The leader of The Prodigy says the UK is a better place now electronic dance music (EDM) is “dead”.
Liam Howlett, co-founder of the Grammy-nominated three-piece, added the UK rap music scene that supplanted EDM “impressed” him.
The producer, 47, told the Press Association the fact the genre was still popular in America did not bother him.
Asked about the state of the British music scene, he said: “It is better than it was three years ago because at least EDM is f****** dead. That’s gone. It might still be in American but who gives a f***, you know.
“We’ve got street music now, which I find more exciting. UK rap, some of the rap producers out there.
“It’s not just the rhymes, its the beats that are being made that really impress me.”
Asked if The Prodigy’s music had ever been used without permission, as American rapper Pharrell Williams found with US President Donald Trump at a rally, he replied: “We have and obviously that f****** annoys me beyond belief. They will be getting legal suits and shit flying around.
“No one can use my music unless they ask, and if they ask nicely I might let them. But no politicians are asking me because I don’t do that.
“We’re not a political band. We are an escapism band. However, what I will say is that some issues, like the Criminal Justice Act, we didn’t see as political really.”
Howlett’s group were critics of the UK’s Criminal Justice And Public Order Act 1994, which banned the raves popularised following the so-called second summer of love in 1988 and 1989.
He added: “We felt like we could do something about that. OK, nothing happened, but it was an important thing to us.
“You won’t find me doing rallies with Russell Brand holding f****** placards. That’s bollocks.”
Howlett, whose band releases their seventh album No Tourists on November 2, also spoke of how he had deprived himself of sleep to encourage his creative process.
He said: “Every album does take you to the edge, man. That’s how the music happens. I’m in the studio, really intense. I wanted to really try to write in a different way than I did on the last record.
“Anyone who thinks they can go into the same room with the same surroundings, same equipment, same time and expect different results is crazy.
“You have to put your head in different thought patterns. I had this new studio in King’s Cross in London.
“I then decided to see what it would be like if I just didn’t sleep. I was testing the boundaries.”
The Prodigy’s No Tourists will be released on November 2 via the group’s label, Take Me To The Hospital.
