The Windermere Number Twos: When Great British Music Meets Great British Sewage Policy
There are moments in British life so perfectly absurd they deserve their own blue plaque. The Lake District giving us Wordsworth, Wainwright, and now a 24-hour radio protest of chart ‘number twos’ is unquestionably one of them.
Lee Durrant of Lake District Radio has taken a stand against sewage spills into Windermere by playing nothing but songs that peaked at No. 2. Not the failures — the nearly-No-1s. The tracks that should have topped the charts but were pipped at the post.
A marathon of musical silver medallists.
A jukebox of glorious runners-up.
A cultural outcry delivered through… number twos.
It is, in every sense, Britain at its finest.
Chart royalty… who also had a number two (don’t we all)
This isn’t a playlist of B-sides and forgotten gems.
This is proper music royalty, many with multiple No. 1s to their name, who also delivered iconic No. 2s.
He’s got artists who can fill stadiums and headline Glastonbury — artists whose mantelpieces hold more silverware than Tottenham Hotspur (not hard) - and yet, even they have a No. 2 somewhere in the catalogue.
Because in music, as in plumbing, sometimes the number twos are more memorable than the number ones.
Durrant’s playlist includes bona fide giants who’ve graced both ends of the chart:
• Oasis, who had several No. 1s and the legendary No. 2 “Wonderwall”
• Pet Shop Boys, owners of chart-toppers and iconic No. 2s
• Take That, who dominated the 90s and still found time for a No. 2 classic
• U2, global megastars with both chart crowns and chart near-misses
• Kylie, who’s had multiple No. 1s but also delivered brilliant No. 2 moments
These aren’t “almost” artists.
They’re giants.
They’re household names.
They’re proof that Number 2 is not failure — it’s simply unlucky that someone else released a banger the same week.
Meanwhile Windermere’s number twos?
Not quite so celebrated.
The serious bit — because the planet matters
Behind the comic perfection of the stunt lies a brutal reality:
Windermere, one of our great national treasures, has recorded dangerously high levels of bacteria linked to human faeces. Only 14% of England’s lakes and rivers meet good ecological standards.
That’s not a chart near-miss — that’s a relegation zone.
And so Durrant does something deeply British:
Take an environmental scandal and turn it into a cultural event.
Protest via playlist.
Shame via singalong.
Making people dance while reminding them what they’re dancing about.
It’s genius-level mischief.
The Ledger Entry: People · Planet · Progress
• People — A DJ using his platform for his community. Proper public spirit.
• Planet — A lake filled with number twos deserves national outrage, not shrugs.
• Progress — Bringing attention through humour, culture, and timing?
That’s activism with craft.
If Defra had this level of creativity, their next report would open with:
“We regret to confirm several further discharges… and to honour them, here’s the greatest No. 2s of all time.”
Why this works (and why it’s so Third Half)
Movements don’t always begin with hard data.
Sometimes they begin with a joke that tells the truth.
This one does exactly that.
It’s angry without being dour.
It’s funny without being trivial.
It’s smart without being smug.
It’s cultural without being elitist.
And behind the humour sits a razor-sharp point:
If our greatest musicians can turn a ‘Number Two’ into an anthem,
we should be able to keep the actual number twos out of Windermere.