Always Outnumbered Never Outgunned

• 23rd August 2004, XL Recordings 12", XLLP 183
• 24th August 2004, XL Recordings CD, XLCD 183
• 14th September 2004, Maverick CD, 47990-2
• 31st May 2005, EMI Korea CD, EKPD-1153

Always Outnumbered, Never Outgunned is the fourth studio album by The Prodigy. The album was released in the United Kingdom on 23 August 2004 under XL Recordings, and in North America on 15 September 2004 by Mute Records and Maverick Records. It was the last album from the band to be distributed under the labels.

Recorded almost entirely using the Propellerhead Reason program, with the mastering being done on Pro Tools, the album contrasts with their previous releases, and features a larger use of vocals than the group's third album, The Fat of the Land (1997). The album title is a play on the name of the Walter Mosely novel Always Outnumbered, Always Outgunned. It was produced entirely by Liam Howlett. Keith Flint's and Keith Palmer's (Maxim) vocals do not appear in this album. By this stage Leeroy Thornhill had left the group. In the boys place are a screamy natural born killers star Juliette Lewis as well as Siouxsie Sioux style vocals and clipped female samples.

The album is a mish mash of next level Chems, Beastie Boys electro voices, moody Gary Numan "Cars" style synths and Basement Jaxx esque Eastern noise clashes, plus stomping Zombie nation keyboards, Switch-style acid squelches and plenty of four bar guitar riffs a la Fatboy Slim and classic early 90's Prodigy.

The name comes from a famous novel "Always Outnumbered, Always Outgunned". The album was originally going to be released in winter 2002 or spring 2003 but as usually it got postponed several times. Liam is well known to release the albums or tracks only when he feels it's finished, and no one can tell when that will be.

Q magazine run down of all the tracks with comments by Liam Howlett.

'Spitfire' (featuring Juliette Lewis)
Massive opener and a statement of intent. "I wanted to start with WWIII".

'Hot Ride'
Borrows from Fifth Dimension's 'Up, up and away' (in my beautiful balloon). "The Prodigy have been too serious. This is quirky".

'Wake Up Call'
"A slap in the face to myself after BGAT. I needed to change or we were fucked".

'Phoenix'
Shocking Blue's 1969 track 'Love Buzz' (later covered by Nirvana).

'You'll Be Under My Wheels'
"It's just an album filler". Shocked

'The Way It Is'
Built on a re-created sample of Michael Jackson's 'Thriller'.

Shoot Down
"It's quite punk rock".

Break down of some of the tracks taken from Mix Mag article

GET UP GET OFF
"All get up if you wanna get off" warns the bloke shouting over the top of an Eastern sounding female vocal. Its very Basement Jaxx with a male rapper over the top. (doesnt mention who!)

WAKE UP
If you still play Chems "Block rockin beats" on your pubs jukebox, this will please. A full on rocky bassline with pounding live kick drums throughout.

ICE
Garagey sounding beats but in the nicest possible way build up to a clangy melody, met with high pitched drum and bass style screeches. It makes a full throttle dub. RAW!

PHOENIX (ex Love Buzz / 1965)
A clangy guitar provides a four beat riff that runs throughout this bouncer before it gets played backwards. This sounds like Fatboy slim if he played lead guitar for the Kinks.

HOTRIDE
This is a stabby roller with the kind of heavy bass that would keep our unsightly neighbours at Kerrang happy. We'll put our money on this being the second single.

Liam statement to fansite nekozine.co.uk

The new prodigy album is finished! We got 11 possibly 12 fist in the air traks. it sounds sinister, electronic, trashy, sexy and fresh to my ears. this album is about reminding people what the prodigy was always about---the beats and the music. the vocals on this record are mostly used as an extension of the sound rather than the main focal point.

Like Jilted, Keef and Maxim weren't involved musically and they are not on this album. ALL 3 of us will be together to do what we do and play this record live and rock it later in the year, we cant fukin wait! you will probably begin to hear stuff early summer and the new album will hit in august. yeah -- more news to follow soon.

Info about collaborations

Before album was actually released there were plenty of rumours going around about the possible collaborations:

Juliette Lewis
Juliette has collaborated with Liam Howlett of The Prodigy on three songs for the new Prodigy album. The songs, 'Twista', 'Hot Ride' and 'Spitfire' were recorded in England in January.
Source: her official website

Oasis
Liam Gallagher's long-rumoured guest appearance on the next Prodigy album has been confirmed. Also, his brother Noel plays bass on the song, which is called ’Shoot Down’.
Source: NME

Kool Keith
Kool Keith aka Dr. Octagon will guest on track ’Wake Up’.

Perry Farrell

Howlett told Q magazine that Perry Farrell of Janes Addiction will feature on one track on the record, which is taking a more "electronic" direction than he anticipated. He commented: "I thought it was gonna be really rocky but it's turning out quite electronic. I don't know what it's going to be like yet but I know it's not going to be all fake blood and stupid hairdos. I'm doing one track with Perry Farrell and Keith (Flint)'s playing guitar on the album too."

Working titles and possible unreleased songs

Tracks from Nekos interview with Liam

"Sandstorm"
"The Way It Is"
"Lovebuzz"
"Girls"
"Who You're Fooling"
"Action"
"Slang Technology"
"No Souvenirs"
"Wake Up"
"The Gun"

Tracks mentioned by NME, XFM from the XL-Recordings Conference
"Ice"
"1.9.6.5"

A Long break after previous album

Later Maxim has explained in an interview why they felt the need to take such a long break after The Fat of The Land. ”On the whole, we just needed to take a break for a while and chill out. We’d been going for nine years without stopping and we needed to chill a bit. Instead of playing another Reading, another Glastonbury, with people getting fed up with us, we thought we should take a break and not exactly re-invent ourselves but find a different vibe we could use. If we were stupid and naive we could be playing now, but before we knew it we’d have damaged ourselves and become exhausted.”

"I've got 80 per cent of the album somewhere in my studio. I've just got to assemble it. The other 20 per cent is going to be collaborations and stuff. " - Liam