there. But Rae is in charge so I'm not sure what he is keeping.

Now I hear you also contributed a track to the Dr. Dre's elusive Detox album. What can you tell us about that?
No comment! (laughs)

Annnnnd moving right along to your upcoming Digi Snax tour (see all dates here). What's a solo RZA tour like in the context of Bobby Digital?
Just a whole lot of fun man. A good time for everything, a real good time. One thing I like to do is that when I can get together with the people, and we can share that little bit of time, I want to make sure they know I'm thankful for buying my albums through out the years and for supporting us. So I want to make sure when we hang out, we have fun together. I mean, I'm still also going to embed some teachings, lyrically, like I always do, and things about society, but I'm mostly there for us to have a great time together. I'll be bringing Bobby Digital, but also some of my Bobby Digiteks (laughs). Expect to see Black Knights out with me, and Stone Mecca too.

I heard Digi Snax goes slightly beyond most albums in how the dirty and the clean version of the album differ aside from edits in language?
They have different cover artwork, and some songs are included only on the dirty version, or there actually two different versions across albums. Let me give you an example. There's a song called 'Old Day', which is only on the dirty version, and there's a song called 'Ice Cream' that's on both, but each version really flows from a different concept with a different angle lyrically.

So it's a lot more involved than the tradition clean vs. dirty versions. Is that a conscious choice this time around or is that something that you've always been concerned with?
I mean, in Hip Hop you always have a clean version also, so I've always been like that, but this time around I was just a little more deliberate about it.

Any last words for the readers about the new album?
As far as the album goes I also want to let people know again that it's a lot of fun and I want them to take time to have fun. I don't know if you drink, or smoke, but get what you do first, and then pop my CD in (laughs). And if you're underage, if you're under 16, then get yourself a lollipop, some bubble gum, and pop in the clean version and get that sugar high. (laughs)