Meet Yard Act, the Blueprint For the New Wave of Post-Punk
Hot off their Coachella debut, it’s safe to say that the members of everyone’s favorite up-and-coming post-punk band, Yard Act, have come a long way from playing in small shows in Leeds and acting in the background of Peaky Blinders. Vocalist and occasional actor James Smith and bassist Ryan Needham had both been members of other Leeds-based bands, Post War Glamour Girls and Menace Beach, respectively.
After their separate projects released a split EP in 2016, the duo began discussing forming a band together. The duo’s plan eventually came to fruition in September 2019, when the pair moved into a house together in Meanwood and started creating minimalist rock tracks using a primitive drum machine and borrowed bass guitar. They soon recruited guitarist Sammy Robinson and drummer George Townend who played together in Treeboy & Arc; however, Robinson departed from the group, leading to the recruitment of Sam Shjipstone, leading to the current Yard Act lineup.
The newly formed band went straight to work and quickly released their debut single, “The Trapper’s Pelt,” in March 2020. The song narrates the cynical story of an ‘enterprising’ man who stockpiles discounted fur to flog to freezing office workers at an ever-climbing rate, leaving the previous owner of said fur pelts with nothing, shivering naked in the cold. The early '80s post-punk instrumentals blend with eerie synths and hypnotic and raucous percussion. Its striking lyrics preach that “All that divides us is evil, but all that unites us is evil,” and is the first of many examples of the band using their music to commentate on the destructive realities of capitalism, gentrification, and social class structures.
Following the release of their debut track, the band dropped a series of singles throughout the rest of 2020, compiling into an EP titled Dark Days, released in January 2021. The nihilistic four-track body of work oozes with experimentalism, adventure, and angst, especially on tracks like breakout single “Fixer Upper” and title track “Dark Days."
Following the success of their debut EP, Yard Act announced that they would be releasing their debut album, The Overload, and dropped the title track in September 2021. Smith shared with NME that the album cycle’s first single would serve as an overture to the album and was written from the perspective of someone sitting in a pub overhearing snippets of different conversations from different characters and acting as a vessel for their own thoughts and opinions. The group soundtracked the rest of 2021 with the release of "Land of the Blind,” which examines the art of illusion and how self-confidence can inspire conviction, anti-capitalist anthem “Payday,” and its tongue-in-cheek, abrasive sequel “Rich.” Finally, they started 2022 with the release of their last single, the warm and wistful “Pour Another,” which the band claimed as a cover of Elton John’s “Tiny Dancer.”
The band then dropped their highly anticipated debut album, The Overload, in January 2022. The eleven-track record delves deep into swirling conversations surrounding greed, privilege, and existentialism, rife with biting lyrics full of humor, insight, and compassion. “We knew we were writing a lot, but there was no form or structure to it; it was just loads of ideas,” says Smith to Apple Music. “It was when we started to realize how much material we had that we said, 'All right, now is probably the time to go in and have a go at the album.’ We realized there was a theme running through the songs, an anti-capitalist slant to the whole thing. We came up with this idea of an arc about this person’s journey trying to become a success and how that pans out.”
Since the release of their critically-lauded debut effort, Yard Act has earned two NME Award nominations for “Best New Act In The World,” alongside artists like Olivia Rodrigo and Inhaler, and “Best New Act From The UK,” alongside Berwyn, Wet Leg, and Bree Runway.
Listen to The Overload below:
