Keith Flint fans invited to attend Prodigy vocalist's memorial procession

https://www.theguardian.com/music/2019/mar/23/keith-flint-prodigy-fans-invited-to-memorial-procession-essex

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Fans of the Prodigy vocalist, Keith Flint, have been invited to pay their respects to the musician by lining a procession route before a private service celebrating his life on Friday.

An inquest in Chelmsford earlier this month heard that Flint was found dead in his Essex home on 4 March.

Stars pay tribute to Keith Flint: 'A powerhouse of energy and attitude'

Since his death the pub he once ran in the village of Pleshey, the Leather Bottle, has become a rallying point for fans who have made the pilgrimage to Essex in tribute to Flint.

A tweet from the band’s official Twitter account described the procession route.

Fans are invited to line the procession route, starting at 3pm in Braintree, Essex on Fri 29th March, to pay their final respects & 'raise the roof' for Keef!If anyone wishes to lay flowers or tributes these should be sent to St Mary's church in Bocking, no later than 2pm Friday pic.twitter.com/cMTDv2jKi9

In a separate tweet his bandmates said: “The church service will just be for family and close friends, but there will be speakers relaying the ceremony outside the church for everyone to hear.”

An image was posted with the tweet, showing that the procession will start at the beginning of Courtauld Road, at the roundabout of Railway Street and Coggeshall Road. The route of the cortege will proceed along Courtauld Road before turning right on to Bradford Street and then Church Lane, where the procession is expected to end at 3.30pm. Flint’s bandmate Liam Howlett said in an earlier Instagram post that Flint “took his own life”. A full inquest into the circumstances around the singer’s death will be heard in Chelmsford on 23 July.

Flint performed the vocals on the Prodigy’s best-known singles, Firestarter and Breathe, which both went to No 1 in 1996. Firestarter became their biggest US hit and the group are often credited with helping to break dance music into the mainstream in the country.

Firestarter’s black-and-white video, featuring a headbanging, gurning Flint, was banned by the BBC after it was screened on Top of the Pops, with parents complaining that it frightened children. The lyrics – “I’m the bitch you hated/Filth infatuated” – were the first Flint had written for the band. “The lyrics were about being on stage: this is what I am. Some of it is a bit deeper than it seems,” Flint told Q magazine in 2008. The track sold more than 600,000 copies in the UK.

He was described in a statement by Howlett and fellow bandmate Maxim as “a true pioneer, innovator and legend”. They said Flint was their brother and best friend, and would be forever missed.

After Flint’s death, the Prodigy immediately cancelled all shows, including their appearance at London’s South West Four music festival in August.