I pulled Music For The Jilted Generation out of the shelves recently after realising it had been years since last giving it a play. To me Experience sounds a little dated now, even though it does contain some complete classics, but Liam’s second album has stood the test of time surprisingly well, if you ask me.
It sits pretty nicely somewhere between their hardcore beginnings and the rock/dance crossover act that they’d eventually become. I kinda lost interest when Keith and Maxim stopped just doing the running man and started getting on the mic but obviously lots of people didn’t agree with me as they’re still going strong and headlining festivals the world over.
The singles on the album massively overshadowed everything else and made me super bored of hearing them ever again but there are some total gems there. This one shows that there was a bit of hardcore still alive in the Prodigy sound and the last three tracks on the record are pure gold, especially Skylined. The whole things brings back memories of seeing them at Brixton Academy in ’95 or so dancing about with my curtains flying all over the place. Good times.
Crackin’ ardkore on Seduction’s Impact label. It all went a bit horribly happy later on but the earlier releases are mostly total classics. Plenty of the happy stuff is still pretty awesome, even if it does descend into some awful cheese at certain points.
Mad stuff from hip hop producer Just Blaze. Just got all the way through and he went from old skool bits & pieces into a whole host of randomness in this one. All done to test out the new mixer he’d just bought late one night. It’s far from polished but that’s not really the point and there are some amazing moments in there. Highly recommended…
Tucked away on the b-side of the 3rd release on Rough Tone there’s this little track. I love the sounds in it and the wicked little reggae sample. Very simple breakbeat hardcore but effective nonetheless.
Pop fact: Rough Tone was set up by one of the guys from UB40 who was also one of the blokes behind this very tune. Remember that for when this (never) comes up in your local pub quiz.
