Yard Act share new track “We Make Hits,” the song arrives ahead of their second album, Where’s My Utopia?, available March 1st, 2024 via Republic Records. Frontman James Smith sings: “Every night on the back of the bus/You know it ain’t no fuss, we’re on the same wage/And we ain’t afraid to get paid on the stage/Fan fiction caught in the act is a fact/If you get your back backed up at that/You won’t be missed/Now we make hits/(But not hits like Nile Rodgers, just that we ain’t hook dodgers)/We make hits, we make hits.” Yard Act will tour North American, Europe and the UK, including a hometown headline show at Millennium Square Leeds.

Smith says: “We Make Hits’ started like most Yard Act songs do these days, in Ryan’s spare bedroom. He’d recorded a couple of basslines and I went round to throw some words on top just to see what might happen. I was reflecting on how things had changed so much for us over the last few years when I realised that sat round a laptop trying to make each other laugh, necking black coffee and craning our heads out of the window to smoke cigs every hour or so, all that had really changed within the writing process was that, thanks to my baby, we were at Ryan’s house rather than mine and that Ryan had a place of his own now, which was nice. Despite the outside blowing up, behind closed doors, we were the same, and I’m grateful for that. You can see the cynicism and the silliness on the surface of ‘We Make Hits’ without much effort, but at its core, for me, it’s really an ode to friendship and the unfiltered joy you feel when you’re making music with the people you hold dear in your life.

For the song’s the band reunited with longterm collaborator James Slater. Smith explains “We’re back in the Yardiverse, we’re getting the origin story of the hitmen Dynamite Dave and Dudley Sunglasses. A valid parable about the trappings of late capitalism, and the compromises we have to make to survive sometimes.”

Director Slater says: “For ‘We Make Hits’ I took a song which charts the origin story of the band and used it to tell the backstory of two hapless hitmen who upon receiving an eviction notice in their student bedsit embark on a job search which ultimately leads them to gainful employment as assassins for the holy global enterprise. As ever with the Yard Act vids I’ve made, this vid is part of an ever expanding cinematic universe – a continuation of The Visitor’s journey we began with ‘Trench Coat Museum.’”

Smith allowed himself to reach lyrically deeper into himself than ever with Where’s My Utopia?. Gone, largely, are the outward-facing character studies of yore, replaced with a set of songs that stare fully into the headlights of life, wrangling with the frontman’s own fears and foibles to create a sort of Promethean narrative – but with jokes. “You can commit to the idea that we’re just animals who eat and fuck and then we die, and that’s fine,” Smith suggests. “But for me, creativity always seems to be the best way of articulating the absolute minefield of what human existence is.”

Yard Act Tour Dates:
(New Dates in Bold)
Thu. Feb. 29 – Kingston, UK @ Pryzm [SOLD OUT]
Fri. Mar. 1 – Bristol, UK @ Rough Trade
Sun. Mar. 3 – London, UK @ Rough Trade East
Tue. Mar. 5 – Nottingham, UK @ Nottingham, UK
Wed. Mar. 13 – Norwich, UK @ The Nick Rayns LCR (UEA)
Thu. Mar. 14 – Nottingham, UK @ Rock City
Fri. Mar. 15 – Glasgow, UK @ O2 Academy
Sat. Mar. 16 – Manchester, UK @ O2 Apollo
Sun. Mar. 17 – Newcastle, UK @ Northumbria University
Tue. Mar. 19 – Belfast, UK @ Mandela Hall
Wed. Mar. 20 – Dublin, IE @ Vicar Street
Fri. Mar. 22 – Liverpool, UK @ Invisible Wind Factory
Sat. Mar. 23 – Bristol, UK @ O2 Academy
Sun. Mar. 24 – Cardiff, UK @ The Great Hall
Mon. Mar. 25 – Brighton, UK @ The Dome
Wed. Mar. 27 – London, UK @ Eventim Apollo
Thu. Apr. 4 – Nantes, FR @ Stereolux
Fri. Apr. 5 – Paris, FR @ Cabaret Sauvage
Sat. Apr. 6 – Bordeaux, FR @ Rock School Barbey
Mon. Apr. 8 – Lisbon, PT @ LAV
Tue. Apr. 9 – Madrid, ES @ Mon
Thu. Apr. 11 – Barcelona, ES @ La 2
Fri. Apr. 12 – Lyon, FR @ Le Transbordeur
Sat. Apr. 13 – Bologna, IT @ Locomotiv Club
Sun. Apr. 14 – Milan, IT @ Santeria Toscana 31
Tue. Apr. 16 – Zurich, CH @ Mascotte
Wed. Apr. 17 – Munich, DE @ Muffathalle
Thu. Apr. 18 – Berlin, DE @ Festsaal Kreuzberg
Fri. Apr. 19 – Copenhagen, DK @ Loppen
Sat. Apr. 20 – Stockholm, SE @ Slaktkyrkan
Wed. Apr. 24 – Hamburg, DE @ Uebel & Gefährlich
Thu. Apr. 25 – Amsterdam, NL @ Paradiso Main Hall
Fri. Apr. 26 – Nijmegen, NL @ Doornroosje
Sat. Apr. 27 – Cologne, DE @ Kantine
Sun. Apr. 28 – Brussels, BE @ Les Nuits Botanique
Thu. May 30 – Solana Beach, CA @ Belly Up Tavern
Fri. May 31 – Los Angeles, CA @ The Regent Theater
Sat. Jun. 1 – Pioneertown, CA @ Pappy and Harriet’s
Mon. Jun. 3 – Santa Cruz, CA @ The Catalyst Atrium
Tue. Jun. 4 – San Francisco, CA @ The Independent
Thu. Jun. 6 – Portland, OR @ Mississippi Studios
Fri. Jun. 7 – Vancouver, BC @ Rickshaw Theatre
Sat. Jun. 8 – Seattle, WA @ The Crocodile
Sat. Aug. 3 – Leeds, UK @ Millenium Square
Sat. Aug. 10 – Oslo, NO @ Oya Festival
Mon. Aug. 12 – Budapest, HU @ Sziget Festival
Fri. Aug. 23 – Southsea, UK @ Victorious Festival
Sat. Aug. 31 – Lisbon, PT @ Meo Kalorama

order Where’s My Utopia? by Yard Act HERE