Tiwa Savage Reveals She Initially Disliked Mavin Records’ Hit “Dorobucci”
Afrobeats superstar Tiwa Savage has made a surprising revelation about one of Mavin Records’ biggest hits, “Dorobucci,” admitting that she wasn’t a fan of the song when she first heard it.
In a recent interview with NotJustOk, the award-winning singer shared a candid story about how Don Jazzy first played the track’s instrumental for her — unexpectedly — during her wedding in Dubai. At the time, Tiwa confessed she didn’t realize the beat was for a major Mavin project and secretly thought it sounded terrible.
“I don’t know if people know this, but Don Jazzy was playing the beat in our hotel during my wedding in Dubai,” Tiwa recalled. “I didn’t want to tell him, but I thought it was such a terrible song.”
After her wedding, Tiwa said Don Jazzy called and urged her to return to Nigeria to work on what he described as an “important new record.” Although she initially planned to continue her honeymoon, she eventually decided to fly back and join her Mavin Records labelmates in the studio.
To her surprise, the version she heard upon returning was completely different.
“When I got back and heard the final version, I was shocked,” she said. “It sounded nothing like the rough version I had heard earlier.”
Despite the transformation, Tiwa admitted she was still skeptical at first and even hesitated to record her verse.
“Everyone else had already recorded their parts. I was just looking at them like, ‘Do you guys really like this?’” she said with a laugh.
Interestingly, this wasn’t the first time Tiwa underestimated one of her future hits. She revealed that she didn’t like her 2013 smash hit “Eminado” when she first recorded it either. Both songs would later go on to become massive chart-toppers, dominating radio airwaves and dance floors across Africa and beyond.
Reflecting on the experience, Tiwa praised Don Jazzy’s creative brilliance and visionary instincts, crediting him for seeing what others couldn’t.
“We all know what happened to that record,” Tiwa said. “Don Jazzy just has that magic touch. I didn’t even know I’d end up on the song, but it turned out to be phenomenal.”
“Dorobucci,” released in 2014, became an Afrobeats anthem and a cultural movement, uniting the Mavin family — including Tiwa Savage, Don Jazzy, Dr SID, D’Prince, Korede Bello, Di’Ja, and Reekado Banks — in one of the most iconic collaborations in Nigerian music history.
Today, Tiwa looks back on that experience with laughter and gratitude, recognizing that even her doubts couldn’t stop “Dorobucci” from becoming the timeless hit it is remembered as.