When I switched over from a complete classic rock n metal background to big beat electronica back in 2001 I remember my clear big beat favourites were the Chems (Come With Us was my crossover eyeopening lifechanging record) followed by the Prodigy, Fatboy, Daft Punk and BT. I used to often wonder back in the 2000s how these bands will evolve individually though they're all being clubbed under Big Beat pioneers. Which ones would stay in the game, evolve to new levels, still blow our minds over the decades with innovation n live gigs.
Clearly all have gone down their own paths. Different yet iconic all. Some have obviously lost studio steam. Personally I used to often wonder most between the Prodigy and the Chems. They both started (like Fatboy) as insanely psychedelic mindbending music (I was a Prodigy Experience fan more than Fat Of the Land - that mad rave energy of the outter space drums n keys Liam wrote on that gold record- that record wouldn't stop from the word go to finish). The Chems were way more diverse from the word go.. a complete psychedelic album experience much like Pink Floyd (my numero uno psy Gods back then) - their albums would follow the acid graph - start..rise ... peak madness.. nice long awesome plateau.. gradual n soothing comedown leaving you with an afterglow. Glint. Tonight in 2012 I finally saw the Chems live film, and the Prodigy live film back to back - yeah they're late in the day some may say, but I personally think it's apt timing for both the bands - they define right now what both stand for.. today.. and their evolution into the mammoth live acts they've become over the last 20 yrs - both iconic yet so different. Also having seen the Prodigy live twice last year finally, and the Chems last month, my dejavu stares me in the face now; this is what I had kinda imagined back in 2001 when it was not so clear. The Prodigy - a mad mad live act - definitely way more commercial and bigger in the dance music industry thanks to their flamboyant live and media acts - Keith Flint - enought said... Liam the supergod and the brain of the juggernaut always had Keith, Leeroy and Max to smack the proverbial bitch up live. Mad bad ass punk energy, live guitars and drums, it's mindnumbing to see the Milton Keynes DVD - a lot of metal fans at Download this year are gonna be up for the surprise of their life. I remember some friends who went to see Maiden at Dubai back in 2005 and were forced to see Prodigy (as they were right before Maiden) - they didn't know what hit them that night. These people had never heard any electronic music before. I found some of their vocal reactions on message boards amusing but I knew exactly where they were coming from when they said " I don't know man what was going on but we couldn't stop jumping the fuck up for 2 hrs". Yes these ole skool metalheads were raving to Prodigy that night, back before they could spell electronic music or rave. A lot of them love the Prodigy and a lot of electronic music today. Nothing ironic there really.
The Chems on the other hand are a completely different psychedelic monster in the studio and live even today - they get crazier n bigger if anything by the day..some naysayers may say they've become tamer - there are no mad chemical fucked up beats anymore, not much breaks, but they've done all that, they have nothing left to prove there- they wrote the fucking genre! there's no moshing, there's no headbanging, there can never be any circle of death at a Chems live. People (fans and first timers alike) are often caught with their eyes closed, holding their hands up to the sky, humbled, and silenced in a spiritual trance. Out of control. In awe of something bigger than everything they've always felt and believed real. Possible.
Watching them live last month dj for two and a half hours bang centre front infront of the mad strobes and loud, crystal clear but mindcrunching sound envelope (without any visuals!!); and then watching the live FujiRock film tonight with the insane visuals from the other mad visual scientists Adam Smith and Marcus Lyall.. I'm silenced again. I shouldn't have been. Not to this extent. For I've been hearing their live fan bootlegs since Come With Us era - hundreds by now, I've always known they're mad psycho scientists fucking your brain in all kindsa dimensions n melting it, even more if you are a fan and know where those multiple layers and samples are coming in live from - how effortlessly (or you may believe) they're being triggered, mixed live into monster segues, making a psychedelic salad of your heads - with a big grin plastered on your face in unbelievable awe most times, - at their dexterity at blending those mad layers and samples live, taking you higher than you could imagine, those mad bass drops which can actually throw you off your feet, fucking with those sirens till u scream scream n then scream some more.. till you just give in.. surrender to their void.. let forever be.. take u.. however.. wherever... just let it flow. They make you do it even if u'r not the kind who can let go of control. They leave you no fucking choice really. I've seen it happen to 25000 almost ravers (almost most non fans- there to "check out" the Chems) - they didn't know what hit them but they knew how good it was. Yes not everyone can withstand the complete aural assualt they subject you to initially, but at some point you just give in and let yourself go where they take you - those very private very shy rockstars behind the mad analogue decks. You're lost in their world. They control everything that you see in there. Literally. For eg, "most" Fujirock fans on the film didn't seem the hardcore fans who knew every song.. but they all went through the most mindnumbing psychdelic circus that night - yet the most spiritual epic journey of their lives. You could see it on those sometimes lost, sometimes scared, innocent, bewildered, frenzied yet mostly very happy faces. I always knew about this MAD aspect to the Chems live experience- having been hearing the fan bootlegs loud in the confines of my home forever now; there could be no more a crazier mindbending live experience for a mad fan like me. But still ("unsurprisingly", if I may borrow anType's very apt word here, when I saw them dj last month at Future Music I actually got blown by the real taste of THE CHEMS LIVE experience - of being there and not being there - they took us through these wormholes into many parallel universes - for those 2 hrs we were definitely not on this planet and not in any reality we knew. N probably the single most happiest soul on earth. Almost all 25000 of us. Whether we were a fan, or just a random raver who'd just come for a good time. That's something that surprised me. I always thought it would be too much, too hardcore for the non-fans, the casual electronica listeners.. but yes.. they all were in glint that night.

