LimeWire Music Blog

UK rave titans The Prodigy roared through New York City last night, and for 90 minutes it felt like 1997 again. Under the direction of mastermind Liam Howlett, the band’s frontmen, Keith Flint and Maxim Reality, snarled and prowled around Roseland’s stage like wild tigers. Howlett, who was perched behind a turret of keyboards and gear, rocked back-and-forth like an unhinged scientist. As he filled his Petri dish with gargantuan breakbeats and samples, a drummer and guitarist contributed to the cacophonous din. The Essex boys tore through classics like “Smack My Bitch Up” and “Firestarter” and whipped the crowd into a sweaty frenzy (they would’ve moshed had there been enough room in the jammed club), while tracks from their new album, Invaders Must Die, specifically the rave-tastic “Omen” and reggae tinged “Thunder,” went down extremely well. While groups like Daft Punk, Underworld and The Chemical Brothers offer intellectual interplay with their audience in the form of clever videos, The Prodigy eschew high art like your little brother avoids vegetables.

Nearly twenty years since The Prodigy’s punk-rave aggression played a pivotal role in the birth of the UK rave scene, and subsequently inspired contemporaries like Pendulum and Justice, it appears that age and experience helped them become a better band. Last night’s performance proved that their apocalyptic message is as incendiary and important as ever.

images by Darren Ressler