Maria Taylor
By All Music Guide
By All Music Guide
With help from Conor Obersts well-trained ear, the Saddle Creek label act Now Its Overhead picked up on their plaintive pop sound and courted them to join. As half of that group, they signed to the Omaha, NE-based Saddle Creek while continuing their Azure Ray projects on the independent Warm Recordings.
In 2001, both Azure Ray and Now Its Overhead released scantly received self-titled debuts; a year later, Taylor and Fink took up full-time residence in Omaha and released Burn and Shiver. The pairs third full-length, 2003s Hold on Love, released on Saddle Creek, brought it indie-scene raves on the merits of the singles The Drinks We Drank Last Night and New Resolution. Fall Back Open, a Now Its Overhead set, was released in 2004 amid heavy touring.
Having paid her dues by contributing lullaby-warm vocals to various projects by Moby, Bright Eyes, and Crooked Fingers, Taylor struck out on her own with 2005s 11:11. On it, she is by turns melancholy (Birmingham 1982) and daring (the danceable One for the Shareholder). Throughout, she sounds like Idas pillow-voiced Elizabeth Mitchell, but the wisdom, joy, and pain that pulse from her carefully crafted lyrics owe a debt to Carole King and Laura Nyro. Two years later, Taylors second solo record, Lynn Teeter Flower, came out.
