The Prodigy @ Koolhaus

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Wednesday March 25, 2009 @ KOOLHAUS THE PRODIGY alongside XI TICKETS: $40 in advance On Sale at all TICKETMASTER locations or by phone 416-870-8000 Also available at PLAY DE RECORD SHANTI BABA Doors 9pm Late 80s Britain. The subterranean free party vibe whispers its secrets to a hidden generation all chasing the smoke of a rumour like cats stalking shadows. Into the secret euphoria step a production wizard, two dancers and a soundsystem MC. Obsessed with the East London warehouse party scene they debut with a fistful of ruffneck breaks and a party hard attitude at Labyrinth in Dalston, London’s Four Acres Club. It’s 1990 and the Prodigy experience is born. That night the band played to a handful of friends and passers by. Not the most auspicious introduction perhaps but a step, no matter how tentative, on a journey that would become little short of breathtaking. Back in the rough and ready ambience of The Labyrinth however only two things concerned the Prodigy crew; getting a record out and playing Raindance. Within months both dreams would come true. The debut ‘What Evil Lurks’ EP, offered a deep slice of rough-around-the-edges, renegade-break psychosis. While only a month later Raindance offered four-colour lasers, 8 thousand party people and a bone rattling soundsystem. “Being on stage at Raindance was it for me. It had the proper East London warehouse spirit. As far as I was concerned we’d arrived!” Liam once told me, echoing the thoughts of ravers everywhere. By the time the band delivered the lumber crunching bass’n’breaks epic ‘Charly’ the rave scene had completely succumbed to the Prodigy’s euphoric rage. Of course it was the uplifting classic ‘Your Love’ that captured the underground hearts. Just as the mainstream had started to wake up to the rave sound, so the Prodigy had already started to move on. The debut album Experience followed a year in which the band took their beats into the charts and around the raves numerous times. “I remember at the time I wasn’t into doing an album, I thought it was a sellout coz we were about putting our beats on 12’” vinyl for djs” said Liam. Instead of doing the customary rave circuit to promote the album they took the rock and roll option of playing a headlining tour of traditional venues. Even at this early stage they’d moved beyond the increasingly narrow confines of the rave scene. Over the months to come the rave scene would be brought to its knees by unscrupulous promoters, dodgy drugs, officious policing and ever more draconian legislation. The last straw for the Prodigy came with the over enthusiastic noise limitations placed on raves. For the band the scene was dead. “At one big rave, I think in Scotland, the sound was turned down so low by the officials you could hear people in the crowd. We said fuck this, someone should take a stand so we walked off stage and the police had to deal with a lot of unhappy people. We then got the blame for killing rave with the Charly tune which we thought was hilarious. We were like, fuck it, it was worth killing then!” said Liam. But the Prodigy was most definitely alive. Just to prove it they took their incendiary show direct to the heart of rock heritage with a gig at The Marquee in London. Their second album drew heavily on this newfound love of rock. Music for the Jilted Generation spat guitar licks fused with pounding breaks and little bit of voodoo magic. "It was at a time when the criminal justice bill bullshit was going on, clamping down on any parties and we were all affected by that. It was a mad creative time with a lot of purpose in the music. We had spent some time in America and we were listening to the first Rage Against The Machine album, it was inspirational because it had the groove of hip hop but the power of punk rock. That was definitely one of the records that was in my head when I wrote Jilted ” said Liam. Jilted Generation seemed to naturally