Pitchfork

A handful of industry insiders and media outlets expected The Prodigy's third album, 1997's The Fat of the Land, to alter America's pop landscape. Those prognosticators were correct: The album (which, fact fans, debuted at #1 in the same week that Radiohead's OK Computer bowed at #21) was a significant modern rock signpost, albeit not for the expected reasons. At the time, The Prodigy had been billed-- along with the Chemical Brothers, Orbital, and Underworld-- as the leaders of the mainstream media's regretfully named "electronica" movement, a moment in which electronic dance music was going to finally crossover to MTV and radio in the U.S.

However, instead of inspiring you and your band to trade in your guitars for turntables, The Prodigy-- along with unlikely and otherwise unrelated contemporaries such as Korn, Nine Inch Nails, and Rage Against the Machine-- laid the groundwork for the string of mostly limp rap-rock/nu-metal bands that dominated modern rock throughout the late 1990s and into the new millennium. In retrospect, The Prodigy may not have become America's Great Electronic Hopes but "Firestarter" could be the world's greatest nu-metal single, a rousing anthem for the Mook Era that was unfortunately taken to heart at Woodstock '99, the abandoned festival that served as rap-rock's peak in popularity and its cultural nadir.

OK Computer, "electronica," Rage Against the Machine, Woodstock '99-- it may seem like ancient history, but that divide is the uphill battle The Prodigy face after a seven-year gab between records. The good news is that calling the band "they" is more misleading now than it has been in recent years: The Prodigy's fourth album, Always Outnumbered, Never Outgunned, is mostly the work of musical linchpin Liam Howlett. Dancer Leeroy Thornhill left the group years ago, and neither Maxim Reality nor Keith Flint is featured here. Flint's bleating on The Prodigy's 2002 comeback single "Baby's Got a Temper"-- a cringe-worthy attempt at provocation (it's an ode to "date-rape drug" Rohypnol) that is thankfully not included-- may have been his final bow with the group.

Instead, vocals are provided by Kool Keith, Princess Superstar, and Juliette Lewis (among others), a roster that hints that the seven-year wait between records is less a result of going back to the drawing board as it is trying to coax a finished product from years-old ideas. (One could add Liam Gallagher to that list of past-their-sell-date vocalists, but as Howlett's brother-in-law his appearance could be as much a familial decision as a musical one.) Of the guests, only an underutilized Twista lends the album an air of timeliness.

Even more disappointingly, Always Outgunned is a mess of unfocused energy and uncomfortably irrelevant sonics, an odd mix of cartoonish immediacy and tired youth-cult ideas that would be the perfect soundtrack to Itchy & Scratchy & Poochie: The Movie. The results are even more regrettable because they're coming from Howlett, whose string of singles and first two albums with The Prodigy are still crucial and enthralling.

Howlett's run of solid singles does remain intact with "Girls", a delicious red herring of electro and breakbeats that stands head, shoulders and torso above the rest of the album. It leads into Princess Superstar collab "Memphis Bells" and "Get Up Get Off", the next closest things to album highlights. The latter features the yeoman-like Twista, who wisely slows his cadence rather than being tempted to race alongside BPMs which-- although hardly pummeling-- are much higher than, say, a Kanye West or R. Kelly production.

"Hotride"-- one of two Lewis collaborations-- is a heavy-handed re-imagination of The Fifth Dimension's "Up, Up & Away" (no, really) that aims for sexual but simply isn't sexy. Howlett also reaches back into the 1960s on "Phoenix", which liberally samples of The Shocking Blue's "Love Buzz", a vain, lifeless attempt to rub shoulders with the current wave of retro 60s garage rock. It's perhaps the record's most telling moment: long-time innovator Howlett aligning himself with the most necrophiliac elements of contemporary rock. The record's ungainly, knuckle-dragging nu-metal trappings overshadow any other pleasant sonic accoutrements-- the bassline from "Thriller" that loops throughout much of "The Way It Is" or the playful, subtle beats of "Memphis Bells".

"Your time is running out," Liam Gallagher sneers on album closer "Shoot Down", and it's unfortunately a fair warning for The Prodigy themselves. For a record that presumably took seven years to create, Always Outnumbered sounds unsurprisingly outdated but oddly lazy. Perhaps if Howlett officially disbands The Prodigy he can rediscover freedom and inspiration recording under his own name or another moniker, but if this "it goes to 11" take on rap-rock is all he's managed to digest and engage with during his absence, it's possible he needn't bother.