Each day of December this year, I’m highlighting one of my favourite albums of 2024. Counting down the list, we start with #31 on December 1st and go all the way down until we’ve reached #1 on December 31st. Today, #12 on my Album of the Year list: Yard Act – ‘Where’s My Utopia?’.

“It’s a bank holiday, so all the hospitals are shut. Guess I’ll have to saw off my own foot” are James Smith’s first words on ‘Where’s My Utopia?’. It sets the stage for Yard Act’s 2nd album, the follow-up of their highly praised debut ‘The Overload’. With a strong emphasis on the sprachgesang of their frontman, Yard Act became one of the most booming bands in post-punk’s recent revival. Now the dust of 2022 has settled, we find ourselves back in reality, listening to a brutally honest record. One that takes the prominence of James Smith’s songwriting to the extreme. Yard Act’s caricatural songs are usually jam-packed with sarcasm and irony. It’s what made the Leeds boys the band they are now. And whereas ‘Where’s My Utopia?’ is still filled with that, it’s also way more personal and self-reflective rather than being a satirical show of some kind.

Recently, I sat in the park and wrote down the words: “Sometimes, I wonder what a documentary about my life would look like. Me, an average Joe who nobody knows. Would anyone even be interested in watching it?” Something similar must’ve gone through James Smith’s mind when he decided to write ‘Where’s My Utopia?’, an entertaining 45-minute play with James Smith starring as Yorkshire songwriter James Smith. After one-off single ‘The Trenchcoat Museum’ (which kind of instigated this weblog!), he decided the spotlight needed to be on himself rather than the odd concept happening around him. That’s why, on this album we get guided past some key moments in the life of the 34-year-old frontman. Without spoiling too much of the show, here’s some interesting highlights. On ‘Down by the Stream’, Smith recalls being a childhood bully. With the sense of a parent, he continues: “(..) if I found out my own son had been picking on someone, I’d grab that little f*cker by his rucksack”. ‘We Make Hits’ and ‘Dream Job, both sort of mirroring Yard Act’s status in the modern world right now while ‘Petroleum’, about an incident between James Smith and his crowd in Bognor Regis, tackles life’s numbness, especially when doing a certain job over and over again. Furthermore, it’s worth mentioning Gorillaz’s Remi Kabaka Jr., handling the album’s production, causing it to be a lot more sonically diverse than its predecessor.

It all comes together on ‘Blackpool Illuminations’, Smith’s magnum opus. A 7,5-minute conversation between James Smith and a therapist portrayed by himself, about sustaining a childhood injury which eventually trickles down into a mind-boggling reflection on life, incorporating references to earlier songs, to come back what it all comes down to: “(..) why the f*ck was I wondering what w*nkers would think of album two?”.

After this heavy loaded narration, ‘A Vineyard for the North’ ends the album feeling like a weight has been lifted off of Smith’s shoulders. Near the end of television series ‘Avatar: The Last Airbender’, protagonist Aang needs to open all his chakras in order to control the Avatar State. ‘Where’s My Utopia?’ feels as it James Smith had to reflect on several key moments in his life in order to open his own chakras. He’s now successfully dealt with this overflowing sense of reflectiveness and is ready to move on, as the cycle continues on to album three.