Review – Dead Trains – County Road Bound

Grab your bag, you’re runnin’ late. Dead Trains bring to you County Road Bound, the latest in Hillbilly Hardcore from Allston area. In a Boston neighborhood becoming famous for a community of tiny heads and bad haircuts, it’s good to hear the driving tones of Dead Trains. Consistently dissatisfied with their surroundings and always on the move to find a little truth, County Road Bound will get you there. The songs are familiar without being tired and can fit most any occasion as long as there’s a fight. Whether you’re drinking the 3AM whiskey or breaking some kind of law, you’d be good to have these songs at the ready.

County Road Bound/Mean Town Blues, the title track for the album, is definitive get-up-and-go music. Jumping from Mississippi delta blues to 90’s Seattle (with a nod to Johnny Winter) in mere moments, it will not permit you to sit still.
Another gem on this recording is their cover of Suicide’s Rocket USA. Suicide is not the easiest group to interpret, but Dead Trains does it with an ace up their sleeve. Taking the minimalistic nihilism of Alan Vega and Martin Rev to transform it into a raucous good time is no small feat.

Cannonball, the 5th track, the rolling track, the telephone poles on the side of the road, the burnt down farmhouse where nobody goes, the field where Bobby lost an eye, where Lilly said goodbye. Fuck!
The whole thing closes up around the song Fire Next Time. One of those reflective inside time tunes where everything you’ve been trying to forget for the past fifteen years comes back around to remind you of the terrible things you may have done. It’s the hard stop to a speed fueled heist.