The Prodigy paid tribute to the late Keith Flint while playing ‘Firestarter’ at Reading Festival last night (August 23) – check out the footage below.
Flint died by suicide on March 4, 2019. He was 49 years old. The surviving members of the band are currently headlining Reading and Leeds Festival for the first time since his passing.
It’s their sixth time at R&L, and this time they’re playing the “groundbreaking” new stage, The Chevron. They’ll be performing at Leeds tonight (Saturday August 24) at 9:35pm.
Last night, the band paid tribute to Flint during their 1996 hit single ‘Firestarter’. While performing the track, the band beamed a laser outline of the late singer on stage that moved in time to the music.
It’s not the first time they’ve honoured the late singer in this way, In 2022 they embarked on their first live tour since the frontman’s death, which is where they began dedicating ‘Firestarter’ to Flint. They’ve paid tribute to him in this way at every live gig since.
Check it out below:
Nice Keef tribute. @the_prodigy @OfficialRandL pic.twitter.com/885uPnINXa
— Andrew Trendell (@AndrewTrendell) August 23, 2024
Earlier this month, Liam Howlett spoke to NME about what it was like to return to Reading and Leeds without Flint. “After losing Keith we couldn’t even think or talk about the band. I think it was two years after his death that me and Maxim started bringing it up. ‘Could we play live again? Did we even want to? Why? How?’ All that shit.
“We realised the only possible real way to know how we would feel was to do it: get back on stage and do a bunch of gigs. It was so hard to walk onto that stage without our brother, but we really felt the crowd with us. Those gigs were highly emotionally-charged but we came out the other end with our answer.
He went on to say: “That was summer 2022 and here we fucking are: loud and proud!”
NME caught the band’s performance last night, calling it a “gloriously unhinged, carnivalesque rave-up,” in a four-star review. “This is a glossily produced and sensationally life-affirming gig. In Flint’s absence, Maxim carries the show almost entirely himself,” Jordan Bassett wrote.
Reading & Leeds Festivals 2024 kicked off yesterday (August 23) at their usual sites of Richfield Avenue (Reading) and Bramham Park (Leeds) – see here for how you can follow along at home on BBC iPlayer and elsewhere if you were not able to secure a ticket.
The festival boasts Fred Again.., Lana Del Rey, Liam Gallagher, Catfish And The Bottlemen, Blink-182 and Gerry Cinnamon as its six headliners this year.
Raye, Spiritbox, Fontaines D.C., Reneé Rapp, Pendulum, Denzel Curry, Kenny Beats, Nia Archives, Two Door Cinema Club, Neck Deep, The Wombats, Rachel Chinouriri, Hak Baker, The Last Dinner Party and more are also expected to play.
Check back at NME here for the latest news, reviews, interviews, photos and more from Reading and Leeds 2024.