Magnet Factory may be Pylon Reenactment Society’s debut album, but it’s far from band leader Vanessa Briscoe Hay’s first rodeo. Having folded after a decade of output spanning the 1980s, Hay has (sort of) revived the iconic Athens-based post-punk unit Pylon which she fronted between 1979 and their third and final LP in 1990. Now, under the new moniker and with a new backing band, Hay has returned with a new set of songs that are equally knotty and informed by the ’80s left-field dance-punk movement.
After catching up with Hay and her longtime friend Kate Pierson of The B-52’s recently, we had her band perform a “Neighborhoods” set in their hometown of Athens, Georgia, whose music scene they helped put on the map. Set up in front of an Airstream trailer the full band powers through album tracks “Messenger” and “No Worries” with barren tree branches visible in the background. Check it out below, and revisit our interview with Hay here.
