We recently had the stellar opportunity to check out the new single “Bookstore” from Yard Sign . You can listen to “Bookstore” Here.

Yard Sign is an online punk rock band, one-man folk punk act and Tik Tok Emo from Columbus, Ohio. They specialize in songs about life, love, loss and Star Wars. No matter the incarnation, Yard Sign is a variety of musical outputs led by Scott Marks, an elder millennial punk rock Swemo originally from New York, but calling central Ohio home for the past decade. 

We instantly felt drawn to “Bookstore” from Yard Sign. It’s a smartly crafted song that has a memorable melody that we happily enjoyed having it stay in our head long after the music ended .

Coming of musical age in both the New York hardcore and pop-punk scenes, Marks played all different instruments for all different bands before settling into middle-agedom in the Midwest. 

After 10+ years of musical semi-retirement, Yard Sign emerged from the pandemic, churning out full-band punk rock (and adjacent) anthems on the internet and leading sing-along kazoo parties across Ohio and beyond in their one-of-a-kind-one-man pop-folk-punk shows.

When asked about “Bookstore”, Scott Marks shares , “Bookstore’ is kind of a Frankenstein of different song ideas. I always wanted to write a song called ‘bookstore’. I’m a big reader and fan of romantic comedies, so bookstores are kind of a sacred place to me. Movies like ‘You’ve Got Mail’, ‘Notting Hill’, ‘When Harry Met Sally’, all about bookstores! Then one day I was scrolling through the internet and was presented with a meme from one of those ‘words are my porn’ kinda pages that said “someone telling you they read the book you recommended is the ultimate love language” or something like that. So the idea for the song was basically the opposite of that; someone NOT reading the book you recommended to them. I picked up the ukulele and the line ‘had an idea, but it was stupid’, just came right out. The rest of the song kind of wrote itself from there. I wanted it to feel like that middle act in a rom-com where the two leads breakup/fallout/get sad at each other. Sad, longing, but maybe also a little hopeful.”

So find your favorite music listening spot and get lost in “Bookstore” from Yard Sign.