It’s safe to say the Prodigy’s music wasn’t really to my taste. What you couldn’t say about it was that it didn’t make a statement. It stands in stark contrast to the ocean of blandness into which modern music has submerged in the late teen years of the twenty-first century, where all the performers seem to merge into one generic mass.
It was therefore sad to hear of the demise of Keith Flint who fronted the Prodigy in their mid-90s pomp. Even sadder that it seems he took his own life. Any life cut short is a misfortune but more so when it might have been prevented.
I also discovered from the obituaries a personal connection with the band as it was formed in Braintree, Essex, a town where I lived for two years during 1980 and 1981.
Listening to this (and to their only other number one Firestarter) now, I find myself warming to their work. Too late, alas.
The Prodigy: Breathe
Keith Charles Flint: 17/9/1969 – 4/3/2019. So it goes.
The day after Braintree we took in the nearby village of Silver End. This was the first time we’d been there as for all the years we lived in Essex we didn’t have a car.
We were looking for the housing estate designed by the architect Thomas S Tait who I see from the link submitted an unsuccessful plan for Kirkcaldy Town Hall. Among other accomplishments he was the architect of St Andrew’s House in Edinburgh which I have featured here and here.
We knew we were on the right track when we came upon this in Boar’s Tye Road:-
It’s needing a bit of TLC I would say.
The next junction takes you into Silver Street. Every building is one of Tait’s.
This was taken from the other end of the street after we had parked.
This is the junction of Silver Street and Broadway which also contains many Tait houses.
There must have been around two hundred flat roofed houses in the deco style over the two streets.
A few had some extra deco flourishes like the triangular columns with windows in this photo where you can also see the connecting walls between them which house the gates to the rear gardens.