Keith Henderson
Prodigy will soon be in South Africa. Possibly one of the world’s most successful electronic/rock cross-over outfits, they will be taking to the stage and blasting their unique sound out in an audio and visual performance many South Africans have been itching to see for some time.
Their manic, beat-invested brand of electronica has remained undefined by the industry who so love to categorise every sound. From techno to trip-hop, through rock and breakbeat, Prodigy have driven their machine from day one, producing a phenomenon that breaks the “us versus them” mould of distinct music genres.
By definition, a Prodigy fan will by no means be categorised in any specific pocket. The band’s concerts in this country will, no doubt, attract a diverse audience – from the long-haired rocker to the spandex-wearing raver, through the skater and back to the psychedelic trippy trance children.
Such is the nature of Prodigy performances. The energy grinding out from the stage will prove only one thing – the right sound maketh the party – and there’s no doubt the crowd will be jumping up to every tune.
What began with the release of the vinyl, What Evil Lurks, in February 1991 has become the stuff music legends are made of.
It was Liam Howlett, mastermind of the band’s sound, who cast the first stone when he arrived at XL Recordings in 1990 with a 10- tune demo cassette that led to the respectable sale of 7 000 copies for a first single.
Howlett’s creations had taken place at the height of a new movement in the United Kingdom. The manic, ecstasy-fuelled rave culture was storming the walls of the UK establishment. Prodigy’s sound was to become one of the defining factors of a unified struggle against government order, in the form of the Criminal Justice Bill.
The next rung in the ladder came with the top three hit Charly, the band’s second single. The track became an anthem, identifying the group directly with rave culture. Experience, the group’s debut album, a complex mix of samples and breakbeats, didn’t enable the band to move away from their new pigeon hole. It was the release of their second album in July 1994, Music for a Jilted Generation, that broke the mould.
The band had been exposed to other movements – The Smashing Pumpkins, Red Hot Chilli Peppers, Wu Tang Clan and The Stone Temple Pilots became influences. Change had become a manifesto. The band stood on the edge of greatness. “Thing is,” Leeroy Thornhill explains, “from day one we’ve been real. None of us have ever wanted to be pop stars, or famous, or anything. It’s just happened. Sure, we still love it. But we’re still no different from the day we started. I mean, we still get together and laugh about how lucky we are …”
The sincerity of Prodigy’s sound is, perhaps, what fans are drawn to. With Jilted Generation, the band had massive hits like No Good (Start the Dance), One Love and Voodoo People. The anti-Criminal Justice Bill track, Their Law, aligned the band in the UK with an ever-increasing group of party-goers who were angry at their lives being stomped on by the British government (“Fuck em’ and their law”). A message on the album sleeve said it all: “How can the government stop young people from having a good time? Fight this bollocks”.
It was almost two years before the public heard from Prodigy again, when the single, Firestarter, entered the UK charts at number one. The world was introduced to a new-look Prodigy. Along with Maxim, the spiked-up and pierced Keith Flint had become another voice for the band.
“[The change] has been a natural thing really,” Thornhill says. “Before Firestarter, me and Keith did the same thing. And then Keith wanted to try these vocals and it worked – and now that’s another element we’ve got. It opened up new things for us. And thus the stage show progressed. The roots of where we come from are all pretty much still there.”
With the legendary Glastonbury performance of July 1995 still fresh in the minds of fans, Prodigy became specifically known for their live performances. “It’s that urge to get on stage and do the live shows which is the whole buzz really, and as long as we’re buzzing we’re going to be out there. Being on the road is what we live for,” Thornhill admits. “You can’t explain the buzz of standing in front of 350 000 people all wanting to see you.”
A manic touring schedule finally resulted in the release of the legendary Fat of the Land five years after Jilted Generation. “When the album came out it went to number one in 24 different countries, some of them we’d never even been to. It’s hard to comprehend that so many different people are into something that you do as a passion,” Thornhill enthuses.
“It’s then just such a pleasure to go to those places. When you go to a place like Bosnia, and there’s a war 500 miles away and yet you’ve got a room full of 10 000 people who are Kurdish and Serbs, and they’re kids and they don’t give a shit what’s going on up the road, it’s a nice possession to have. It makes you feel good to be able to do that for people. That’s what we’re there for. We’re a people’s band I guess. But we’re selfish in that we do what we wanna do and we don’t want everyone to like us.” This, perhaps, is the success story of Prodigy. They’re a four-man Boy’s Own adventure story.
“A lot of night’s we’ll go out and there and we won’t know what Liam’s gonna do and what’s gonna happen,” Thornhill tells me. “We may have heard a beat or something at the sound check but that’s it. And that’s what keeps it fresh for us … If it were a planned-out thing we’d all be bored by now and it wouldn’t be happening.”
As far as coming to South Africa is concerned, Prodigy are ready for anything. “A world tour is always exciting, ya know. Just going to different countries is a bug in itself. We don’t really know what to expect. But we’re sure its going to be pretty full-on either way, yeh? It’s going to be a really good vibe.”
Prodigy perform in South Africa as part of the Big Night Out tour starting Saturday March 20 in Durban, Monday March 22 in Cape Town and Wednesday March 24 in Johannesburg