BBC

Prodigy take their act to Beirut

• 7th May 1998

The Prodigy is to become the first major western band to play in Beirut. The band will be playing a one-off gig in the war-ravaged capital of Lebanon on Saturday.

The four band members will play on a specially built stage in Martyrs Square which straddles what was once known as the "green line" - the frontline for the country's warring factions when Christian and Muslim militias battled each other from the mid-1970s until the late-1980s.

The stage is surrounded by the remains of churches and mosques dating from the Ottoman Empire, and once fashionable villas built when the city was a glamorous draw for international travellers. Then Beirut was known as the "Paris of the east."

Saturday's gig is not the first one the band has played in unlikely locations. Others on the tour have included Reykjavik in Iceland, the Red Square in Moscow, Tallinn in Estonia, Katowice in Poland and Prague.

"The band decided to play in Beirut because the chance just came up. They are well-travelled, they have always been very adventurous. They just thought that 'yeah, let's go there'," says Prodigy's spokesman Chris Sharp.

"One of the reasons for their popularity is that they have made an effort and have toured in non-obvious places."

But Sharp says the band is strictly unpolitical.

"When asked about political issues they have always refused to comment," he says.

"I think they just believe in uniting people, that different groups of people come together to listen to the music."

---

• Beirut
• Gigs

---