We Make Hits

Album: Where's My Utopia? (2024)
Play Video

Songfacts®:

  • "We Make Hits" is an autobiographical account of Yard Act's origins, all wrapped in a love letter to the raw joy of making music with your mates. The band recorded the song for their second album, Where's My Utopia?
  • The song was born out of a writing session between frontman James Smith and bassist Ryan Needham in Needham's spare bedroom. Needham had recorded a couple of basslines, and Smith, during a break from touring, tossed some words on top just to see what might happen.

    "I think Ryan had been going for that kind of French disco, Daft Punk, Justice vibes and everything fell out of me quite fast," Smith told Apple Music. "I started by writing the story of me and Ryan and how we started the band. With this song, we were acknowledging that we'd always had ambition and we'd always wanted to do something bigger with music. Even though, at our core, all we wanted to do was make music, we always knew we would quite like to see what it was like on the other side and achieve something."
  • Smith takes a refreshingly honest look at himself throughout Where's My Utopia? On "We Make Hits," for instance, he injects a healthy dose of self-awareness with the line, "and if this isn't a hit, we'll say it's ironic."

    "I think more people should be more critical of themselves," Smith told Uncut magazine. "It's probably a reaction to this sort of purity that has come out in people, probably because of social media, trying to preen themselves and their self-image to be holier than thou. Humans aren't like that. For much of the album I'm framing myself as someone who's struggling. You're leaning into empathy from other people, asking them to relate to those situations, so I thought it was important that I had balance and admit I'm capable of causing hurt and harm to others."
  • Shot by the group's regular visual collaborator James Slater, the video features a recurring character in the band's music videos, The Visitor. It's a continuation of The Visitor's journey they began with "The Trench Coat Museum."

    "For 'We Make Hits' I took a song which charts the origin story of the band," said Slater, "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."
  • For Where's My Utopia?, Yard Act traded the post-punk grit of their debut album for a disco-infused party atmosphere. The band co-produced the record with Gorillaz member Remi Kabaka Jr.

Comments

Be the first to comment...

Editor's Picks

Why Does Everybody Hate Nu-Metal? Your Metal Questions Answered

Why Does Everybody Hate Nu-Metal? Your Metal Questions AnsweredSong Writing

10 Questions for the author of Precious Metal: Decibel Presents the Stories Behind 25 Extreme Metal Masterpieces

U2

U2Fact or Fiction

How did The Edge get his name? Did they name a song after a Tolkien book? And who is "Angel of Harlem" about?

Joe Jackson

Joe JacksonSongwriter Interviews

Joe talks about the challenges of of making a Duke Ellington tribute album, and tells the stories behind some of his hits.

Stan Ridgway

Stan RidgwaySongwriter Interviews

Go beyond the Wall of Voodoo with this cinematic songwriter.

Billy Steinberg - "Like A Virgin"

Billy Steinberg - "Like A Virgin"They're Playing My Song

The first of Billy's five #1 hits was the song that propelled Madonna to stardom. You'd think that would get you a backstage pass, wouldn't you?

N.W.A vs. the World

N.W.A vs. the WorldSong Writing

How the American gangsta rappers made history by getting banned in the UK.