momentum ("Block Rockin' Beats" is the "Whole Lotta Love" of Dance Floor '97). And while the Chemicals know what to do with a good singer ("Where Do I Begin," with British rave-crowd chanteuse Beth Orton, sounds like Jane Birkin-does-"Ummagumma"), they don't need words or voices to get their basic message across. Which is: Shut up, trance out, dance your ass off.

Prodigy get by nicely on ferocity alone; "Fat of the Land" hasn't sold 1.3 million copies in the U.S. because of its textural depth or stimulating lyrics (it has little of either). If it weren't for the distinctively plastic sound of the drum programs and the gulping-synth noises that pass for melody, "Fat" would barely qualify as electronica. Producer, writer and chief button pusher Liam Howlett shaves his songs and samples down to a chain-saw-guitar buzz that has "Hey! Ho! Let's go!" stamped all over it. But Howlett's riffs go nowhere after initial impact, and google-eyed stage demon Keith F