Ten Questions With The Fix
In January 2014, a group of friends and university students, Arianne “Ari” Hammond, Orane “Naro” Hart, and Javielle “Javi” Martin, launched “The Fix,” a radio show aimed at capturing a younger audience with engaging entertainment interviews. Drawing inspiration from “The Breakfast Club,” they sought to create a Jamaican version of the show, then called ‘Nightly Fix’, with Naro adopting a bold, controversial style and Javi bringing a more reserved but amiable approach.
Initially airing in a late-night slot at the Newstalk studios of the University of the West Indies Mona Campus, the show faced early challenges, including Javi’s pregnancy. Ari stepped in as a host, solidifying the team’s dynamic, which also included Mathew Jervis as the technical operator.
In 2017, “The Fix” made a significant shift, moving to an afternoon slot and competing against heavyweights like “Miss Kitty,” “Burger Man,” “Action,” and “Barry G.” Despite the stiff competition, the team focused on digital expansion and identified a niche audience. In 2018, they transitioned “The Fix” into a fully independent podcast format, which continues to this day.
The Fix will celebrate its tenth anniversary with a Live event on January 25. In the meantime, here are ten questions with the trio, Ari, Naro, and Javi.
Use one word to describe the first show?
Javi: Fun. Trash, looking back it really was trash, but fun tho
Ari: Overwhelming
Naro: Disaster!
What was the most difficult thing about hosting and producing the fix in the first year?
Ari: “Javi was pregnant and I was very anxious about wanting it to be perfect. I live by the motto age quod agis. I was admittedly nervous about Naro’s personality reception by the guest, he ended up doing well but we clashed for two years straight. I always needed a xanax.”
Javi: “I was nervous as hell, I was a wreck and I put a lot of pressure on myself to be a good co-host with Naro, I’m really shy so talking to the guests at first was hard. Also, Ari and her whole heap a papers”
*Naro Interjects: “You know mi nuh deal wid the paper thing either”
Naro: “my biggest hurdle I had to overcome was ari as the producer, and her anxiety”
Who was the first guest that made you feel intimidated?
Naro: “Honestly it was Bounty Killer, Aidonia made me anxious because it was meeting someone I really rate , but with Bounty I was fully intimidated”
Ari: “Ninja for sure!. I prepped for like a week ! I asked everyone around me , including my mom for every piece of info I could about Ninja”
Javi: “Bounty was exciting, Sean Paul to, but Moyann tho, she has a very intense energy”
Naro: “Mi did scared of LA Lewis, after that interview, I said never again!”
Who was the first guest that made you feel like doing the program was worth it?
Ari: “Sean Paul was a mega global superstar and he seemed excited to come and I was like Holy Crap Sean Paul knows us’ ‘. Taurus Riley has always been so encouraging too’
Javi: “Gramps Morgan was so supportive and he came to us telling about all the countries he traveled that people knew about the fix”
Naro: “ Lady Saw, when she took of her wig in the interview, yh that was something. .Beenie been nothing but supportive as well, the man all turn up to do the podcast on his Birthday.”
Did any guest give you advice that changed the trajectory of the show or how you viewed the show?
Ari: “Wayne Marshall gave us some deep insight about the industry that guided us, twins of twins, Patrick( from twins of twins) understood what we could do individually and produced a segment of the show , separated us and worked on building our individual journalistic capacity”
Javi: “Tami Chin gave me some really solid advice, Gramps Morgan again”
Naro: “Damion Crawford, he reached to us a politician to come on the show and that was different for us and we knew then that we were having an impact”
“Bounty was the first one that went super- viral , for him to sit down with us and have that conversation and helped to legitimize us. While it wasnt advice, that interview changed the show forever”
Was there a moment in the show, where you thought maybe you guys can’t recover from this?
Ari: “An interview with Dr. Damian King about Atheism, we were basically debating Dr. King following an interview he did on religious hardtalk and we were using our own personal testimony with “God” in the debate to justify his existence. People called the station in protest saying that it was a horrible performance for University Students, we were young and green to journalism, it was learning experience for us but the time it felt final.The audience felt we were out of her depth and they made it known to the station and they used words like “dunce” and classed out and our general manager at the time had to call us and address the matter, but she guided us and gave us another chance”
Naro: “That situation was it for me as well”
What topic of discussion made you so heated that you really questioned whether you and your co-hosts would survive this?
Ari: “there is one argument that happened off air, nothing on air is personal but off the scenes there were many times , when mi come out the whatsapp group chat and times when Naro seh do not call back him phone, but never on air”
Naro Interjects: “Whenever I speak about relationships on the show they both can seem upset with me to the point where I felt like them would quit”
Ari: “Nooo”
Javi Interjects: “I’m the mediator”
Javi: “The Episode where we discussed men and women linking did kinda get really heated still”
Ari: “The episode about faking orgasm also got heated where Naro strongly argued that if that if women lie about orgasms they will lie about anything”
Naro: “You see a common theme? , they are both liars.”
Javi: “We are a loving family tho”
What was the most shocking moment caught on air/camera over the ten years?
Ari: “Lady Saw taking off her wig”
Naro: “There was only one answer, the infamous spice interview. I remember going home and waking up my mother to tell her that tomorrow morning there will be something going around about her son, to warn her”.
“Outside of the obvious, we were interviewing gully bop and during the interview him did a throw word at LA Lewis and to our surprise La Lewis turned up at the studio and they had an impromptu clash/trace off”
Javi: “Yh spice was just as shocking for me, I first saw it online because I wasn’t there and was like whaaaat?
What moment or happening in dancehall culture could you look and say “this started here at The Fix?
Naro: “Like fallouts from the Bounty Killer interview and even some radio personalities apparently chilled offa Bounty after the interview . Very recently, the RDX saga was another one recently where we saw the breakup of the group and the aftermath it playing out in the public after it started at the show”
Ari: “Vybz Kartel son, professing that the child was not his, that was a big one.” Kartel himself even name dropped us in a song with chronic law that too was interesting,”
Javi: “We’re Cousins! the confession from Starr Dawkins that her former partner Lincoln 3 DOT were cousins!”
Naro: “I will add in the the recent, alleged picture showed to us by Renae 6:30, where Renee said he was performing some sexual acts and we saw how that played out in the public”.
What is the legacy of The Fix?
Ari: “We showed Jamaicans that the digital space can have global reach, Jamaica is small but we don’t have to think small. When we see how even the breakfast club could make reference to the fix in an interview with Sean Paul, we see that our influence has gone far past our borders. We introduced and continued to innovate the podcast idea to Jamaica, we were young people\, doing something young, innovative and fresh at a high level”
Naro: “Pillars, Game- changed , trail blazers of the entertainment space.”
Javi: “Our impact over the years in the digital space, four young people working well together.”
Bonus Question: Does the Fix Team deserve a National Award?
Ari: “Not now, I would love to see Winford Williams and Anthony Miller get one first, we stand on their shoulders.”
Naro: “If the Minister of Information Says we should get it, who am I to argue with him”.
*Making reference to a recent podcast in which Information Minister, Robert Nesta Morgan opined that The Fix team is deserving of a National Award”.
Ari: “Before you go, I just wanna say none of this would be possible without “Jervis” our tech operator, Jervis is apart of the team has been, and a huge part of our sucess has been because of him.”
Naro: “I wanna say the same, him work behind the scenes but equally as important to the whole operation”