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The Prodigy

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For other uses, see Prodigy (disambiguation).
The Prodigy
File:Prodigy-02.jpg
The Prodigy from the Baby's Got a Temper era.
From left: Keith Flint, Liam Howlett and Maxim Reality.
Background information
OriginEssex, England
Years active1990–present
MembersLiam Howlett
Keith Flint
Maxim Reality

The Prodigy are a British hard dance/rave act, consisting of Liam Howlett (keyboards), Keith Flint (vocalist) and Maxim (vocalist). Leeroy Thornhill (dancer) was also a member of the band from 1990 to 2000. A female dancer/vocalist called Sharky was also briefly associated with the band during their early period. The Prodigy first emerged on the underground rave scene in the early 1990s, and since then have achieved immense popularity and worldwide renown. Some of their most popular songs include "Charly," "Out of Space," "Smack My Bitch Up," "No Good (Start the Dance)," "Breathe" and "Firestarter." The Prodigy have developed various styles over time, initially pioneering the underground rave scene, and now creating bigbeat tracks with punk vocal elements.

History

Beginnings

Formed in Essex, England, the Prodigy started life with an initial 10-track demo by Liam Howlett, put together on a Roland W-30 sequencer keyboard. XL Recordings picked up the demo and an initial 12" pressing of What Evil Lurks was released in February 1991. The band's name is thought to have come from the keyboard Moog Prodigy (created by Robert Moog)

The band's first performance was at Four Aces in Hackney, London. Charly, released six months later, was a huge hit in the British rave scene of the time, catapulting the band into the wider public consciousness for the first time. Some critics were later to identify the release of Charly, with its memorable sample of a government television infomercial aimed at children (Charley Says), as the song that instigated the ultimate destruction of the underground rave scene, opening the door to a flood of rave tracks many of the genre's devotees considered of lesser quality, such as Urban Hype's Trip to Trumpton, and Smart E's Sesame's Treet. Charly was soon followed by the band's first full length album, The Prodigy Experience, widely regarded as one of the finest examples of the rave genre ever recorded.

After this album, and the run of singles that accompanied it, the Prodigy moved to distance themselves from the "kiddie rave" reputation that now dogged them. The rave scene was beginning to implode, with promises of "anti-rave" legislation on the horizon. In 1993, Howlett released an anonymous white label, bearing only the title Earthbound I. Its hypnotic, hard-edged sound won wide underground approval. Many former critics of the band were astounded when they finally acknowledged responsibility for the record. It was officially released as One Love later that year, and went on to chart at #8 in the UK.

In 1994, the Prodigy's second album, Music for the Jilted Generation, displayed a much wider spectrum of musical style. Heavyweight dancefloor tunes still abounded, but were complemented by more unusual tracks such as 3 Kilos, and rock-oriented inclinations (Their Law). The album was nominated for a Mercury Music Prize.

The international success of Music for the Jilted Generation meant that touring beyond the UK was now a viable prospect. The band augmented their line-up with guitarist Jim Davies (from the group Pitchshifter) in 1995 for tracks such as Their Law, Break And Enter 95, and various live-only interludes and versions. The 1996 release of Firestarter, featuring vocals for the first time courtesy of a new-look Keith Flint, helped the band break into the US and other overseas markets, and reached number one in the UK. In this year the Prodigy also headlined the prestigious Lollapalooza festival. The Prodigy have toured all over the world, including Beirut and Moscow's Red Square.

The third Prodigy album, The Fat of the Land, was released in 1997. Like its predecessors, the album represented a new milestone in the evolution of both the band and the wider mainstream dance scene. Featuring simplified melodies, sparser sampling, and more sneering, punk-like vocals, the album nevertheless retained the bone-jarring breaks and buzzsaw synth so idiomatic of the band. The album cemented the band's position as one of the most internationally successful acts in the hard dance genre, entering the British and American charts at number one. The best selling single, Breathe (1996), was taken from this album.

