Tot Taylor: Biography

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• Prefab Sprout
• My Life Story
• The Divine Comedy
• Mari Wilson

• Randy Newman
• Harry Nilsson
• Cole Porter

• Sound Barrier
• Sound Barrier
• Advertising

Genres:

Classical Music, Rock Music

Decades Active:

1980's

With a style equal parts pop/rock and Tin Pan Alley, former Advertising leader Tot Taylor embarked on a solo career following the demise of his former band. Taylor began his career in a group called A Special Moment, which recorded one song for Island before being dropped. The group changed its name to the Blue Kittens and Taylor, Mick Bass, and Johnny Whetstone composed a musical, +Ideas on Romance, which ran for two nights in Cambridge. In 1976, Taylor became inspired by the D.I.Y. spirit of punk and formed an energetic, visually distinctive bubblegum pop group called Advertising. However, the group did not fit the musical zeitgeist, and Taylor went solo. He released three singles on the GTO label, which subsequently dropped him; in the meantime, he also formed musical partnerships with soul singer Mari Wilson and Swedish pop singer Virna Lindt. With no label but a newfound stable of artists, Taylor formed his own company, Compact Organization, and released his own records, plus those of his everexpanding roster. Taylor first solo project was the Playtime album, which had originally been recorded for GTO. Released in 1981, the album outlined Taylor's basic approach, paying homage to idols like Cole Porter, George Gershwin, Jerome Kern, and Rodgers Hart through his Tin Pan Alley melodies and clever, yet not showy wordplay. 1984's The Inside Story followed in much the same vein. Taylor next worked on several other projects, composing an allinstrumental LP for the Sound Barrier and contributing a song (which was recorded by jazz legend Slim Gaillard) and incidental music for the film Absolute Beginners. Following a back injury which gave him time to sit down and compose, Taylor returned to pop with a vengeance in 1986, releasing an album, an EP, and a bestof collection (BoxOffice Poison, Arise, Sir Tot, and Jumble Soul, respectively), which further pursued Taylor's Tin Pan Alley influences and featured expanded instrumentation. That approach culminated on 1987's ambitious, jazzy My Blue Period, but later that year, Taylor did an aboutface and recorded the simple, strippeddown Menswear in his basement studio. However, no new Taylor material appeared after that; a limitededition box set featuring two albums and previously unreleased tracks, Scrapbook, was released in 1988. Taylor has since worked on several musical projects and contributed music to films and television shows, as well as producing for singer Gretchen Hofner.

- Steve Huey, All Music Guide