The Prodigy

The Prodigy are the perfect example of the band that ignored all the stereotypes, rules and patters, chose its own way and rose to universal fame from the depths of underground. Their story began 1990 with the surfacing of the first single What Evil Lurks, a rarest thing today. It was followed by the immediate release of the legendary single Charly, one of the most popular dance hits of that time. Until that time, it was difficult to find the information on The Prodigy lineup and the background of the members. It appeared that although the band consisted of four people, the music was written and performed by only one of them, Liam Howlett, the founder of the project. He needed the other three, Maxim Reality, Keith Flint and Leeroy Thornhill to dance and sing during the live performances.

The first album by The Prodigy was called Experience and saw light in 1992. It held the first place in the British charts for twenty five weeks and took a shortest time to get golden. The Prodigy established a new model of hard dance music and never let any performer do it better than them. In 1994, they released Music for the Jilted Generator selling more than a million copies worldwide. Most meticulous critics and influential magazines named it the main event of the year in the dance music world and flooded the band with prizes, titles and awards. It was the perfect moment to get ready for tours. 1994 and 1995 were spent in endless concerts all around the world to bring madness and delight to each stage the musicians stepped on.

Poison (1995) became already the band’s ninth single to top the charts while The Prodigy’s performance in the major Glastonbury festival was proclaimed the best one in the history of the event. The underground extreme music group reached the mainstream level still playing non-pop music. The 1996 single Firestarter signaled the approaching of The Prodigy’s strongest and most successful album Fat of the Land released in 1997. It headed the charts of twenty two countries and sold 2,500,000 CDs in the first three weeks. The Prodigy produced the music that dethroned the concepts of traditional songwriting and neglected the moral codes. The video for Smack My Bitch Up was prohibited by many channels and aired by MTV only late at night due to extreme graphical drug and alcohol use and sex. The Prodigy used the moment of glory to sink into silence for a while. They made everybody wait eagerly for their next move and guess what it would be like. They also needed the time to find the new direction to develop not to become a sellout and pop-oriented band.

In 2000, Leeroy left The Prodigy to make the total number of the members just three. After an incredibly long seven-year break, they returned to their fans with the 2004 most anticipated album Always Outnumbered, Never Outgunned. The music was strongly different from what they had done before mainly due to the unprecedented focus on the vocals and significant contribution of the guest performers headed by Liam Gallagher from Oasis. Howlett tried to apply as much live instruments as possible, which also distinguished this work from the others. As a result, the record was nominated for Grammy as one of the best dance albums. In 2005, The Prodigy released the collection of the best songs, Their Law: The Singles 1990-2005. The band’s first two albums were re-issued in 2008 with additional material composed mostly by rare songs and remixes.

The Prodigy’s fifth album Invaders Must Die was released half a decade on since their last one. Liam Howlett suggested that Invaders Must Die would see The Prodigy return to their earlier sound and this becomes apparent within the first few songs of this record (such as in the title track and energetic lead single Omen). The blatant, stirring calls for rebellion and anti-authority rants were still there. The album featured Keith Flint's most effective vocal contribution and Maxim's appearance on the apocalyptic World 's On Fire.