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So I have been trying to teach myself the fine art of blasting pipes. I've finally gotten the blast I've been looking for! Now I'm on to staining.

I've stained and restained old mess up blocks practicing. I'm trying to figure out how to remove stain from a blasted pipe. Right now I'm rubbing the pipe down with a DNA soaked rag. I'm just not getting enough stain off the pipe to do contrasts. I've tried extremely lightly sanding but that just flattens off my blast.

Advice?!

You could... start with a light stain, then add dark. You could blast again real gentle and stain again. You could make a colored topcoat and apply that. There's all kinds of things to play with.

Sas is correct.
You need to know that all briar doesn't stain the same, especially blasted pipes.
This is where one needs to experiment.
One that some do is to stain dark, blast again lightly, then a lighter coat of stain.

Heating the briar, length of time the stain is left on before wiping can also make a difference.