I ♥ MUSIQUE: Looking back to Leeds

I got massively lucky in the summer and was asked to chip in with the DJing at Leeds festival, which was amazing. I wrote a post for Global Cool's behind-the-scenes blog at the time, and here it is...

Here at GCHQ you've probably noticed that we're pretty big music fans, so that normally means the summer is dominated by festivals and this year was no different. For our Do It In Public campaign we chatted to tons of bands backstage at V, Field Day and Summer Sundae, but when we weren't doing that, some of us still found time to check out some of the UK's other brilliant music festies.

And last weekend I got to enjoy the mighty Leeds festival from a totally new perspective - on a stage!! The Piccadilly Party Stage is a little way off from the other stages, and sits right on the edge of the main campsite. As soon as the headliners walk offstage, it becomes the place to be if you want to put off going to bed for a few more hours.

So I struck gold and was asked by the regular DJs of this stage (two cracking gents called Andy and Dave who go by the name of Beef Warehouse) if I wanted to come along to help DJ, which was a massive no-brainer to say the least. I packed up my CDs, headphones and wellies and happily jumped on the East Coast line to Leeds. And between 11pm and 6am each night we were charged with keeping the crowd bouncing, and from where I was standing (or rather, jumping up and down like a kid on Christmas morning), it felt like mission accomplished. Check out the picture above for a taste of what it looked like.

If you want to recreate (or relive if you were there) the moment, here's a little playlist (click to open in Spotify) of the biggest tracks that we played...all you need now is a lukewarm beer in a plastic cup and you're practically there.

1. Example - Kickstarts
2. Dr. Dre - The Next Episode
3. Guns N' Roses - Welcome To The Jungle
4. The Killers - Mr. Brightside
5. Plan B - Stay Too Long
6. Vampire Weekend - A-Punk
7. Jay-Z - 99 Problems
8. Mumford & Sons - Little Lion Man
9. Nas & Damian Marley - As We Enter
10. Arctic Monkeys - I Bet You Look Good On The Dancefloor

And in addition to the post above, here are some other shots that I took. It were proper mental, it were...

It was CDs all the way for me...