"I can make anything – and it tastes good!"
 
Quite a claim, but Dev will not be swayed from his claims of cocktail-making genius. The mainstay of Lightspeed Champion is extremely tired after weeks of eight-hour van drives from venue to venue on their European tour – "so messy… rotting fruit everywhere," he shudders, his eyes taking on a glassy, thousand-yard-stare quality. "It's quite hard to bear." In a hostel in Brussels, some swine even relieved him of his wallet and video camera. Things are coming apart at the seams, but if there is one thing this man is sure of, as we chat away in this small Austrian ski lodge, that's mixology.
 
The Bob Marley Bloodclot
 
A shot of Jameson's Whiskey
A drop of raspberry jam
Orange and banana smoothie ("sort of over the top")
Some Strongbow
Some red-orange Orangina
 
If you can stomach that, other cocktails in Dev's repertoire currently include the Cruddy Mary, the Apple Sauce Bitch, and the impressively named Orangenius. Later tonight, Lightspeed Champion will take to the bar stage where indie-electro hopefuls The Whip are currently having a go on Xbox's newRock Band game through a haze of sleep psychosis. Dazed has been brought out to the festival to try out this new game, which is getting its European launch at the Snowbombing festival (motto: "Piste by day, beats by night") – it's a bit like a hi-tech karaoke, but with added plastic guitars and drums – it's stoopid, party fun and pretty addictive, it has to be said, and you get to play along to real songs by proper bands, though if I never hear "Main Offender" by The Hives again, it won't be too soon.

Fifi is taking a break from her normal drumming duties to sport a stick-on moustache and shriek her way through The Clash's "Should I Stay or Should I Go?" Fortunately, before anyone can answer, they're sprawled on a sofa nearby, offering their verdict on their performance – "Our rhythm section has not actually been to bed yet," considers singer Bruce. "So, they're a bit loose." Amazingly, the band have actually managed to get out on the slopes and snowboard at some point today, despite being barely able to walk.

Wait, Kid Carpet's here! He'll be a natural, what with being famous for making music on stage with toy instruments. "I'm getting away from all that," he says, slowly. "I don't want to be the 'gimmicky toy boy' any more. The idea was, you can make a song with anything, if you have a good idea. But it was totally defining me." Will he have a go though, anyway? No.
 
Later that day, watching Madness in a forest clearing half way up an Alp (can you have a singular Alp?), Suggs bops about against an unlikely backdrop of snow-covered peaks glinting through gaps in the pine trees, singing about naughty boys and baggy trousers. After The Whip's performance in town the previous evening, Suggs apparently materialised in their dressing room, dispensing unsolicited stagecraft advice – the boys are still quite clearly nutty, observes Bruce, which is confirmed when we run into one of them the next day – still in the bar at breakfast time, showing off his large, jagged heart bypass scar, and threatening to lamp his friend.
 
Snowbombing, then – snowboarding, slopes, Jagermeister, all-night beats, and an A-Ha and Michael Jackson-covering oompah band called Oompocalypse Now. And the Rock Band challenge? "I think we embarrassed ourselves," says The Whip's Nathan. "We couldn't even get Soundgarden."

Rock Band is out in May on Xbox 360. Kid Carpet's Casio Royale is out in June, The Whip's X Marks Destination is out now, as is Lightspeed Champion's Falling off the Lavender Bridge. Madness are available for parties and bar mitzvahs.