So coming back, yes, I always knew at the back of my mind even back in 2001 it would be the Chems who would stay my personal heros. Nothing really substantial against the Prodigy - I worship the genius of Liam Howlett even today (hear the dirtchamber sessions to know what I'm talking if you don't already know the gold mix)- the 2nd biggest brain after Tom n Ed in electronic music, right up there with the psychdelic and mad production genius of Norman Cook - the man who gave us the most mindbending of records in history - You've Come A Long Way Baby. I am one of those fans who stayed with Norman through his new avatars - I loved Palookaville and respected him for what he'd evolved into. Loved that record unlike most ole skool fans. But live Norman was always a much tamer, happier, hippier experience - I'm not talking his psycho funky underground mix sets from back in the day - I'm talking the more commercial brighton and big beach boutiques - the 3 lac people on the beach raves - those live sets were always far away from his insane psychedelic very twisted monster studio records - live for him was about smileys, fans jumping, ladies showing titties, drunk and e-fueled fans climbing high poles, basically everyone just losing it having a great time. Mad respect to the man for going that way live too. He didn't choose to fuck his fans and turn them into brain salads live, even though he's as twisted as they come.. but rather have happy jumpy Xtatic times.. the more casual hippy ravers.. u didn't have to be a psycho fatboy fan to still have the best rave of your life at his gigs - yes - if that didn't make your booty move, your booty must have been dead. You could always spin one of his studio records in the confines of your room sitting smack bang centre in the middle of the speakers to experience your brain turning into jelly as he mad produced and panned those crazy motherfucking sounds on his epic records. That's if you were a hardcore fatboy fan -but if you weren't you could still go shake your ass at his gigs and look back at it as the best rave of your life. Yes I look forward to seeing Norman live someday soon. It will truly be a mad happy experience.

Daft Punk - yes - geniuses but always been withering on funny grounds -pseudo experimental - sometimes hitting some right notes, but mostly bum ones lately. Tron had one good song honestly. They were mad live for me back during the Alive 97 days - I'm sure they still are..To be very honest I've never followed their live stuff so hardcore - I respect them for the musical geniuses they are, but never reverred them (as people and live musicians) like my other top 3 or 4 ..though they are also definitely considered a complete mad live act.
For me the personal touch was missing. Blame the helmets? Maybe not. Yes they wrote two of my favourite studio albums of the time, own every cd they've put out, almost every mix (I actually liked Human After All also quite a bit - some great tracks, not a great record) and I'd still give half an arm to see them live once - but frankly I lost the respect somewhere along the line many years back. I was honestly never much into Orbital - i did casually flirt with their records just a few years back, liked a couple but was more a Chems boy always. They were ahead of Orbital in the same kinda sphere. I may be off here. Late to the party, but the new album has blown me away so you never know i may dig in to the old stuff again, but I'm honestly past that stage to go back to dated records. But I'd still go seem them for their live set if they come anywhere close to me. Same with Underworld - wasn't exposed to their stuff at the right time.. except some obviously great remixes of the Chems ( a couple really) and of course THE Born Slippy. Thanks to Trainspotting primarily. Monster track no question. Again I blame lack of exposure. I was discovering all my dance music (we didn't even call it dance music back then cause we never danced to it!) on my own with my best buddy and flatmate - we never knew any people into this music in this town - everyone heard metal or turned to psytrance when they crossed over. There was no internet back then to download music, and we had to spend big bucks to source the stuff we did find from foreign shores. No record stores sold our kinda stuff. People laughed at us for selling out and listening to techno. So who are your favourite live acts today in 2012 if you were an original big beater? If big drums were religion? Even if breaking those beats is almost dead and those bands have evolved into something else today.

