High Vis: Guided Tour (transparent purple vinyl) [DAIS]

Why you'll love it

This is the limited transparent purple pressing from Dais Records. The Guardian and Kerrang! both gave Guided Tour five stars out of five, it holds a Metacritic score of 82, and Kerrang! said it confirms High Vis as "British hardcore's torchbearers."

This edition

Limited edition transparent purple vinyl
Dais Records pressing (cat# DAIS231)
11 tracks over two sides

About the album

High Vis started out as an English hardcore band and have been quietly sneaking melody into the van ever since. By the time they came to make Guided Tour, several of the members had gone full-time on the band, and it shows: the songs are bigger, the hooks are sharper and Graham Sayle sings as much as he shouts. They cut it at Holy Mountain Studios in London with producer Jonah Falco, playing the tracks from memory rather than copying demos, so the takes keep the push of a band that has spent a long time on stage.

The singles map the range. "Mob DLA" puts street punk energy behind a song about cuts to disability support in the UK; "Mind's a Lie" drifts into house, baggy and trip-hop, with a sample from South London DJ and singer Ell Murphy; "Drop Me Out" heads straight back to the fast stuff, and the title track leans on jangly guitars and a chorus built for festival fields. Pitchfork's Madison Bloom called the record "a rousing Britpop manifesto that transmutes grime and drudgery into raw-nerved power ballads," which is about as good a summary as anyone has managed.

The cover is a 1980s photo by David Sinclair of a kid on a motorbike outside a shop in Liverpool. It suits a record about growing up somewhere ordinary and finding something loud to love there, and it is considerably safer to frame than to recreate.