1983-86 Hit The Pulse To Purge is the new 4cd box set from underground electronica legends Portion Control featuring no less than 77 tunes including the albums Hit The Pulse, Ste Forward and Psycho Bod Saves The World plus two live shows from 1984 and 1985 along with 12" singles and rarities. All the tunes have been remastered by Paul Lavigne at Kontrast Mastering. This review will feature the 10 key tracks sampler, The B-sides And Demos disc and the live disc. Portion Control are Dean Piavani and John Whybrew who recorded several Peel sessions and were a much loved underground electronica act who have been reactivated since 2004.
Chew You To Bits mixes early electronica with vocals in a similar vein to the many faces of Foetus, the bassline being central to this, with drum machines and effects fired off around it, while he gets properly bitter trying to Chew You To Bits. Under The Skin has what sounds like gated drums, a clap track and some rather krautrock style synths for a floor filler questioning just why we are here and what's going on, making you think while you dance the night away.
Danger Zone is where they take us with a similar intensity to B.E.F. while they list the things we shouldn't do, some scratching and synths leading them into the brave new world of Danger Zone colony earth that is a salutary lesson for our current tech titans desire to live on mars.
The Great Divide 12" version has an hi-nrg beat and feel musically, the vocals being more intense as they try to cross The Great Divide, between those that want a militarized society and those who prefer a more free way of living, over the immense drum workout, taking away your fears and keeping you away from The Across The Great Divide websites paranoia.
H.O.T. Matter is spilling its guts all over the dancefloor with cool effects, echoes and minimalist drum machines trying to cleave open your heart and accept the love. Brain Scraper Death Dive is dark twisted and uses its samples carefully to add to the intensity of what's going on in the dislocated beats.
Go Talk (Purge Version) is a bit controlling in how they want to treat you, with the intense electronica pulsing, they urge you to go talk and sort things out over that synth riff, that keeps revolving and evolving, until the monumental breakdown dub chasm with deep powerful bass beats leading into the fade out.
Raise The Pulse (Purge Version) tries to tell you how they feel, over break beats and quite euphoric keyboard lines, getting pulped in the maelstrom of noisy intensity, going back to the electropop style. Havoc Man has a slight intro around a simple keyboard motif, while they hope for a quiet life avoiding all the damage and aggression of the Havoc Man and what he does to destroy his world, rather than working to make it better, while sounding like Carter The Unstoppable Sex Machine might have reworked this song into one of their bigger hits, better call the Sheriff.
Abbo Dabbo has some interesting samples and industrial percussion on what could be a tribute to Abbo from UK Decay.
B-Sides And Demos 1983-1986 opens with the frightening clatter of Collapse that fades out and in and takes a motorik beat, pots and pans industrial percussion, intense vocals and sounds properly bonkers.
Bite My Head has a clear vocal rap that is surrounded by electronic weirdness and effects, with an unrelenting drum machine beat, vocals are pitch shifted and everything shredded through an echo machine of some sort, before going back to the poppy keyboards, this is wonderfully out of its mind, showing what a proper mad b-side remix could sound like.
Justice has a proper EBM beat and sound with the righteously bitter vocals calling for real Justice, with lots of effects and left field sounds bringing a sense of unease. The Man Who Did Backwards Somersaults should be back to back with David Bowies Up The Hill Backwards, only this is far weirder and more out there, with some great metal sheet percussion and a stonking bassline.
Upside Down reworks Go Talk with danker beats and a propulsive edge, with the keys phasing in and out of time to the vocal grunts that are rather dark room at a club. Drag Down has Casio keys with a very simple drum machine part, allowing the synth lines to develop over them.
Divided sounds like an immense dancefloor jam, with some rewind the selector tape manipulations, keyboard stabs keeping us moving and grooving across the great dancefloor Divide, making as many weird grunting noises possible.
Bolt It Down the cacophonous intro leads into the simple keyboard part that the drum machines build around, I need a bigger dancefloor to really let rip to this, that should be heard in the scuzziest darkest dankest of club environments of the sort that are no longer allowed.
