The Prodigy

The Prodigy are an English electronic music group that came together in Braintree in 1990. The core members were producer, keyboardist, and songwriter Liam Howlett, along with dancers Keith Flint and Leeroy Thornhill, who later occasionally sang and played live keyboards. MC and lead vocalist Maxim also joined the lineup. According to AllMusic, the band is "the premiere dance act for the alternative masses" and "the Godfathers of Rave." They are credited as pioneers of big beat and several breakbeat-driven genres, such as breaks and breakbeat hardcore.

Formation and early singles success (1989–1991)

Howlett himself calls their sound electronic punk. The group first gained attention in the underground rave scene and saw early success in 1991 with their debut singles "Charly" and "Everybody in the Place," both of which reached the UK top five. After their first album, Experience (1992), they moved away from pure rave music and brought in techno and breakbeat elements for their second album, Music for the Jilted Generation (1994), which earned critical acclaim.

Their third studio album, The Fat of the Land (1997), marked their commercial and critical high point, hitting number one in 16 countries, including the UK and the US. It produced the UK number one singles "Firestarter" and "Breathe" in 1996. The third single, "Smack My Bitch Up," became a UK top ten hit and sparked significant controversy due to its suggestive lyrics and music video. Thornhill left the band in 2000, and Flint died in 2019, leaving Howlett and Maxim as the remaining members.

After a break, the band returned to touring. The Prodigy rank among the most successful electronic groups ever, with estimated global record sales of 25 million, including over 4.7 million albums in the UK. They have achieved seven consecutive UK number one albums. Their awards include two Brit Awards for Best British Dance Act, three MTV Video Music Awards, five MTV Europe Music Awards, and two Grammy Award nominations.

In 1989, 18-year-old Liam Howlett returned to his hometown of Braintree, Essex, after leaving his job as a DJ in the hip-hop group Cut 2 Kill. He had been making his own music for three years, starting with hip-hop and house before turning to the growing rave scene. He liked the non-confrontational atmosphere of raves and began playing DJ sets locally while working on original music at home. At a gig at The Barn nightclub in Braintree, Howlett met dancers Keith Flint and Leeroy Thornhill.

Flint asked Howlett to make a mix tape; Howlett obliged and returned a cassette a few days later with some of his own songs on the other side. He had scratched the word "Prodigy" onto the cassette, a reference to the Moog Prodigy synthesizer he used for some tracks. Flint and Thornhill liked the tape, created new dance routines to the music, and suggested forming a group.

They settled on the name the Prodigy and added a fourth live member, female dancer and vocalist Sharky (real name Sheila Burke), a friend of Flint's. The group officially formed on 5 October 1990. Their first gig was in February 1991 at The Four Aces Club (then called Labrynth) in Dalston, organized by local promoter Ziggy (Ziad Sabir Chowdry), who became their first manager. Howlett described the venue as the roughest in London at the time.

Just before the gig, the group met rapper and MC Maxim, then known as Maxim Reality. Flint suggested Maxim join because of his connections to the reggae scene and music contacts. Maxim missed a scheduled meeting but unexpectedly joined the Prodigy at their first gig, improvising lyrics on stage. Shortly after their live debut, Howlett finished a 10-track demo tape on a Roland W-30 sampling keyboard and approached Tam Tam Records for a deal, but was turned down.

He then contacted XL Recordings, run by Tim Palmer and Nick Halkes, who agreed to a meeting and signed the group to a contract for four singles. Their first official release, the EP What Evil Lurks, came out in February 1991, featuring four tracks from the demo. Soon after signing with XL Records, the Prodigy became a four-piece when Sharky could no longer commit and left. In August 1991, the Prodigy released their debut single "Charly," which samples dialogue from the Charley Says series of animated films by the Central Office of Information.

It became a hit in the rave scene, reaching number one on the UK Dance Singles Chart and number three on the UK Singles Chart, bringing the band wider attention. The success of "Charly" sparked a trend of mixing dance and rave tracks with cartoon samples, seen in songs like "A Trip to Trumpton" by Urban Hype and "Sesame's Treet" by Smart E's. Clubbers liked them, but critics dismissed the style as "kiddie rave" or "toytown techno." Howlett realized that a similar follow-up "would have been the downfall of us" and wanted to avoid those labels.

He used earnings from "Charly" to buy new instruments and studio gear, including a Roland U-220 sound module and TR-909 drum machine. Their second single, "Everybody in the Place (Fairground Edit)," came out in December 1991 and reached number two in the UK, kept from the top spot by a re-release of Queen's "Bohemian Rhapsody" after Freddie Mercury's death. During 1991 and 1992, Howlett recorded the band's debut studio album Experience at his home studio, Earthbound Studios. The project began after...