In the Zodiac, Taurus is the second astrological sign, governed by the planet Venus, the planet of art. Two keywords commonly associated with Taurus are creativity and dedication.Both words apply to Chris Morrissey’s new Brooklyn-based band, Taurus.
“It was all just kind of born all at once. It was born under that sign. I’m not like a super big hippie but I do get into the zodiac a little bit,” he said over the phone. “It seemed appropriate.”
The members of Taurus all work as professional sidemen for artists such as Ben Kweller and Mason Jennings.
“We wanted to have something that was our own. Being kind of professional sidemen can kind of wear on you,” he said. “You don’t have a say over when the tour starts and stops.” Morrissey is also part of a jazz quartet.
“[Before Taurus] I wrote a lot of music, but it was all for my jazz band,” he said. He didn’t have confidence in his writing chops, though, he adds.“I love good lyrics, and I think, being around all these really great lyrics writers, I just kind of doubted my ability to do that in a way that would be satisfactory to me,” he said.
Fortunately, Morrissey was asked to help a friend write some lyrics. He sat down and began to write, and found that he liked what he was writing.“It really inspired me to find out that I could actually do this,” he said. Over the next couple of months, Morrissey wrote a self-described “shit-load” of songs, and said to himself, “Wow, I wanna have a band, I wanna have a rock band.”
So, in the spring, Taurus was born.
Their debut record, Cannon Falls Forever, was recorded in its namesake town of Cannon Falls, Minnesota. “There was a very famous studio there called Pachyderm,” Morrissey said. “I did a lot of records down there when I lived there.” The studio closed down, but the engineer who had recorded Morrissey still lived in the area and had a studio, so the band traveled there.
“In Cannon Falls, we were basically sitting in a country house that overlooked a forest and a field for a few weeks, and that’s the way that I like to make records,” Morrissey said. When asked to describe the album in three words, Morrissey conferred with his girlfriend. “Both of us are stumped,” he said. “OK, I can do this. Um.” His girlfriend ended up throwing out the word monolithic, and Morrissey added intimate and deep. “Not deep like I think my shit is deep, but there’s a lot to it,” he said.
There is a lot to it, but not in a way that makes it cluttered or overbearing. Taurus’s songs are a glory of distorted electric guitar and driving percussion, with Morrissey’s distinctive voice holding it all together. His lyrical delivery makes you sit up and listen, as if what he’s saying is urgent, and he needs you to hear it. Both his vocals and the guitar hooks don’t follow regular pop melodies or go where you expect them to – instead, they swerve around in the opposite direction. Their music is fresh, and solid. They sound like a band that’s been together for years.
Morissey’s been inspired by many musicians along the way. “A songwriter that I kind of always go back to is Elliott Smith,” he said. “And the people that I’ve been lucky enough to play with have been big influences on me. The way that they approach their creative process has been very inspiring to me.”
He listed off a few names, including Andrew Bird and Mason Jennings. “I’m a big jazz listener and jazz musician,” he added, citing David King as another influence. “He has had a huge impact on the way that I approach music. Originality is something I took on as a priority through him.”
Now, Morrissey said, he wants to be able to do for listeners what his influences did for him.
“I want people to listen to Taurus, this music, and be inspired,” he said. “I just want to put music into the world that’s impactful. I hear a lot of music that doesn’t move me in the way I want to move people. I don’t want to make music that is easy to tune out.”
Easy to tune out, Taurus is not. One listen to their song “Money Man” is enough to hear that. A tense energy pulses behind the song, driving the music forward. Morrissey’s catchy melody and words ring out above the instruments. His lyrics have a raw honesty. “I wanna move fast but I gotta go slow/I got a grip so tight but I gotta let go/I saw this coming but I can’t say no/And I know damn well what it’s like to be alone.”
Morrissey said the band’s been busy lately with their other commitments. “We’re been so swamped with the Kweller release. We’ve been on tour with him for the last few months.”
But, he said, Taurus has some cool stuff coming up. “We have a Daytrotter session coming out in May,” he said. Taurus is also playing a May show with The Dig, another Brooklyn-based band. “I think that something that I’ve learned from having my own project is that having confidence in it and being proud of the music that you’re making is important,” Morrissey said. “The thing is to stay confident and make sure that you’re loving what you’re doing.”
