so, does anyone have a link to it? I missed this

Well, Liam did not only use 'expensive decks and mixers' to write FOTL, he used his samplers, which was the point - he's not sampling creatively anymore. Oh yes, he used a SAMPLE here or there, but that's not SAMPLING anymore. Have you seen the SMBU-video from Pavloff? That's how wicked Liam's sample sills were at the time. It's even easier today, where you can bypass the hardware. Liam always said he was a sampler man, that it was his favourite instrument and how he could bend and twist bits of other peoples music and make them fit into his tunes. He'd always try to get something weird going in the samplers, first. And you can totally hear that all over FOTL. There's really weird stuff going on in some places. Check the other Pavloff vids and you'll see what creative sampling is. IMD delivered nothing in that respect. There were breaks and some vocal samples, but that's just lifting, not creative sampling - nothing crazy like what happened in SMBU, Climbatize or even the resampled synth parts in Mindfields.

Apart from that, the drums just sound like ass on IMD. Compressed to shit, just a hit of white noise, no punch, no detail, no definition. It's all just a foggy mess of noise.

To your last sentence: Sure sure, anybody can "destroy" a crowd these days. That's just platitudes. Rammstein is destroying crowds, Scooter is. Drunken people on concerts don't need much. Me neither.
But I want a multi-dimensional record. One that I can also listen to at home and marvel at the writing, sound design and engineering work, the overall creativity. I can do that with Experience, MFTJG, FOTL, even BGAT or WEL.

Don't think that it's only the equipment that caused the major change in his writing.

Liam knew ho to write kick ass sound-design-beats. Maybe he's gotten lazy, maybe he's got other things on his mind, maybe he's not interested in the process anymore that much, maybe his head has turned into a Moet cabinet, who knows. Still, the overall quality of beats and sampling (and songwriting itself) has declined.
The Prodigy still produce good tunes. The difference is, they're not producing music anymore, that only The Prodigy could make.

That said, there's the odd ray of light here and there. The new material sounds much better than IMD and AONO to me. Things like the Sunlight-riff sound mystical and powerful, just the way it needs to be.

it sounds a lot like the bridge from thunder (lightning maybe?)

hope liam is not reading all this .. worst thing for creativity is to be pushed by other people opinion to do what they want not what you feel

+100

*The band is still the best compared to the rest by far for me since i first heard them back on the Experience era.The difference is that after AONO and IMD they look just like a shadow of the past. The gap with the other bands has closed.Most who are 25-26 yrs old and younger dont find the band so much better than others of their and current era. Even that Pendulum guy said something about Liam not long ago , remember? Who would dare to run his mouth about Liam's songwriting before AONO?

I luv u bk ppl, plz have fairh in lh, this ablb gonna blow ourminds, gut feeling, drunk but aware od prodge powwer

RESPECT .

Guyz listen to me, this band is my life . I am represwntin eevry daY . Wearing my teez every day, even my son does d same, i believe the will dwliver hevy shit, lh didnt forget how 2 create bombs

Weding bizzniz

I fucking love drunk Gava

haha.

Good man.

I don't care if ppl label it edm so long as its a good record, there are loads of good producers out there that get put under that umbrella. To me it sounds like a good jump from imd. Id prefer them to have some worldwide success with this album, an easy transition from the current crop of stuff, and I don't think they'd ever put out something we hate. Need to hear these clips in context, 10seconds isn't enough.

I seriously remember all the conversations in 2011 or so when people's biggest fears here were that the album is going to include dubstep because Liam said the album was gonna come out 2011-ish. Feels so long ago and now that's like the most far away thing I could imagine the album being like.

We haven't started a new fear thing here considering the EDM-hype!
What if the opening track of the album has a crazy build-up and a "3, 2, 1, JUMP"-drop?

i don't worry at all. this clip is about fist in the air shit, i bet after the drop there are some heavy prodigy style beats that will fukin lift both your feet up.

Prodigy is something all those edm'd producers are looking up to. it will not be other way around.

it's impossible to produce dance-type electronic music and not have any similar elements from other popular dance music genres.