The Prodigy
The Warehouse Project, Manchester

REPORTS of the death of the halcyon days of '90s warehouse raves have been greatly exaggerated.

Finishing a three-night run at the Warehouse Project on Friday, The Prodigy are making sure that it's too early to throw away those tubs of Vicks Vapo Rub yet.

With stellar support from, among others, Altern-8 and Slipmatt, Victoria Warehouse was bouncing to the sound of hoovers, off-key orchestra hits and furious sampled beats like never before.

Hard. Core.

Having said that, the main attraction largely stayed away from their rave-era sounds, with the notable exception of a wild and unexpected performance of Hyperspeed that had the crowd in paroxysms of ecstasy.

As is their custom, the boys are throwing bucketloads of prospective new material from their forthcoming album, How to Steal a Jetfighter, into their recent live shows.

The best of the new tracks, which are all guitar-heavy but with trademark pulverising basslines, is Jetfighter, a screaming piece of hard industrial noise over which Maxim repeatedly shouts the song's title. Awesome.

Also in the mix is Rock Weiler, a song which, once again, nods heavily in the direction of Rage Against the Machine, and Get Your Fight On, an aggressive beast of a track that sounds a little like a souped-up and speeded-up Diesel Power with no rapping.

There is no doubt that the popularity of dubstep and nu-skool drum 'n' bass are exerting their influence on The Prodigy's sound - perhaps it's for fear of losing their spot as producers of the world's hardest, noisiest and most aggressive electronic music while ear-shredding noise and killer bass increasingly become the accepted standard on today's dancefloors.

Last night's crowd was perhaps a little softer and less seasoned than the average Prodigy gig - there never felt like there was any danger of being trampled or crushed to death, even at the very front.

I'm saying this like it's a bad thing.

Regardless, The Prodigy, 22 years in, are still on top of their game and unparalleled at what they do best - fist in the air carnage. Bring on the new album.