On stage: HOTT 107.5 DJ and reggae singer Ninja Cutty will be among those to perform at the radio station’s fifth anniversary jam next month. The party will feature the “whole HOTT family from over the years.” *File photo
On stage: HOTT 107.5 DJ and reggae singer Ninja Cutty will be among those to perform at the radio station’s fifth anniversary jam next month. The party will feature the “whole HOTT family from over the years.” *File photo
Party time
• Celebrate HOTT 107.5's fifth anniversary with a party which promises food, music, entertainment and fun.

• Everyone is invited to the party at the Hamilton Princess Hotel on Sunday, July 5 from 6pm.

• Entertainment will include comedian Tony Schofield, Ninja Cutty and past and present winners of Bermuda Idol. Some of the DJs will also be performing on stage.

• Tickets are $150 and can be bought at HOTT 107.5 on Union Street.
Here's your chance to see your favourite HOTT 107.5 DJs like you've never seen them before.

To celebrate the radio station's fifth anniversary local personalities such as Thaao Dill, Miss Thang and Ninja Cutty are to become the stars of their own party.

Whether they like it or not, the DJs are going to be dragged onto stage to show off their hidden talents - or to make them up as they go along!

The "entire family" from home and abroad are to come together to celebrate the five-year milestone with a "party to remember."

The fifth anniversary jam takes place at the Fairmont Hamilton Princess on Sunday, July 5. Tickets are $150, which includes a four-course dinner and plenty of live entertainment, including comedian Tony Schofield and as many Bermuda Idols as they can round up.

Guitar skills

Programme and production director Thaao Dill said several staff members would be performing, including himself who has been "persuaded to play the guitar for some strange reason."

He said: "It's going to be a great night, we're going to have as many people as we can in the building.

"It's going to be the whole HOTT family from over the years, those on the island and from overseas.

"So many people have been part of the movement that has made us so successful.

"There's going to be a lot of entertainment, music and fun, it really is going to be a groundbreaking event."

HOTT success

Thaao - who has been at the radio station since day one, which he says is 5.2 years - "couldn't be happier" with the success of HOTT.

He says it's quickly became a "community institution" having been started with two fundamental ideas. They hoped to create a "safe and trusted space to share information" and wanted to offer listeners "more choice with another radio option."

Thaao believes "the musical format has remained the same" although they have "Bermudianised things" to give listeners what they want.

Sounds of R. Kelly

Although the big difference is that they don't play quite so much R. Kelly compared to five years ago.

When the radio station was launched - on July 5, 2004 - it was based on the format of a Chicago-based radio station and was about the time R.Kelly, who is from Chicago, made his comeback after the sex tape that allegedly showed him with an underage girl.

Thaao joked: "There was an enormous amount of R.Kelly being played, probably about once every 80 minutes."

Thaao added: "We soon realized we had to make it a Bermuda concept and have managed to make it into a better product with fewer people.

"We have the most dynamic, committed and focused team that there is."

Thaao's own highlights from the last five years include being able to document a conversation with Dame Lois Brown-Evans that took place just a couple of days before she passed away and the radio station's election day coverage, where the opinions of "ordinary folks instead of the usual pundits" were used.

Thaao is also proud that the radio station has been able to support so many people, by giving away such things as school uniforms and grocery vouchers.

But perhaps most importantly, Thaao wants people to know that there is a lot more to come as "we're not going to stop anytime soon."