I'm sure it's still the Chems for me - will always be - in a league of their own - THE MAD SCIENTISTS (I was always a geek), the baaps of acid house, the original cross over artists (like Fatboy said in his famous interview - "we were all mildly flirting with rock n roll - they took it and shoved it up it's own ass);

And then there are the others - some insane live acts who've done really well, unlike my original predictions that they would die out in the long run.. I'm glad they're all still around and kicking ass.. and have big fan followings and their own iconic gigs. But what's the way forward for us ole skoolers, the proverbial light at the end of the tunnel - I see hope in some new live acts like Holy Fuck and some relatively new though not new - like a Phoenix (borderline psy electronica tho mostly still rock), Air have lost it for me, where did the FreeStylers go?, Plump DJs who? Krafty Kuts? I like the last Crystal Meth a lot after their mid career clunkers, but most folks don't - is the future really all wobble bass, blips n bleeps and "minimal"? The Trentemollers and the Deadmau5'? the Skillrex'? I saw Chase n Status live and I loved the act - amazing band - but no - honestly they're nowhere close to the above Gods we talk about. Almost same with Pendulum. I personally love them, but the last album was almost meh. Yes they're massive commercially because of the stupendous live act- bigger than and prolly the new Prodigy. Any reccos you brothers got for me or is electronic psychedelia in it's true mad mindbending glory really dying, and people are happier shaking their asses in garage clubs to the new "proggy" minimal trends; maybe some spinnin these records a wee bit at home, but are fans really worshipping these musicians like the icons of our time anymore? Has digital production and bastardization of the music creation process really killed the icons, the real game changers, the stadium fillers, the reverands? Dumbed out music creation and listening? Are there still bands out there emerging I'm not aware of, catering to fans like me who once loved mighty mindbenders like a Pink Floyd.. for making music that ceased to being just music at some point, and became portals to different alternate universes, just soundtracks to a mad journey inside, or outside? A spiriitual "trip" (sometimes happy and blindingly bright, sometimes very dark and scary, but yet always illuminating and enriching at the end)? Is this the past already?

That's quite an essay you wrote there Jack. Have to sink in it.

I've been a massive Prodigy fan from 1992 and a massive Chemical Brothers fan since 1994.
Through the years I've always known that the Prodigy would be an "I'll kick your as and make you buzz" act and that some day I would outgrow them. Now 20 years further I've seem to have arrived at that point. I'm still going to as many gigs as I can but I will not be moshing at the front of the stage, I'll do my partying behind the sound guys at the back.

I have grown up with music by Mike Oldfield, Tangerine Dream, Vangelis, Maurice Jarre and Jean Michel Jarre and I had a feeling that The Chemical Brothers would be an evolvement of those 70's instrumental electronic music. I still believe that to be true but they have become so much more. The Beatles, Kraftwerk and Pink Floyd are great reverences but also Tame Impala or I Break Horses or the Knife, psychedelic, electronic music with a tiny glimpse of pop.

I understand why the Prodigy can be headlining Gatecrasher or Creamfields and also Download, why the can be in Mixmag and in Kerrang! and NME. The Chemical Brothers were the big frontfighters of the Big Beat genre but the were always more than that, allways an amalgam between hip-hop, acid, pop, psychedelica.

The Prodigy still stays the live-act. I can see The Chemical Brothers going Jean Michel Jarre style. Big extravaganza shows at the Eiffel Tower or the pyramids. Or even in the Roundhouse. The back to back live show of Further with all the visuals . Adam Smith said in an interview that would like to have used the round venue for all kinds of projections. 1 thing is for sure that IS going to happen.

I would like to see the Chems headling a big DJ set. I've them twice in Turnmills but an out in the open to 25000 people DJ show would be a great experience.

In those early 90s I like British electronic act like Underworld and Orbital as well but they seemed to have peaked in the mid 90s where the Chemical Brothers have grown much more and evolved their music in something that doesn't sound like their early work but suplement it in the live sets.

