When someone famous dies, everybody suddenly is a fan and people start to dig up memories. Let me chime in for the colorful face of The Prodigy.
In 1992 the debut album “The Prodigy Experience” was released. My younger brother already knew the band. I guess “Charlie” or “Out Of Space” had been released as singles before the full-length album. He has this massive “The Prodigy Experience” poster which stuck on the wall of our shared room.
By that time I moved from rock to metal to black metal so of course The Prodigy was way too cheerful for me. It took only a few years before I started to broaden my musical horizon again and I remember buying two versions (European and American) versions of the “Voodoo People” single from 1994. My guess is that I already liked “Music For A Jilted Generation” when it came out in the same year. The album does contain great tracks such as “Their Law” and “Speedway”. Towards the end of the album are a couple of the more ‘happy’ tracks such as “No Good” and “One Love”.
In news about the passing of Flint you usually see that with the “Firestarter” track Flint got a bigger role in the band. He was a dancer from the beginning, but then he took the mike. I thought that he actually debuted as vocalist in “Diesel Power”, but this proves to be another Keith.
It is true that from the third album “The Fat Of The Land” (1997) Flint started to cooperate on the writing of music and lyrics (“Breathe”, “Serial Thrilla” and indeed “Firestarter”). “Firestarter” surely did firestart his ‘career’ and perhaps also that of The Prodigy in general. Flint replaced his long hair and his somewhat goody-goody look for the raw punk apparel that he would continue to develop and be most famous for.
It took many years before “Always Outnumbered, Never Outgunned” saw the light of day (2004) and another five until “Invaders Must Die”. That was when I finally got to see the band on stage, a dazzling show with an unbelievable amount of energy. This could very well be the best show I saw in my life.
Years later I would see The Prodigy again, around the release of “The Day Is My Enemy” (2015), but the sound was so awful that it ruined the show.
The Prodigy is one of the few ‘pop’ acts that found their way to this website. For many years (decades) I have liked them, but it is not like I play their music every day. Every new album brought a peak in interest though and I usually thought that the new album is better than everything before. Looking back it is safer to say that all albums have a couple of brilliant tracks and some that are just alright. On Spotify I have a playlist with tracks that did not make it to albums, but which are still great. Perhaps it is time to make an overall playlist with the greatest tracks. However (I think) most of the music came from the mind of Liam Howlett, I am curious about what the remaining members will do with The Prodigy. At least in the last decades, Flint was the face of the band and probably the main reason why people went to the shows.
And so another iconic popstar dies. Life is a bitch, smack her up.