"Smack My Bitch Up" controversy

Prodigy was getting a lot of airplay on rock stations with their track, "Smack My Bitch Up," and were getting even more negative backlash for the song. Time-Warner, Prodigy's parent company, was feeling the heat from the National Organization for Women (NOW) over the track. Although the song's lyrics are few but repetitive ("Change my pitch up, smack my bitch up"), NOW has stated that the lyrics are a "...dangerous and offensive message advocating violence against women." Howlett responded to the attacks by claiming that the song's lyrics are being misinterpreted: (the song means) "...doing anything intensely, like being on stage - going for extreme manic energy." The band did not write the lyric, but rather sampled it from the classic Ultramagnetic MCs' track "Give the drummer some" (they had also sampled another Ultramagnetic's song "Critical beatdown" on their earlier "out of space" single). Several radio stations defended the song, yet only played the track at night. The music video (directed by Jonas Åkerlund) featured a first-person POV of someone going clubbing, doing a lot of drugs, getting into fist fights with men, abusing women and picking up a prostitute. At the end of the video the camera sees a reflection in the mirror of a woman. MTV only aired the video between 1 and 5 a.m. in order for mature viewers to see the "groundbreaking" images. The director got the inspiration for contents of the video after a night of drinking and partying in Copenhagen.

Wal-mart and Kmart later announced they would pull The Fat of the Land off their shelves. Even though the LP had resided on their store shelves for over 20 weeks, the two stores found the marketing campaign for the new single release offensive.

In mid-2002, the full-on unedited version of this video was aired on MTV2 as part of a special countdown showing the most controversial videos ever to air on MTV. This countdown was only shown late at night because of the graphic imagery of "Smack My Bitch Up" and several other videos on the countdown. This video in particular was deemed the "Most Controversial Video" by MTV and showed at the #1 spot on the countdown.

Later Works

1999 saw the release of Dirtchamber Sessions Volume 1. This album was not strictly speaking a Prodigy album (although it did carry the band's name and logo), being a DJ mix album by Howlett, produced as an official record of a successful guest appearance on the British Radio 1.

In 2002, after a break from touring and recording, the single Baby's Got a Temper was released to critical disappointment. The song was written by Keith Flint's sideband, Flint, and also featured Jim Davies. Howlett produced it. In the same year, however, Q magazine named The Prodigy as one of the "50 Bands To See Before You Die".

The Prodigy's fourth studio album, Always Outnumbered, Never Outgunned was released on 23 August 2004 (14 September 2004 in the USA.) A precursory and experimental single, Memphis Bells, was released in very limited numbers, followed by the traditional release of the single Girls.

5,000 digital copies of Memphis Bells were sold over the Internet. Each copy was a combination of customer-chosen instrumental, rhythmic, and melodic options, of which 39,600 (of 660,000 total) choices were available. Five mixes were sold in three file formats, WAV, two audio mixes in MP3, and a 5.1 DTS Multichannel audio mix and all were free of Digital rights management. The experiment was a success, with the 5,000 copies being sold in just over 36 hours in spite of server problems from the demand.

In 2005, they released a compilation, Their Law: The Singles 1990-2005, which spawned a single containing new remixes of the songs Out of Space, the Audio Bully Remix, and Voodoo People, which was the Pendulum Remix. The latter was also followed by a music video which featured on the DVD release of the compilation. A trivial fact from the music video is that Sharky, the group's only female member, is participating and winning the race depicted in the video.

Evolution

The Prodigy are a difficult band to classify, because they have evolved significantly with time. Each of their albums represents a distinct stage in the band's musical evolution. From their initial inception as a psychedelic rave band with scene staples such as Your Love and Out of Space, to the much more mainstream dance of No Good, to the rock-oriented Their Law to punk tracks such as the L7 cover Fuel my Fire in more recent years, the Prodigy continue to innovate and surprise. The Prodigy have had the ability over the years to appeal to various different crowds of music fans; from the Dance cultured crowds of Creamfields Festival, to the indy-types at T in the Park and soon the Download Festival, most known for its metal and punk heritage. Their image has for many years been more in tune with rock / metal sensibilities rather than rave or dance.

Because of their broad appeal to fans across several genres, The Prodigy have been described as "A rock band that plays dance music," which many would agree was a fair summation of their work.

Members

Current members

Ex-members

Live members

Former live members

Discography

Studio albums

Compilation albums

Hit singles

pre-album single

from Experience

from Music for the Jilted Generation

from The Fat of the Land

non-album single

from Always Outnumbered, Never Outgunned

from Their Law The Singles 1990-2005

See also

Official sites

Fan sites in English

  • Brainkiller - Prodigy fan site
  • TheProdigy.nl - Very much updated Fan site
  • Nekozine - Fan site with many exclusives.
  • Kotta's Prodigy Site Fan site with a complete discography (not updated since before Baby's Got a Temper).
  • Juge's Prodigy Site - Fan site with original downloadable material.
  • [1] - The Mindblowing Prodigy Network - Fan site with lot of features.
  • [2] - .:|The Prodigy Edge|:.. - very good site rich in info and media.

Fan sites in other languages

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