See also: The History of DJ Hammy in his own words
More than four decades of music. Hundreds of Supersonic shows. Thousands of artists and songs. One place to explore them.
The DJ Hammy Archive is an independent, fan-created project documenting the online shows of Southampton DJ David “Hammy” Hamilton — better known to generations of listeners simply as DJ Hammy.
It exists to make Hammy’s extraordinary musical history easier to explore: the shows, the songs, the artists, the requests, the discoveries and the memories that connect them all.
Who is DJ Hammy?
Hammy has been DJing since 1980, but his musical story began much earlier.
Growing up with three older brothers, he was surrounded by records from artists including The Beatles, The Rolling Stones and Roy Orbison. Then punk arrived in 1976 and changed everything.
Hammy became part of Southampton’s emerging alternative scene, regularly visiting The Magnum in St Mary’s — a gay club that was also one of the first local nightclubs to welcome punks. After repeatedly pestering the DJ for a chance behind the decks, Hammy eventually landed an early gig at the Rio Grande, turning up with a bag of seven-inch singles and beginning a DJ career that would span decades.
Over the years he became a familiar presence at Southampton venues including Manhattans, Riverside, Barbarellas, Thursdays, The Joiners Arms, Network Club, West Park Tavern, the Academy, Rhino and the Dorchester.
His sets evolved with the music around him. Punk and post-punk gave way to indie, Manchester and baggy, grunge, Britpop and countless other scenes and styles.
But Hammy has never really been defined by genre.
As he explained in a 2008 interview, he is more of a “favourite tune person” than a favourite-band person.
That idea probably sums up Hammy better than any genre label could.
From the dancefloor to Mixcloud
For decades, Hammy’s shows were built around the relationship between DJ and audience.
Requests were always part of the experience. People would suggest records, Hammy would discover new music through them, and those discoveries would find their way back into future sets.
In 2008 he described one of the things he loved most about DJing as making people happy while having them educate him about music.
The technology has changed since then, but that relationship has not.
Around 2020, health issues and the arrival of Covid brought Hammy’s mobile DJ work to an end. Friends and regulars encouraged him to take his shows online, and Mixcloud became the new home for Supersonic.
The Friday show came first. During lockdown some broadcasts stretched to eight or nine hours, allowing listeners on both sides of the Atlantic to join in.
A more relaxed, family-friendly Sunday show followed.
Cameras and live chat transformed the broadcasts into something more than an internet radio show. People turned kitchens and living rooms into dancefloors, chatted throughout the broadcasts and stayed connected during a period when many were isolated from friends, family and normal social life.
For people living alone in particular, the shows could become an important part of the week.
The Mixcloud Massive
A community soon grew around the online shows.
Known as the Mixcloud Massive, listeners did much more than simply tune in. People helped moderate chats, made posters and merchandise, shared recommendations and built friendships around the broadcasts.
The community eventually moved beyond the screen too, with real-world meet-ups and picnics after lockdown restrictions eased.
Hammy’s online audience also brought different generations together.
Some listeners had known him from Southampton clubs twenty or thirty years earlier. Others discovered him for the first time online. By 2008, Hammy was already meeting younger clubbers who told him he had once DJed for their parents, aunts or uncles.
Mixcloud extended that story again.
By January 2024, Hammy had broadcast around 360 online shows, built a community numbering in the thousands and attracted listeners from around the world. One New Year’s Eve broadcast reportedly had around 2,000 people listening simultaneously.
And the requests kept coming.
Hundreds could arrive for a single show, with Hammy spending days listening, choosing and working out how to weave them together.
He has said that the first few years of broadcasting online introduced him to more new music than the previous decade.
Expect the unexpected
The thing that first struck me about Hammy’s DJ sets was their sheer unpredictability.
A familiar indie anthem might sit next to punk, soul, ska, electronic music, a forgotten pop record, something brand new or something you had never heard before.
The result was eclectic without feeling random.
There was always another record around the corner.
