Album review: High Vis – Guided Tour

Make no mistake about it, High Vis are one of the best bands in the UK right now. From the post-punk-inflected 2019 debut No Sense No Feeling to 2022’s Britpop-meets-hardcore Blending, new album Guided Tour is the most realised version of the London punks’ (high) vision yet, standing as the only band who could feasibly support Oasis and headline Outbreak.

It’s an addictive yet antagonising listen, as vocalist Graham Sayle laments the realities of just wanting to exist while raging against those who cause and ignore the hardships that so many people in the UK and beyond face each and every day – from the lack of community care and public services through to how this ultimately affects our relationships with other people and ourselves.

As working-class guys in their 30s, High Vis speak with lived experience on the complexities and actualities of lives you don’t see or hear about enough. While sticking it to the status quo is stitched deep within the DNA of punk and alternative music, Graham sings with a societal and emotional intelligence that vastly outstrips the countless artists screaming about faceless authority figures. High Vis know the enemy and they know the damage that has been done – the swaggering, stomping Mob DLA breaks down the shame of being broke and just trying survive in a system that’s rigged against you, while Mind’s A Lie reckons with cuts to mental health services that leave people feeling isolated and confused.

With all that going on, you’d be right to assume that Guided Tour is an angry record. Not necessarily heavy, but with Graham Sayle’s gnashing, sneering vocals – with a Scouse lilt that gives it even more edge – there’s an inherent urgency underpinning the record, not least in the empowering, fist-swinging Drop Me Out where the band tackle re-evaluating frienships and removing toxicity in life with the pointed, ‘We’re supposed to be in this together / Off you fuck these ties are severed.’

Perhaps the most cathartic moment comes in the superb closing track Gone Forever, where having offered that ‘Pacifism is a privilege’, the record culminates in a joyous, adrenaline-bubbling chant-along of ‘When you’re gone, you’re gone forever, you won’t be fucking missed’ you just can’t wait to scream with your mates.

In fact, so many of these barbed exchanges are primed to be belted out by the disenfranchised and lost. It’s hooky, it’s infectious and it comes charged with one thing in mind – unity. At its core, beneath the aggression and attitude, the importance of community and supporting those closest to you remains the prevailing message. Call your mates, call your mum, call out. And listen to High Vis.

Verdict: 5/5

For fans of: Militarie Gun, Spiritual Cramp, Higher Power

Guided Tour is out now via Dais

READ THIS: High Vis: “You can’t judge someone because of the privileges they’ve been given. It’s how you deal with those privileges”