The Mirror

Prodigious Keith's just a little devil

• 1st November 1996

KEITH FLINT - lead singer of chart-toppers The Prodigy - has a pierced nose and tongue, hair gelled into devil's horns and numerous tattoos. On stage he snarls like a Rottweiler. Off it, he lists his leisure pursuits as screaming, photocopying his bottom and composing songs using his "body noises".

Is he trying just a tad too hard?

As a teenager, I had multi-coloured spiked hair and wore make-up that made Dusty Springfield-after-a-hard-night eyeliner appear polished. Little old ladies clutched their handbags to their quivering bosoms in the street, lest I leap forward and mug them. And I only wanted to ask directions. Neighbours gave my parents pitying looks. But they held their nerve, which is what Keith's mum and dad, school secretary and civil servant should do. He'll grow out of it.

In the meantime, should either of them fancy a seat on a crowded train they need only enlist their son as a travelling companion.

Corrections: Oh dear, Lowri, your so-called journalism certainly fits in the tabloid fantasy press - plenty of make-believe 'facts' to make your opinion sound valid. Well, let's see

1) Keith has never listed "screaming" as a leisure pursuit. It's more likely that he prefers fast motorbikes and cars - he just happens to scream now and again, which makes a difference to all the Elton John/Whitney Houston/George Michael pap which is always glorified in your paper (which I used to do work for!).

2) "Photocopying his bottom" - this is from one drunken incident from a Japanese tour which happened a few years ago, probably not exactly a hobby, but never the less, getting a Japanese shopkeeper to help adjust the contrast on his supermarket's Xerox copier while you have trousers round your ankles - that is rock and roll! What can I say! Well done Keith!

3) "composing songs using his body noises" - I remember Liam (that's Liam, not Keith) stating in the NME in March: "You can play anything you fackin' like in front of ravers - you could loop your farts and play that - as long as it's got a bassline and a beat". I noticed the printed picture used for the Mirror article was exactly the one printed in that issue of NME, which is where Lowri picked up and distorted the "body noises" story. Lowri, you're talking out of your arse.

And as for the printed picture of Lowri with her 'harder-than-Keith' look - well, what can I say, what a pile of crap! Not at all frightening! I'd sooner be scared of Jarvis Cocker than some pretentious youth who looked like a reject from Siouxie and the Banshees - the eyeliner used was virtually non-existant, the hair may have been spikey, but it looks blond, (not green or purple or pink, etc) and it's not a 'devil horns' haircut either. I bet grannies used to beat her up! Stop dissing our Keith!

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• Keith Flint