BADBADNOTGOOD: "Limit To Your Love"

“Limit to Your Love” has, through no fault of its own, become a curious artifact. I doubt Leslie Feist ever imagined it would be taken on and reinterpreted on two youthful, enterprising records in two years, particularly given the imbued personality and feeling in the original. This BADBADNOTGOOD iteration, however, is even more interesting for the way that rather than tackling Feist’s version, it takes on James Blake’s cover of last year, and becomes a filter of the filter. Which is an odd concept, as covers usually symbolize a maintaining of the concept and a departure of the aesthetic, so a cover of a cover would have to mean…what, exactly? Especially when, in this instance, James Blake already substantially altered the tone; his striking silences, wobbling tension, and disregard for the song’s chorus and moment of empowered release—the bridge—transfigured the mood from one of acceptance to that of hurt. Perhaps that justifies BBNG’s attempt: Blake’s aesthetic choices had made his “Limit to Your Love” a new creature to the extent that the song’s emphasis had changed, in turn validating reasoning that the cover itself could be related differently.

It is a wholly new rendition when BBNG do it, too, their jazz style bound by the genre to associations of performance and illimitability. Their Bandcamp willingly proclaims BBNG2 was recorded in one ten-hour session, by musicians not yet fully adults. Experimentation of the bounds of their instruments feels innate to these performers, and comes with assurance. There appears to be no qualms or hesitation about the way BBNG make this song sound threatening. Gone are Blake’s dubstep reverberations, replaced instead by suffocating rolling drums, a palpable tribal menace. As it gathers momentum, it rumbles and erupts; drum rolls become cymbal crashes and fills; thunderclaps round out the mix. It’s difficult to imagine this latent power lying dormant in Feist’s wistful, resigned effort, but maybe that’s what James Blake brought to the mix, and left unknowingly awaiting this treatment.