The world's longest-running weekly music show, Top Of The Pops was never exactly a hotbed of subversion. The TV show's most iconic moments - from David Bowie performing Starman in July 1972 through to Nirvana's November 25, 1991 desecration of Smells Like Teen Spirit - gained infamy precisely because they were such a jolt to the senses on a programme regarded as a national institution.
Which might help explain why being confronted by the sight of a twitching, lairy man with a strip of hair shaved from the centre of his head stomping up and down an abandoned London Underground tunnel waggling his pierced tongue down the camera lens caused such outrage when the British public settled down for tea in front of Auntie Beeb's flagship music show on March 28, 1996.
A record number of complaints followed, and as the song began a three-week residency at the top of the national singles chart, the tabloid press and a number of English MPs expressed alarm at what potential messages this self-professed 'Twisted Firestarter' might be imparting to the nation's youth. As a teaser of what was to come with The Prodigy's third album, it could hardly have been more impactful.
