Portion Control: album reviews and ratings

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Reviews & Recommendations

	Portion Control

Artist Listing:

S - Z

"At the dawn on the eighties, Portion Control sat alone in the middle of a great big hypothetical field. On one side resided the commercialism of electronic exponents such as The Human League, Depeche Mode and Ultravox etc., and on the other side sat underground illusionists such as SPK, My Bloody Valentine, Nurse With Wound and the Legendary Pink Dots. Portion Control either couldn’t decide which way to turn, or weren’t marketed suitably in either direction. However, they’re still fondly remembered as an innovative, experimental electronic group, even if awkwardly lumped in with what one would call the Electronic Body Music / Industrial scene."

-- barcodezine.com

Portion Control Discography - Album / CD Reviews

1981: A Fair Portion

1981: Gaining Momentum
Tracklisting: 1. Retreating again. 2. In Pursuit of Excellence. 3. Diving. 4. Shame (of a Burden). 5. Justify Treason. 6. Preach. 7. Brix. 8. Valuable Commodity. 9. Toffee toffee.

1982: With Mixed Emotion
Tracklisting: 1. Simulate sensual 2. Held Back 3. Come Alive 4. Le Crunch 5. One Choise 6. Moving Towards A Waste 7. New Phase 8. Come Alive

1982: I Staggered Mentally
Tracklisting: 1. He is Patriotic 2. Out of Order 3. Plateau Stage 4. All present and correct 5. Karsic 6. Sex Crimes 7. Sure is kinda spooky 8. Mass Disorder 9. Fiends 10. Sort Out *

1983: A-MAG (Audio Media Assault Group)
Tracklisting: 1. Glamour. 2. Kicked in the head. 3. Strapped down. 4. Suck and blow. 5. Pump pulse. 6. Sentenced To Die. 7. Heavy sex. 8. Stabbed in the back. 9. Electrotechnik. 10. Return to (version).

1983: Hit the Pulse
Tracklisting: 1.Chew you to Bits 2. Discord 3.Crash Weight gain 4.Eat your Heart 5.Thrust Angle 6.Death by Venom (Ricochet Mix) 7. Abbo Dabbo

1984: Simulate Sensual
Tracklisting: 1.Simulate sensual 2. Bombay Cid (previously unreleased) 3.Electrotechnik 4. Moving towards awaste 5.The Pressure is high 6.New Phaze 7. Le Crunch 8. If I could spit (previously unreleased) 8. Return to Situation 9. He is patriotic (Live) 10.Come alive 11. He is a Barbarian

1984: Step Forward
Tracklisting: 1.Refugee 2.Under the Skin 3.Mutie 4. Texmex 5. Tounge Beat 6. Micro Box 7.Micro Beat 8. Real Estate Cult 9. Tin 10. Havoc Man 11.319 12. Scramble 13. Son of Go Talk

1986: Assault (live)
Tracklisting: 1. He is patriotic. 2. Sure is kinda spooky. 3. Sex crimes. 3. Out of order. 4. Sex drive. 5. Plateau stage. 6. All present and correct. 7. Mass disorder. 8. Sort out.

1986: Psycho Bod Saves The World
Tracklisting: 1.Siren City 2. Breaker, Breaker 3.Danger Zone 4. Screen of Death 5. Coming for You Baby 6. Fistful of Creeds 7. Thrashville Baby 8. Cut and Thrust 9. H.O.T. Matter 10.Soap Distant

2004: Well Come
"Portion Control, the name, the myth is back! This time with an album full of atmospherics, noises and beats. Portion Control is the band who taught Ogre how to sing and Bill Leeb how to make simple but efficient bass lines, among other things. Portion Control are living legends when it comes to electronic industrial. Few who have heard them can ignore them. After releasing classics like The Great Divide, Rough Justice, Raise The Pulse, Go-Talk, Hit The Pulse, I Staggered Mentally, Step Forward and Dirty vs. Universe, among others, it’s almost impossible to ignore this huffing and puffing trio, eventually they will blow your house down. So are they as vigorous now as they were, on this cyberpunk soundtrack? Yes and no; it seems they are taking a more experimental laid back approach to music on this double CD release, but there are still more straightforward tracks with lyrics urging us to break free from this world of simulacra and simulation. (...) The only downside here is that it’s a double CD deal. Not all tracks are necessary some are just fillers with no real purpose at least that’s how I as a listener perceive them and sometimes some tracks work better as background noise, and of course we all would like to hear more of Dean Piavannis voice. When you have such a special and unique voice to use, you should. Still it’s better than the great majority of streamlined, slick mass-produced things being released right now. It’s been a long wait and it has been worth it. This album will be a new Portion Control classic and the tracks Coma, Earl Of Kennington, Onion Jack 2 and Blind Eyes are new classic tracks, all in all placing Portion Control in the avant-garde as well as in the fringes of the mainstream insisting on attention and change. "

