| No Limits! | ||||||||||
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| Studio album by 2 Unlimited | ||||||||||
| Released | May 10, 1993 | |||||||||
| Recorded | Soundstational Studios | |||||||||
| Genre | Eurodance | |||||||||
| Length | 1:10:23 / 55:46 (UK) | |||||||||
| Label | Byte Records (Sony / PWL) | |||||||||
| Producer | Jean-Paul de Coster (exec. prod.) and Phil Wilde. | |||||||||
| 2 Unlimited chronology | ||||||||||
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| Singles from No Limits | ||||||||||
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No Limits is the second studio album for Dutch eurodance band 2 Unlimited. With this release, they became the only eurodance artist to have a UK number 1 album - a feat that they achieved twice.[1] As their British record company PWL were disatisfied with Ray Slijngaard's raps[2], the British version of this album replaced most of the raps with instrumental parts. No Limits yielded five singles and went platinum in several countries.
Contents |
2 Unlimited had limited success in 1992 with their debut album Get Ready!. It had produced four hit singles, but the album had not performed well commercially, peaking at just #37 in the UK.[3] At the time, many eurodance acts were able to produce hit singles but were unable to capitalize on this with a commercially successful album.[4] 2 Unlimited, however, broke the mould.
At the end of 1992, 2 Unlimited were still only known amongst those who followed chart music at the time. With the first single listed from this album, this changed. It went to number 1 in the UK in early February (competing with I Will Always Love You by Whitney Houston), and spent five weeks there. This exposure lead to them being parodied by the mainstream media with the TV series Spitting Image parodying the track as No Lyrics due to its repetitive lyrical content. Second single Tribal Dance was released in May 1993, and then this album followed soon afterwards.
Like all the studio albums by the band, the title of the album was a modification of the title of the lead single to be taken from it. The artwork for the UK cover was designed by Julian Barton and David Howells. As like all the 2 Unlimited releases, most other territories featured a different album cover to the UK edition of the album. Unlike their previous album in the UK,[5] where many of the tracks featured on it were instrumental,[6] the artwork to this album featured Ray and Anita on the front cover.
For the debut album, most of the writing had been done by Wilde and de Coster, with some input from Ray Slijngaard and other featured writers.[7] For No Limits, both Ray and Anita had much more input into the song writing process compared to the previous album. Anita has writing credits on seven of the album's fourteen songs and Ray has writing credits on ten of them.[8]
| Professional ratings | |
|---|---|
| Review scores | |
| Source | Rating |
| Allmusic | [9] |
| Smash Hits | [10] |
Despite its commercial success, at the time the album was panned by the critics, especially in the UK. In Smash Hits, reviewer Mark Frith described the album as an "across the board techno splurge" and stated that this album contained clues as to why the band were unpopular in "elite dance circles".[11] In the review of Maximum Overdrive, the magazine reiterated that the band were, "not hard or imaginative and they have no credibility in dance circles."[12]
The Allmusic review stated that beyond No Limit and Let The Beat Control Your Body, there was little to recommend this album.[13] Toby Anstis stated in his review of Faces that he "thought the album sounded all the same".[14] Nonetheless, the band won the Best Dance Act award in Smash Hits that year[15] as well as the World Music Award for Benelux.
Retrospective reviews of this album and the band in general have been more favourable. Only three years after the band split, they were described in a Guinness World Records publication as "spectacular" with the sound of No Limit being compared to "the sound giant dinosaurs might make stomping on cities".[16] Their entry then goes on to describe their choruses as "chant-worthy" and that the singles from this album "ravaged hearts and minds across the globe", ending with the statement that they "linger forever in the hearts of true music lovers".
| # | Title | Length |
|---|---|---|
| 1. | "No Limit" | 3:44 |
| 2. | "Tribal Dance" | 4:31 |
| 3. | "Mysterious" | 4:23 |
| 4. | "Faces" | 3:48 |
| 5. | "Maximum Overdrive" | 3:58 |
| 6. | "The Power Age" | 3:59 |
| 7. | "Break The Chain" | 3:49 |
| 8. | "Kiss Me Bliss Me" | 3:52 |
| 9. | "Throw The Groove Down" | 4:18 |
| 10. | "R.U.O.K." | 4:11 |
| 11. | "Let The Beat Control Your Body" | 4:02 |
| 12. | "Invite Me To Trance" | 4:07 |
| 13. | "Where Are You Now" | 5:01 |
| 14. | "Shelter For A Rainy Day" | 5:15 |
| 15. | "Get Ready For This (Wilde Mix)" Bonus track on the Continental edition |
5:59 |
| 16. | "No Limit (Automatic Breakbeat Remix)" Bonus track on the Continental edition |
4:48 |
| Chart | Date | Peak position | Certification |
|---|---|---|---|
| United Kingdom | May 1993 | 1 [17] | |
| The Netherlands | May 22, 1993 | 1 [18] | Platinum [19] |
| Norway | June 1993 | 2 [20] | |
| Switzerland | June 6, 1993 | 3 [21] | Platinum [22] |
| Austria | June 20, 1993 | 3 [23] | |
| Sweden | June 2, 1993 | 3 [24] | |
| Ireland | May1993 | 1 | |
| Japan | May1993 | 17 |
| Year | Title | UK | Netherlands | Germany | Switzerland | Austria | Spain | France | Ireland | Sweden | Norway | Canada | Australia | NZ |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1993 | "No Limit" | 1 | 1 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 7 | 40 |
| 1993 | "Tribal Dance" | 4 | 2 | 2 | 2 | 3 | 1 | 4 | 2 | 2 | 4 | 7 | 5 | 38 |
| 1993 | "Faces" | 8 | 2 | 8 | 19 | 10 | 4 | 16 | 7 | 11 | — | — | 54 | — |
| 1993 | "Maximum Overdrive" | 15 | 5 | 16 | 23 | 13 | 2 | 35 | 11 | 18 | — | — | 32 | — |
| 1994 | "Let The Beat Control Your Body" | 6 | 2 | 8 | 11 | 11 | 10 | 10 | 6 | 11 | — | — | 39 | 29 |
The following personnel all have writing credits on this album.
| Preceded by janet. by Janet Jackson |
UK number one album June 12, 1993 – June 18, 1993 |
Succeeded by What's Love Got to Do with It by Tina Turner |
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