The production team which brought house music back from the brink of commercial mediocrity, Leftfield made it safe for artistic producers to begin working in a new vein termed progressive house. Paul Daley (a former member of A Man Called Adam and the Brand New Heavies) and programmer Neil Barnes combined the classic soul of early Chicago and New York house with the growing Artificial Intelligence school of album-oriented techno to create classic, intelligent dance music. When legal hassles over ownership of the Leftfield name prevented the pair from recording their own music after the release of their debut "Not Forgotten," they turned to remixing, establishing their early reputation for reworking tracks by artists ranging from Stereo MC's and David Bowie to Yothu Yindhi and Renegade Soundwave. Finally, with their courtroom battles successfully behind them, they formed their own Hard Hands label in late 1992 and issued the single "Release the Pressure," featuring reggae vocalist Earl Sixteen; "Song of Life" followed, and in 1993 Leftfield scored their first major hit with "Open Up," recorded with John Lydon. Their debut LP Leftism was released in 1995; the long-awaited Rhythm and Stealth followed four years later. With only two albums under their belt, Leftfield decided to split in early 2002 to focus on solo projects. ~ Jason Ankeny, All Music Guide
Leftfield are well-known to the mainstream UK audience for their track "Phat Planet", which soundtracked the "Surfers" TV advertisement for Guinness, ranked number one in Channel 4's Top 100 Adverts list in 2000. "Phat Planet" was the track used in the animated television series Beast Machines and the simulation racing games F1 2000 by EA Sports and Racedriver GRID by Codemasters. In addition their song "Release the Pressure" was used on adverts for the O2 mobile phone network at its launch and "A Final Hit" was featured on the Trainspottingsoundtrack; the b-side "Afro Ride" was also featured on the soundtracks to both wipE'out" and wipE'out" 2097 although it was only actually in the first game as a listenable track "in game". They also released a series of singles and two acclaimed albums before breaking up in 2002 to focus on solo projects.
Leftism
Their first major hit was "Open Up", a collaboration with John Lydon; soon followed by their debut album, Leftism in 1995, blending dub, breakbeat, and techno especially called "UK-dub". It was shortlisted for the 1995 Mercury Music Prize but lost out to Portishead's Dummy. In a 1998 Q magazine poll, readers voted it the eightieth greatest album of all time, while in 2000 Q placed it at number 34 in its list of the 100 Greatest British Albums Ever. The album was re-released in 2000 with a bonus disk of remixes.
At the very first Leftfield gig, in Amsterdam, the Dutch police were close to arresting the sound-man due to the sound system reaching illegal volumes. At the next concert, in Belgium, thirty people were given refunds after complaining that the sound level was too high, leading to a newspaper headline reading "Leftfield Too Loud". In June 1996, while the group was playing at Brixton Academy, the sound system caused dust and plaster to fall from the roof;[3] subsequently, the group was banned from ever returning to the venue.[3] The ban however was taken by the band as a ban on the sound system and not themselves,[3] which was confirmed when Leftfield played Brixton on 20 May 2000.[4]