So 20 years from now there will be a time when a whole lot of forum members will meet at an airport somewhere, showing each other photos of their double mohawk firestarter hairdo from way back when, singing Lager, lager, lager along on great hits of the 90s radiostation and even one of us has Daft Punk helmet (or is it Thomas himself?) as we board a plane flying to China for a Chemical Brothers 40th anniversary gig at the Great Wall in China where green and yellow balloons will explode on, toy robots will walk out of and clowns will sing on.
I hope to see you guys there.

I want to reply to this simply out of respect, but I don't know what I could say to match that. Wow.

(I would like to object a bit over the summary of Daft Punk, though... if only because their fourth record looks like it's shaping up to be a real game-changer.)

A 40th anniversary gig at the Great Wall? I'm there, count me in!

That really is quite an essay, Jack. There are a lot of things you've laid out, coming from the perspective of someone who has been a fan for so long and is just now beginning to experience the 'live' realm. In the end , i really think music and the experiences it bring, is what you make of it.

In a way, I kind of hold on to so much of what I listen to as a way to keep my grip on the building blocks of my memories. The 90's for me were a whirlwind of constant change, confusion, trying to find my place in the world. I went from being a high school grad, to college student, to being a wife, to being a new mother, to being a toddler chaser - all in under a decade. The thing that has been constant is the music I listen to. When worlds collide or collapse all around me, the songs are there. Something to hang on to, something to reel me back in time, or in some cases propel me into a moment that can build a memory for the future. With that said, and now that we're past the first decade of the new millennium, I don't really have much of a desire to hang n to the romantic idea of big beat anymore than I have the desire to go to a club on a Saturday night and dance until I'm in copious amounts of pain. I mean, I'm a bit of an old lady now. It's weird, and I get hung up on age sometimes. But overall i'm OK with that - the whole getting older bit.

But as far as the things that continually hold my interest, or music that gets my attention and holds my gaze. Those things are few and far between, and always have been. I think my time spent on here for as long as I have is evidence of one of the constant things in my life that has managed to grab my attention and keep me interested all these years. The people here are pretty cool too. That is more than I can say about other bands (that goes for the ones I admittedly love and have talked about here). I've been a fan for long time but I can't stake my claim of being a 'back in da day' fan. When I saw the Chems in 1999, that was the landmark gamechanger for me. The Chems were superstar dj's by then. I knew nothing of what to expect - I didn't read up on their shows! I barely was even on the Internet. I just liked their music and wanted to hear what it would sound like, live. Oh, and I wanted to go to a giant rave in the middle of the desert. but anyway. What I saw were 2 men on stage hunkered behind a wall of gear and tangled wire, overshadowed by these electrifying projected images that pulsed and breathed along with music that sounded completely alien, and beautiful, and exceptionally loud. But as big as the spectacle was, there was a feeling of intimacy that reached through the music. It felt familiar and reminiscent of something I had experienced before. Even though that was a pretty big show, it has been an amazing thing to watch that show and their stage presence evolve into this mega thing over the years, just as their music has evolved. It makes me proud to have seen them in 1999 as it makes me proud to watch (from the comfort of my own sofa) a bunch of people totally getting their rocks off at Fuji rock. Listening to that playlist from Easter, their career is pretty damn prolific. Not just the familir hits. But the breadth of what they've done with their music all this time. I'm not sure what's next, in terms of music in general - my approach is let the pieces fall where they may - and I'm not sure what's in store for The Chems, or their live show. I don't want to spend time wondering or worrying about what might or might not be. I'm just glad I've made it this far and the Chems have allowed me to come along for the ride. So whatev. I'm ready to go whereever they go.

Your story is very similar to how my musical taste developed back then. My eye opener was Daft punk's Discovery, soon to follow by CWU, the chemical brothers. I used to lend CD's from the public libary and soon found the Orbital, Enigma, Fatboy slim and The Propellerheads (check them out! one of the best Big Beat one day fly s ever)
I loved reading your experience and decided to revise all the records that made me fall in love with Big Beat and psychedelic awesomess in general.

Where next? I think a concept album is something they didn't do yet and will be very special. Maybe they go more in the direction of Tom's psychedelic mix and make more ambient like work. All we know is that it will be something better than we can expect in our wildest dreams. They are at their peak right now (Escape velocity is the most epic track ever made and the best way to have 4 eargasms in 12 minutes) and i think they can do even better Let's hope they don't get lonely at the top.
My deepest wish is a collaboration with Amon Tobin in the future. what do you guys think is next?