Eric's friend Denice Franke, who sings harmony vocals on two of Resurrect 's 11 songs, says these songs are cobwebs, with each strand carrying a metaphor or taste or texture or temperature. Then again, maybe they're dark, captivating little novels you can read without your glasses. They're funny, too, sometimes. Imagine a revived Abe Lincoln packing heat, waiting for the play to begin, or a petty thief's justification for stealing a spoon and coffee cup. Franke says it's like other good writers, only a step farther.
Some people say two or three steps.
In those days, he worked at Houston's Family Hand club, where he met and learned from bluesmen Hopkins, Mance Lipscomb, Mississippi Fred McDowell and others. Those lessons paid off in a rootedness and specificity of language still heard in Taylor's work. As Taylor's reputation and song catalogue grew, he enjoyed a following that included Nanci Griffith, Lyle Lovett and other young Texas writers like Robert Earl Keen and Darden Smith. Even during his time away from live performance, Taylor's songs were traveling the world on albums by Griffith and Lovett. Nashville-based musician David Olney, himself regarded as one of America's better living songwriters, confirms Taylor's analogy of songs to stories.