The three-deck wizard’s new memoir details a life behind the decks, from the Houses of Parliament to Honolulu – and tragedy in Venezuela. Now, he says, his baking is as popular as his music

In late November 2007, Carl Cox’s DJing career was over – or so he thought. A few days earlier he had played a set at a festival in Caracas, Venezuela, as part of a tour of South America. The vibe was good and the crowd was bouncing. “I heard all these fireworks go: ‘Bang, bang, bang.’ Everyone was going: ‘Woooo! Yeeaaaah!’” Cox mimics dancing behind the decks. “Then there were more bangs and I thought: ‘Yay, more fireworks!’ But then I looked at the crowd and something was wrong. They were dispersing. I realised: ‘Fuck, that’s not fireworks, that’s gunfire.’”

Two rival gang members had met on the dancefloor and begun shooting. Cox got down on the floor and crawled to a backstage locker room where he and his tour manager barricaded themselves in. After an hour, they were escorted out to a car, past scores of police vans and ambulances. Four people had died and nine were injured. “Seeing people shot on the dancefloor and dying in front of me, blood everywhere …” Cox says, rubbing his eyes. “One minute we were having the time of our lives and the next we were cowering for our lives.”