The Ransom is the kind of Portland punk band that conjures the spit-in-your-eye tenets of Northwest rock’s past. The trio of bassist/vocalist Charley Nims, drummer Faith Davenport, and guitarist David Nelson has lurked in the shadows of local punk shows at haunts like the Vern, the Firkin Tavern, and the Ash Street Saloon, and they’ve been regular performers at the annual Centaurpalooza festival. Nims typifies the band’s wily energy, spouting trashy punk epics full of rowdy hooks over Davenport’s four-on-the-floor drumming and Nelson’s deft buzzsaw assaults. Under the pseudonym “Myrtle Tickner,” Nims was part of one of the last lineups of the legendary Portland hardcore crew Poison Idea, most notably on the band’s 1990 LP Feel the Darkness. Last year the Ransom released Sell the Kids, which builds on a playful explosion of humorous punk on deliciously titled tunes like “Pratfall,” the thrashy “Eyeless on 82nd Avenue,” and its penultimate scorcher “Throw Garbage Everywhere.” RYAN J. PRADO