In JG Ballard's 1974 novel Concrete Island, an architect called Roger Maitland crashes his Jaguar and finds himself trapped on a fenced-off wasteland between three motorways, unable to escape or even signal for help. This was roughly the experience of the Dazed team in our hotel on the southern outskirts of Rome, where trying to get anywhere on foot, even the nearest Metro station, made one feel like one of those badgers who has to cross the M5 to find food.

Thankfully, Dissonanze 2008 more than made up for it. The festival, now its ninth year, took place the weekend before last at the Palazzo dei Congressi, a huge marble edifice that was once part of Mussolini's stern Esposizione Universale Roma. The Palazzo has three stages: a beautiful terrace on the roof which got the rock and the hip hop, a sit-down auditorium at the back which got the experimental music, and a hanger-sized room at the front which got the house and techno. It's a perfect venue, in other words, for a mid-sized electronic festival, and the very youthful Roman crowd made the most of it, whether they were enjoying/enduring the lung-rattling bass of Sunn 0)))'s Stephen O'Malley or going on a space odyssey with Italo disco pioneer Alexander Robotnick.

Come back over the next couple of weeks for interviews with some of the top artists from the festival's superlative line-up, including Yacht (our personal highlight), The Bug, Pinch and Murcof.