Yard Act – The Overload

With their resolutely rock attitude, these boys piss off a lot of people. They make fun of the winners of a new wild form of capitalism, they ridicule the refinement of the bourgeois-bohemian, take shots at the post-Brexit English extreme right, imagine dystopian science-fiction episodes, describe the trajectory of a loser… At this age when you’re an assumed artist of the rock culture, thus inevitably destined to economic modesty (unless you draw the right lottery ticket), this posture is quite appropriate.

Yard Act is a rock quartet from Leeds (a little north of Sheffield and Manchester), a tributary of the now distant punkitude of the ‘70s, which refined and diversified itself during the ‘80s (post-punk, electronic, funk, etc.), then became even more sophisticated in the ‘90s and 2000’s (contemporary jazz and improvisation) and groovier in the 2010’s (hip hop, soul/R&B). With the eloquent James Smith as their frontman, the boys from Yard Act have definitely got it all! Gathered on an opus titled The Overload, their 11 excellent songs exude the freshness and irreverence of great emerging rock bands, two years old in this case. It’s hard to imagine a better introduction.