-- Magnus Nilsson, movinghands.net, 4/04

2006: Filthy White Guy
Tracklisting: 01. High Visibility 02. Hardman 03. Random Shift 04. Seven Shades Of Shit 05. Slur 06. Hey Hey 07. Too Much Damage ( 08. Susano 09. Sub_Sequence 10. Swerve 11. DBA04 12. Sapphire 13. Spread Needle 14. Joe Smoke

" According to legend, and Portion Control’s website, every track on 'Filthy White Guy' was mixed from a set of six different locations to determine whether they could be given a certain dynamic trait depending on where they were prepared. Locations included a bingo hall, power station, caravan park and chapel. However, to me, 'Filthy White Guy' just sounds like good old Portion Control – and whether or not the mix locations enhanced the end product is impossible to say, not having a copy of 'Filthy White Guy' mixed in one location to compare with. So, what we have is Porcon’s second album in three years, following a few solid EPs. 'Filthy White Guy' is a different beast to the previous, 'Wellcome', but stays true to the hard, rhythmic industrial sound they’re renowned for. The compositions are dark and menacing, as you would expect, but also surprisingly electro-pop in places; tracks such Seven Shades of Shit, swiftly followed by Slur, have highly addictive melodic choruses. 'Filthy White Guy' is probably a more accessible album than we’ve heard from the band before, but by no means less enjoyable – this is almost an object lesson in how to make an industrial album, even though they don’t particularly deserve being lumped into that bag of dead fag ends. But as we have already discovered over the years, Porcon are masters of the genre, they know exactly when to slow the pace, speed it up, flit between the brooding and ominous, spidery and unclean, light and poppy, analogue and digital, but never pandering to the genre, just moving like a shadow from one corner to another, basking in the application of their own compositions. 'Filthy White Guy' has depth, not just surface water. Tasty tracks leak their supper all over this album, Susano is a real beauty with its brusque analogue bass pads and mesmerising percussion - accentuated by shimmering, metallic synth sweeps. Then there’s the bossy stomp of High Visibility and Sapphire’s supercharged rhythms via chunky metal pads, the eerie intelligence of the horror-flick instrumental, Sub_Sequence, and the plain, good old kick you in the bollocks menace of the seething Spread Needle. Porcon make industrial music relevant again, like every genre is relevant, but absent of the cliches that 95% of modern-day industrial music generally produces - usually little more than a rehash of stale ideas. Even Front Line Assembly has fallen into the hole, like many of the genres once bright stars, they should listen to Filthy White Guy and be embarrassed by their recent ineptitude. Porcon’s renaissance is still going strong, their class unwavering, and Filthy White Guy is another corker - not to be missed."

-- barcodezine.com

2008: Slug
Tracklisting: 01 roast 02 infant 03 global 04 sick man 05 defend 06 heavyweight 07 T4 08 depth charge 09 unrest 10 paw 11 cosh boy ver2.1 12 T5 (mono) 13 cubicle 14 waste 15 sammy circle 16 bleach

"With their latest outing, deviously titled 'SLUG', the group - now solely consisting of John Whybrew and Dean Piavani - continues further down the path of experimental software synthesis paved by their more recent work, while still giving us a few accessibly danceable tracks to hold the interest of the casual listener. Of those tracks, Infant, Defend, and Rogue present us with the trademark Portion Control EBM formula that has been so revered by bands like Front Line Assembly and Depeche Mode, stomping away with aggressive beats and bass lines that should appeal to the modern industrial dance floor. The same can be said of Cosh Boy Ver2.1 with its driving subsonic bass and disjointed beats that are just shy of four-on-the-floor, updating a track from their previous 'Onion Jack IV' release. Other tracks like Unrest and particularly Global take a more abstract approach, less concerned with a catchy bass line than creating a pervasive industrial atmosphere; while the sounds are completely synthesized, there is a certain organic resonance to the scrapes and thrums that resound through these tracks. (...) In the end, the one drawback to 'SLUG' is that by now Portion Control have established a recognizable sound, and while that's admirable in its own right, it does little to make the album truly stand out against its predecessors."

-- Ilker Yücel, regenmag.com, 6/08

2010: Violently Alive
Tracklisting: 01. Icon 02. Relapse 03. Skull Kid 04. Amnesia 05. Blood Loss 06. Addiction Rising 07. Rise 08. Waste 09. Guided By My Fear 10. Extraction 11. Stealth 12. Swollen 13. You Hold Me Down

Release Date: April 9th, 2010.

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Recommended Links:

Portion Control: official page
Portion Control on Myspace