The Prodigy
THE PRODIGY
With special guests PUBLIC ENEMY
The city at night talks through drones and chaos. The hidden city that lives in the shadows of the anaesthetized and over-stylized urban landscape. The night time heart that pounds to the rush of different drums: a subverted militaristic snare, a distorted break, a glitched dub attack, a middle eastern refrain, a cacophony of in-car dissonance, a symphony of random noise soundtracking life at the edge of the night.Where humanity lurks in darkened corners, hoods up, eyes down and communicating through clandestine gestures. Where the urban fox hunts in the darkness of the city’s suffocating ghost life, ransacking the daytime waste, taking what it wants - unafraid, unchallenged, untethered, untouchable… Like The Prodigy.
Welcome to The Day is My Enemy, an album that takes you on a journey through the unchartered underbelly of urban nightlife where anger is an ever-present energy lurking just beneath the surface of an edgy calm.
“I can’t tell you why this record came out so angry, I think its just inbuilt in me, ” says Liam Howlett “It’s more about what I like music to do. I’ve always seen music I like as a form of attack. That’s what I use music for, it’s an attack. I didn’t plan this album to sound violent, it’s just the sound that came out of the studio , a kind of build up over the last 4 years . ‘Anger is an energy’, that’s a lyric which always resonated with me. The tension is buried deep in the music right from the first drop. It’s all about the sound having that sense of danger. That’s what The Prodigy sound is about.”
By rights Liam Howlett, Keef Flint and Maxim shouldn’t be angry at all. For the last 25 years or so The Prodigy has cut a solitary path through the noise-scapes of electronic dance music. They’ve dropped five epoch defining studio albums, including 2009’s world dominating Invaders Must Die, and delivered unforgettable live performances that have taken electronic beats into unchartered territories. Throughout this time they’ve remained resolutely focused on their own vision, inspiring legions of artists along the way. No one would blame them then if they cashed in on their legend and produced an album of USA-friendly EDM mainstream beats like a well-earned pension plan. Isn’t that what bands are supposed to so by this stage in their careers?
Anyone expecting an EDM sell-out for album number six obviously doesn’t understand The Prodigy’s oppositional ideology. The Day is My Enemy finds the band pushing at the edges of expectation with the unbridled fervor of a bunch of teenage car thieves hot wiring the fastest motor they can find.
“The Prodigy right, we’re proud of our roots and we can not be lumped in with the f**kin’ formula dance music by numbers crew,” Liam exclaims. “They’re the f**kin’ jokers that stop this music getting taken seriously. Skits on Saturday night live takin’ the piss? That’s where it’s ended up… That’s not what electronic music is about. The lazy DJ’s, they have to be exposed. I’ve gone out of my way on this album to not have any of those things that people attach to dance music now… there’s no f**king typical snare builds or that bollocks.”
“I’m coming out firing on this record.”
With many of the album’s ideas sketched out on a laptop after gigs and after after-parties (because “I seem to write more when the mind is warped”), The Day is My Enemy perfectly captures the essence of The Prodigy live – warts and all. “I like to play stuff live on analogue rather than programme it all. I’m sick to death of looking at a computer screen, that was never me. Who cares if there’s a mistake or whatever, it gives the music a more organic loose feel.” Liam explains
The Day is My Enemy is the sound of the hidden city that talks through drones and chaos and lives in the shadows of the anaesthetized and over-stylized urban landscape.It’s The Prodigy coming out firing… unafraid, unchallenged, untethered, untouchable… Like the urban fox. – Martin James, 2014. http://cookingvinyl.com/