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Well, what a night. Belfast is a smaller city than we expected, and
Ulster Hall is a rather small venue for a UK tour.
After drinking and dining in Great Victoria Street, we took ourselves
to the venue, where I stood in the freezing cold for about an hour
before the doors were scheduled to even open! There was already a queue
by this point anyway, so we weren't as mad as the others who got there
before us - not that there were a lot of 'em, and even by the time the
doors were ready to open (with 1,800 bottles of Stella delivered to the
venue bar during the wait), the queue was substantially shorter than
for other indoor gigs I've been to. Sold out? I'm not so sure on that.
Venue security decided to divide the queues into male and female before
the gig, to search us all as we went in. The girls got less attention,
with my girlfriend managing to get in with my video camera, which was
spotted by security, but she got let off due to having an English
accent - 'cos we're just tourists, right? Anyway, that was a major
bonus.
This was the first ever gig I've been to, where I could only get seated
tickets, so it was up on to the balcony for us. Our seat allocations
were right at the VERY back row, in the absolute centre. In a way, it
was a good view if you want see everything. I'd have preferred a
downstairs ticket, and there was an easy way of getting in downstairs
(75% of balcony seats were empty, and we knew that many were popping to
the downstairs toilets, waiting for an arena side door to open). Still,
with being prepared for my first seated gig, a video camera in tow, and
the about-to-fall-asleep feeling from having got up at five in the
morning for the flight to Belfast, I wasn't too concerned with doing
the usual front row duty any more. Fans in the queue were impressed
that this was my thirteenth Prodigy gig, and I decided to take it easy
this time.
Leeroy DJ'ed as pre-gig warm up, starting with Public Enemy, going off
into more hip-hop, and generally getting a good response, although he
shocked by going into commercial territory by playing Shut Up by The
Black Eyed Peas and some Sean Paul song (Gimme The Line?) - aargh!
At ten, Leeroy left the stage for a local punk act, whose lead singer
seemed to be taking style tips from the Strokes, although they were
clearly old school punk, and you can recognize the influences from the
Buzzcocks to local heroes Stiff Little Fingers. No idea who they were,
and their shouty rock anthems were a stark contrast to Leeroy's
sub-Liam DJ set.
After half an hour of them, Leeroy returned for some more DJing. The
balcony never filled up completely, remaining only a third filled,
although downstairs was already packed by this time. Out of the main
area, the venue bars were jam-packed. Well done to the Irish for living
up to a national stereotype!
Okay, let's get on to the Prodigy. After a minute the vocoded words
"Wake Up!" being played through the speakers, the band took to the
stage, and Keith was wearing black, with some kind of top hat, making
him look like a long-lost brother of the Addams family. Maxim was in a
long glittery skirt, and the others - Liam, Jim and Keiron obviously
kept themselves to their positions as musicians, as Wake Up Call kicked
off - as you may know, not one of my favourite tracks on AONO to say
the least, although the anticipation from fans there, mixed with the
insanely high volume made it rock. Nobody, and I mean nobody, in the
balcony was sitting down.
Now, here I am sitting in a Dublin hotel after a night out in Temple
Bar, and I really cannot remember the exact set list. There is a
recording of the gig in my bag, although my batteries won't have enough
power to rewind. So, the songs as I remember them...
Hotride, being that b-side version on the single, was played, and the
whole crowd were going mad for it. I think this was the time when
someone threw a bottle at Keith, angering him.
Girls/More Girls was also played, and I think it ended with some
mucking about from Liam, playing some distorted sample through his
keyboard, and making it last about two minutes, which to be frank, is
taking the piss. It wasn't really a crowd-teaser, it was boredom.
The 'new' material - stunk up the place. The first five or so songs
were all familiar to us, but when Keith came on to do Warning, the
balcony crowd mostly sat down, and downstairs was pretty much static.
It went on way too long, probably five minutes, or at least it felt
like that, because of its repetition. This is exhibit A in why Keith
should be kicked out of the band. Also, Maxim's Send You Back To School
was guilty too, a repetitive monotony of Prodigy-By-Numbers. AONO was a
refreshing album because of the lack of Keith and Maxim's cliched
vocals, so this 'new' material is like going back to the FOTL era (but
not as good!).
Their Law got a brilliant reception, one of the best performances of it
I've heard. Liam ensured the original guitar lines were played stronger
than Jim's ad-libbing, which worked well (sorry Jim!).
Action Radar played with the female vocal isolated at first, and then
bringing in one channel of the Numan-esque synth line, slowly bringing
in more channels, gradually making it sound more like the album
version, although this was all short lived, as it was merely an intro
for Firestarter - a song very well received, and despite it being a
song I'm usually tired off, Liam has thrown some new strong
weird-sounding notes into the chorus right where you wouldn't expect
them. I can safely say this is way superior to any version I've heard
before.
Bits of Climbatize were used as an intro to another song, I forget
which. Probably Breathe, which was the usual stuff, as was Minefields.
Nothing special.
The Way It Is was a surprise, it involved a lot of new beats from Liam
played over the top, and some new basslines. Worked really well.
Fake encore time. After a minute of the usual "we want more", the band
returned for Poison, the ending of which got punctuated with the synths
from Liam's mix of Release Yo'Delf, and also the beats and horns too, a
welcome inclusion. I wonder how many people there knew what it was?
Last ever song was Smack My Bitch Up, a textbook play of it, to an
enthusiastic crowd.
And that was that. What can I say about the Prodigy fans there? Very
friendly people, and no-one from England need be paranoid about popping
over to Northern Ireland.
The minor annoyances were some E'd up 16 year old lad from Bangor who
dumped his rucksack next to us to look after during the gig, while he
kept tripping out in various places around the venue.
Quite a good gig - and I'm evaluating well over a day after being
there, so the immediate post-gig enthusiasm can't taint the review.
Best Prodigy gig of the 21st Century, and it is clear Liam and the gang
can instantly go back to their late 90s standards, if not their mid 90s
level, if they would drop the obvious filler and reduce Keith's role
further. It gets a seven out of ten from me. As I said to local Prodigy
fan Kylie who asked me if it was the best - "I've seen them better".
Oh, I played back some of my recording - pretty much distorted, mostly
unlistenable, due to the intensely high volume! Damn.
Didn't bother doing the Dublin gig - so much to see here in this city,
so little time!
I'll add more paragraphs to this review when I'm in a position to
listen back to the gig. I know I've missed out a few songs, although
I'm certain Poison and Their Law were the only Jilted songs played,
likewise with Smack My Bitch Up, Breathe, Minefields, Climbatize and
Firestarter being the FOTL songs.
By Peter Thomas.
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