That same spirit runs through the Supersonic shows today. Requests come from a huge range of listeners with different histories and tastes, while Hammy continues to bring his own discoveries into the mix.
You can hear records from completely different decades and genres within minutes of one another — and somehow they still belong together.
What is the DJ Hammy Archive?
The archive is an attempt to make that enormous body of music searchable and explorable.
At its heart are Hammy’s Supersonic Mixcloud shows and their playlists.
The archive brings together information about:
- individual shows and broadcasts
- the songs played in each show
- artists appearing across the archive
- repeat plays and musical favourites
- different versions or uploads of the same broadcast
- links back to the original recordings on Mixcloud
Instead of having to search through hundreds of individual show descriptions, you can explore the music across the whole collection.
You might want to find every show in which a particular artist appeared.
You might remember hearing a song but have no idea which broadcast it was in.
You might simply want to browse through years of playlists and see what catches your eye.
The archive is designed for all of those things.
More than a list of records
One of the things I love about Hammy’s playlists is that they are more than just lists of songs.
Taken together, they form a kind of musical history.
A 2008 Daily Echo profile described Hammy as someone who could almost alphabetise his life through records. His playlists also soundtrack the lives of countless people who grew up, went out, made friends, fell in love and discovered music in Southampton.
The online shows have added another chapter.
They preserve the strange lockdown years, the growth of the Mixcloud community and thousands of individual requests and discoveries made along the way.
The archive cannot capture every conversation, memory or story attached to those records.
But it can preserve the musical trail.
And sometimes seeing one song in one playlist is enough to bring everything else flooding back.
Why I created the archive
My own connection with Hammy goes back to 1995.
I first encountered him DJing at The Joiners in Southampton, and later at Thursdays nightclub.
I was in my late teens and at college, and those nights became a huge part of my formative years. My friends and I would look forward to heading into Southampton, and Hammy’s sets regularly blew me away because they were so eclectic.
He played things I knew, things I had forgotten and things I had never heard before.
Around thirty years later, I no longer live in Southampton, but I still follow the Supersonic shows.
They are partly a way of discovering new music and partly a connection with an earlier time in my life — hearing something unexpected and suddenly remembering a night, a place or a group of friends from decades ago.
As the number of Mixcloud shows and playlists continued to grow, I realised how difficult it was becoming to answer even quite simple questions:
When did Hammy play that song?
Which shows featured this artist?
Has he played this before?
The DJ Hammy Archive grew from that idea.
It began as a way of organising the information and gradually became something much larger: a searchable record of an extraordinary collection of shows and, I hope, a useful resource for everyone who enjoys them.
Help improve the archive
This is an independent fan project, and the archive will never be perfect.
The underlying playlists have been created over many years and contain variations in spelling, punctuation, artist names and song titles. Some older shows have incomplete information, and there are still gaps waiting to be filled.
If you spot something that looks wrong, know the missing details of an older show or can help resolve an uncertain artist or song, that information is extremely valuable.
The aim is not to rewrite Hammy’s original playlists, but to preserve what was broadcast while making the archive as accurate and useful as possible.
Every correction helps.
Keep listening
The archive is only one way to experience the shows.
The real thing is still Hammy behind the decks.
See also: Hammy History - The History of DJ Hammy in his own words
- Listen to DJ Hammy on Mixcloud
- Check the Supersonic live stream
- Request a song during live broadcasts
- DJ Hammy on Facebook
- Explore the Thursdays and Barbarellas club-history page
Sources and acknowledgements
The historical background on this page draws in particular on interviews and profiles published over many years:
- “Southampton legend DJ Hammy's online sets attract thousands” — Daily Echo, 2024
- “Hammy on the record” — Daily Echo, 2008
- DJ Hammy profile feature — Hayley Clarke
Most importantly, thanks to Hammy for decades of music, and to the listeners, requesters and members of the Mixcloud Massive whose enthusiasm has helped keep the shows going.
Guy Carberry, 17 August 2026.
All images on this page are the copyright of David Hamilton, AKA DJ Hammy.