N.E. Vains’ Running Down Pylons delivers that kind of glorious, basement-level destruction. You know, back in the ’70s when every basement had those flimsy swinging room-dividing doors, and your skinny 130-pound frame suddenly ripped them clean off the hinges in a fit of imagined superhuman strength? The day you went from sand-kicked weakling to full Charles Atlas mail-order muscle miracle? That’s this record. N.E. Vains are the unlikely heroes with X-ray vision glasses, and in seventeen lean minutes, they turn victims into bullies — or at least make you feel like you could be one. Swoon. Heroes without a cape.
Clocking in at a tight seventeen minutes, the record wastes zero time pretending to be polite(they never say please). It kicks the door open, knocks over your drink after gobbling down the swill.
From the opening blast of “Kicked Off the VPN,” the LP hits with a ragged, sweaty swagger that lands somewhere between the sleazy stomp of The Humpers, the snotty punch of The Pagans, and the unfiltered rawness of Candysnatchers. Toss in a long-overdue reminder of NYC’s The Bullys, shake it hard with a dose of Rick Sims-Didjits, and you’re circling the particular brand of chaos N.E. Vains are firing through your already stiletto-slashed speakers.
Most songs barely crack the two-minute mark, but that’s more than enough time for razor-wire, take-your-head-off riffs, pounding drums, and vocals that sound like they were recorded immediately after a studio fisticuff. “Six for 36” barrels forward like a stolen car — look ma, no brakes — while “The Grounds” sneaks in a slightly twangy rock ’n’ roll undercurrent, reminding you this isn’t just punk velocity for velocity’s sake. There’s gutter-level garage rock in the infested bloodstream. Every track feels like the last song of the night, played louder and faster (Just like The Dictators bellowed) because the power might get cut at any second. Zap. Old Smokey’s frying more than bacon.
N.E. Vains aren’t trying to reinvent punk rock — they’re reminding you why it was fun in the first place, delivered with a shit-eating grin and zero apologies. This is beer-soaked, attitude-heavy, riff-driven rock ’n’ roll that feels just a little bit dangerous and a whole lot alive. Danger, Danger Will Robinson.
A snarling blast of garage-punk attitude — The Humpers grit, Pagans sneer, Candysnatchers rawness, and a Didjits-fueled kick all rolled into one loud, satisfying punch, straight from the sweaty dangling gonads of rock ’n’ roll.
8 crushed beer cans of 10
