By the point Blur had been excoriating the repressed English center class, that they had already flung themselves past it, using excessive as their information bounded up the UK charts. So, too, had Oasis, who weaponized their working-class Mancunian avenue cred in opposition to the quasi-posh artwork faculty boys in Blur. Whether or not the topic was a disgruntled civil servant or low-life pleasures, Britpop is eternally certain up in UK class tensions. Regardless of their deep roots within the UK hardcore scene, London five-piece Excessive Vis draw upon that lengthy custom. On their third document, Guided Tour, they current a rousing Britpop manifesto that transmutes grime and drudgery into raw-nerved energy ballads.
Although his bandmates—bassist Jack Muncaster, guitarists Martin MacNamara and Rob Hammaren, and drummer Edward “Ski” Harper—hail from all corners of the UK and Eire, Excessive Vis frontman Graham Sayle grew up in a working-class household in northwest England. On the group’s tune “0151,” he sang about his late uncle, a former shipyard employee and union member who died of asbestosis. “You’ll dwell and die on the banks of the Mersey,” he sang, admonishing the “suffеring offered as delight” he witnessed whereas dwelling in a city affected by Margaret Thatcher’s “managed decline.” Excessive Vis’ first two albums—2019’s No Sense No Feeling and Mixing, from 2022—had been as scuffed and battered as the themes they approached.
Producer Jonah Falco, who manned the decks on Mixing, and has sculpted UK punk information by Chisel and Chubby and the Gang, deserves some credit score for the rattling pleasure that propels Guided Tour. However a lot of this blinding Excessive Vis glow radiates from the bandmates’ private triumphs. A number of members give up their day jobs to pursue music full-time. Sayle kicked booze, obtained married, and caught with remedy. Excessive Vis are nonetheless pragmatists, although, and even a tune titled “Feeling Bless” is tempered by drab pictures of “metallic smoke” and “killing goals by Clipper gentle.” Sayle doesn’t ascribe his blessed existence to any greater function, claiming that “luck or destiny” are equally viable explanations.
The rapture, then, is basically instrumental. “Feeling Bless” is a high-elevation anthem that soars on gusts of reverb and rock-god guitar. Sayle’s sober vignettes reveal his matter-of-fact grip on the world, but it surely’s gratifying sufficient to lean again and let the huge refrain and Sayle’s stretched-out Scouse accent wash over you. The title monitor is simply as exultant, sharing DNA with Leisure-era Blur and, dare I say, the early work of stadium denizens U2. “Guided Tour” churns to jangly, high-tone guitar and toms with the wallop of Doc Martens on pavement. Sayle’s opening cry—“You’re determined to really feel extra/For as soon as in your life”—may very well be the driving want behind all of Excessive Vis’ music: the seek for one thing gilded amid the scrap heap.