The Great Divide (Instrumental) is perfect to drop into a dancefloor at about 2 am, getting everyone dislocating all over the place to that techno beat and magical keyboards. This gets me dancing and moving like I am back at Astral Flight or Helden.
Total Recall is harder than Arnie's triceps, the unrelenting beat and amplified distorted typewriter noises and poppy synth line battle it out, like they are leather men on steroids. 24 is all grunts and clap tracks with almost Rhubarb And Custard keyboards.
IDL Dragdown repeats and repeats until it properly drags you down into the nightclub mire of propulsive repetitive beats and dark misdeeds. Displaced Hybrid Refugee is possibly more pertinent now in 2026 than it was in the 80's although that decades boat people scare would have been happening, they want us to spare a thought for those whose life has become so desperate they have become refugees.
Scramble (Instrumental) (demo) has a great EBM feel, nice and speedy and ready to twist and move to, while looking like you are running to catch a plane. Cut And Thrust (Demo) is looking at how tough things could be if you didn't have a job in the Yuppie 80's world, sounding perfectly ready to be played in clubs all over the place.
H.O.T. Matter (Demo Version 1) has a busy almost drum and bass drumbeat with phaser like synths and vocals about how love is difficult, they want to reach out, but you're not there, they will fight with you to keep the stereo, even if you walk off with all the cool records. The second Demo version seems to have a lightly softer edge musically, yet the vocals sound a touch more bitter and twisted.
Taste Of Love lets them make you an offer you can't refuse, yep you must love Portion Control and buy everything by them you can, including all the t-shirts and hoodies and in return they will make cool synthpop singles like this to delight and entice you with. The demos disc closes with Conscience (Arthur Baker demo) wants you to dance the night away while listening to your Conscience and doing the right thing.
The Live 1984-1985 disc opens with the intro music to the gig at Potanus in Amsterdam on April Fools day 1984, it's ambient bell ringing with clattering noises on metal sheets. Eat Your Heart has almost digital phone ringer noise encased in heavy percussive elements. Abbo Dabbo slowly builds over the vocal sample into mesmeric dark dancefloor action and intense barked vocals.
Crash Weight Gain they are threatening to OD on Slimcea again, they will lead the way to the next repeat of the cycle of despair, they try to get their perfect nightclub ready body. Betrayal sounds properly frightening with all the yelps and hardcore repetitive noise they are muttering through. Box lightens the mood, while baby turns to you and obviously smiles and gets you dancing to the slow electronica, that in places seems to mimic panpipes. The Amsterdam set closes with Go Talk played in maelstrom of clatter and hard synths with the crisis that leads to the Go Talk they recommend stop all the fighting.
The second live set is from Dolce Vita in Lausanne 6.12.1985. and opens with Raise The Pulse that should have been enough to get any crowd going, before they served them up some Tex-Mex whose synth pop edges are set to make you think of more than the next Fondue, spoken vocals urge you not to become a recluse. Real Estate Cult takes aim at the yuppie dream and the need to get on the property ladder to slow electronica and a not too intense dance beat.
Drag Down Love is far more intense than the recorded version and super brief. Karateka has an almost electro clash sound that never leaves the dancefloor, Havoc Man sounds Hi-NRG disco dolly ready to inspire the master butcher from Leigh on sea. Bolt It Down has cartoon noises an imperious beat and slightly askew synths, for this screed to make certain you Bolt It Down before the thieves nick it.
The show and cd closes with H.O.T. Matter the perfect way to leave the crowd all loved up and together, no matter how sardonic the vocals might sound, they still get to the heart of the matter and the need to leave the relationship with the stereo.
Find out more at https://portioncontrol.net/ https://portioncontrol.bandcamp.com/album/1983-86-hit-the-pulse-to-purge https://www.lexermusic.com/portion-control-83-86-hit-the-pulse-to-purge-limited-edition-import-lp-red-vinyl-album
