BBC

Dorset - The Prodigy live review

• 30th November 2005

Dance veterans The Prodigy arrived at the cavernous Bournemouth BIC fresh from the release of their Greatest Hits album. Thomas Thorogood was there to see whether they could rock the arena...

The Prodigy bring their greatest hits (‘Their Law’) tour to Bournemouth over 15 years after forming on the illegal rave scene in their native Essex.

Since the group’s birth they’ve released four genre spanning albums the biggest of which, 1997’s ‘Fat of the Land’, reached number one in 28 countries including the US.

It’s fitting then that having exported their sound around the world they come to the newly refurbished BIC with a Union Jack backdrop behind them. With this tour, unlike the last, they have a live drummer and guitarist who sound great backing the three core members.

Liam Howlett comes on first and stands centre stage behind a bank of keyboards, samplers and laptops, the musical brains behind The Prodigy. The two MCs Keith and Maxim arrive next both looking dapper in jackets and make up.

Stirring

Immediately the showmen get the crowd going with Maxim shouting ‘Bournemouth I can’t hear you...’ and now floppy haired Keith antagonising the crowd with his punk gestures. The pair first appeared on their matching podiums near the back of the set but had soon ran to the front and near the crowd.

Signally their inclusive intentions the group start with early fans' favourite ‘Break and Enter’. During the performance they play songs from every album as well as a couple of pretty cracking new tracks.

Things really kick off a few songs in when the opening bars of ‘Breathe’ fill the venue, the audience reacting immediately and go wild when it kicks in. The track demonstrates The Prodigy’s crowd-pleasing nature with the two vocalists explosively bouncing off each other.

Recent track ‘Spitfire’, which originally featured vocals from Julliette Lewis, also goes down well with the Keith’s surprising falsetto vocal sounding perfect.

Rave renaissance

Halfway through the show the Union Jack drops to reveal a bank of coloured strip lights and white spots. The latter are used to show off the throbbing crowd who rave like its 1991 all over again.

We’re taken back when ‘Voodoo People’ segues brilliantly into ‘No Good (Start the Dance)’. Number one single ‘Firestarter’, of course, causes chaos in the audience as they jump manically and the stage is appropriately filled with red and yellow light.

On new track ‘Warning’ Keith, who was originally the group’s dancer, raps sounding like a cross between Johnny Rotten and Rage Against The Machine’s Zack De La Rocha.

At the end of the track he reprimands the security for treating a crowd surfer badly. “Don’t do that to one of OUR people” he says in his broad Essex twang “stay off the steroids mate.” This only earns him further respect from the loyal Prodigy fans.

Intense

Main vocalist Maxim is on terrific form during storming versions of ‘Poison’ and ‘Mindfields’, which both sound particularly good with live drums. He went into the crowd frequently whilst rapping, the spot light operator struggling to keep up with him.

The encore was extraordinary, starting with the controversy-courting track ‘Smack My ***** Up’. Its long euphoric breakdown had everyone swaying and when the track kicked in wildly jumping.

The Prodigy finished the show with ‘Charly’, the early cartoon cat sampling rave hit, and then ‘Out of Space’, the latter prompting a huge glitter ball to come down from the ceiling and the strobes come on.

Undwarfed

The worry at the BIC was that the group would be dwarfed by the newly enlarged 6,000 capacity hall and the show would feel too impersonal.

However thanks to impeccable staging and the two enigmatic, engaging showmen this didn’t happen.

With The Prodigy’s killer hits and hooks, and the really up-for-it crowd, the show proved the band are still at their best and we should all look forward to that fifth album.

 

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