Pirate radio is illegal, dangerous - and taking over the airwaves of Britain. But without it, stars like Ms Dynamite might never have been heard. So here I am, lost and blindfolded, being hurried along a north London street by my captor. Subtle pressure from a hand on my shoulder helps me weave a trajectory around lampposts, past oncoming pedestrians. The man's other hand propels a photographer, who, like me, has had a baseball cap jammed onto his head, the peak yanked below eye level. We met our "guide" 20 minutes earlier in the West End. He calls himself "Big N" and his appearance fits his name - built like a pocket Tyson, in a hooded top and baggy jeans. I wonder how passers-by are reacting to our plight; it must look as if we are being kidnapped. Fortunately, we aren't. Of the three of us, only Big N is on edge. He runs an unlicensed radio station, Xtreme FM, and, if caught, could face a two-year sentence for contravening the Wireless Telegraphy Act of 1949. Big N remembers the fate of another pirate station, Freek FM, featured in a national newspaper two years ago and, days later, raided by police. Hence the makeshift blindfolds, ensuring that Xtreme's location remains secret. We're ushered through a doorway, up some stairs. We're in a large old house, possibly a squat. Through another door, and - caps off - welcome to Xtreme FM's studio. This turns out to be a spartan room, not much bigger than a student bedsit, and only slightly less grotty. A sheet is pinned across the window, the room lit by a bare bulb. The walls are peeling, there is a torn carpet underfoot and, in one corner, some rickety chairs. In another corner, six sportswear-clad youths cluster around some basic sound equipment: turntables, a mixer, a microphone and, on the floor nearby, a hi-fi and a small black custom-made "link box". The link box sends Xtreme's signal, via a cable, through a tiny hole in the wall and up onto the roof. From here, a microwave "LNB" link - a hand-sized transmitter, "liberated" from a satellite TV dish - beams it to the main transmitter, "the rig" in pirate parlance, which is located on some high point, usually a tower-block roof, and could be anything up to five miles away. The rig is connected to an aerial that beams Xtreme onto the FM dial. A show is in progress, the DJs taking turns to mix records together and exchange banter in a cockney pirate patois. The music veers from chunky hip hop to saccharine R&B - like most contemporary pirates, Xtreme champions "urban" sounds, a term that originated as a euphemism for black music. When not DJ-ing, they fiddle with their mobile phones: texting, reading texts, taking calls. Everyone has a top-of-the-range handset. There is a studio mobile too. It vibrates every few seconds like a faulty alarm clock, as listeners call and text. Scrolling through its inbox, I notice scores of "missed calls". Big N explains that this is how pirates gauge a record's popularity. If listeners like a tune, they call in and then ring off, so the studio mobile registers a "missed call". This costs callers nothing. If Xtreme receives over 20 missed calls from different numbers before a track ends, the DJs play it again. This is why teenagers listen to pirate radio: it's interactive in ways legal stations can't match. Some tune in on their mobiles - on the bus, in the high street, even at school. Read the full and very interesting Sunday Times article here