DESTINATION: Tony de Vit

Tony de Vit's deejaying career took him right up into the top five DJs of the world even though many of his fans thought of him just as a Trade icon. This month sees the release of a new double compilation of all his releases in full-length mixes. It runs to an hour and a half and is on HMV's recommended new release list.
"Definitely one for the fans. It brings together most of his releases with hits like 'Burning Up' - you can't obtain these any more - and it shows his changing career from 1993-1996," says John McDonald, who runs Blue August Music and Plenty Records.
"It's true to say that by the summer of 96, Tony was really at the top of his game," he writes in his tribute on the CD's inner sleeve.
De Vit died in 1998. A man in his early 40s. But it wasn't clear why. Some were

told it was a car crash, official sources said it was pneumonia, The Sun came right out and said "DJ dies of Aids".
John McDonald, who releases the CD on his label, remembers "it was a nightmare at the time, he was pretty ill."
'Bijou', a fan and fellow DJ remembers: "In Trade, when Tony came on, we went mad...It was a blast. Then one night he had left Birmingham (my home town) to get down to Trade where he was due to play. I was at Trade; it was announced that he'd had a car crash. They closed the club that night. It was terrible...then I heard rumours on the scene that he didn't actually die of a car crash.

"All I know is, he was a quiet nice guy in person, you'd never think he was one of the most popular, hard club DJs of the nineties."