Toronto indie pop duo TAURO’s “Crüel to Be Distant” glows with the sweetness of a summer evening, carrying the sting of realizing someone you love is pulling away. In conversation with Atwood Magazine, Cynthia Tauro discusses the importance of trusting your intuition, the freedom of creating beyond genre boundaries, and the playful, instinctive chemistry behind her band’s debut album ‘Act I’ – a soulful, beautifully varied introduction whose effortless melodies keep revealing deeper shades of emotion.

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Stream: “Crüel to Be Distant” – TAURO

Some songs feel like the golden hour stretching itself into a whole night.

The air turns honeyed, the edges blur, and the whole world seems to glow with that rare, suspended warmth that makes even uncertainty feel beautiful for a moment. It’s the kind of atmosphere that invites you in before you realize there’s an ache moving underneath it.

TAURO’s “Crüel to Be Distant” drifts in like a warm breeze on a hot summer evening – sweet, lush, and disarmingly easy to fall into. It’s a golden-hued pop reverie that seems to soften the room around it, with radiant guitars, pillowy keys, aching pedal steel, and melodies that melt in the mind like butter. Beneath that easy glow, the Toronto duo sing about the slow unease of realizing someone you love is pulling away – the evasions, the half-truths, the gut feeling that turns distance into its own cruelty.

I don’t believe you in the summertime
I don’t believe you in the fall
I don’t believe you when its snowing outside
No I don’t believe you at all

Released in February and featured on TAURO’s April debut album Act I, “Crüel to Be Distant” turns emotional distance into a beautifully lush pop song with a guarded heart. Cynthia Tauro and Brendan Canning keep the surface dreamy, bright, and welcoming, but the hurt underneath is unmistakable: This is a song about intuition, self-worth, and the cruel little silences that tell us more than words ever could.

A collaborative project between jazz-trained pianist and songwriter Cynthia Tauro and indie-rock mainstay Brendan Canning of Broken Social Scene, TAURO formed after the pair met backstage at Toronto’s Field Trip festival in 2022 and began writing together from Tauro’s home studio. Their world draws from indie pop, jazz harmony, R&B groove, neo-soul warmth, and soft-focus dreaminess, but the point was never to stay in one clean lane. “We’re essentially a pop group who don’t want to be pigeonholed with, ‘oh they sound like this or that,’” TAURO tell Atwood Magazine. “We’re getting our project off the ground and there are so many ways to present musical ideas, so why stay in a narrow lane. We’re here to have fun making music and hopefully affect peoples lives in some small meaningful way.”

That openness shapes every corner of Act I, a debut rooted in trust, intuition, and the pleasure of letting different musical worlds collide.

Tauro cites Bill Evans, Carole King, and Sting among her major influences, while Canning’s references stretch from Air to Frank Zappa; add core collaborators Kintaro Akiyama, Thom D’Arcy, and Spencer “Moose” Muscio, and the album becomes a meeting place for texture, groove, feeling, and instinct. Rather than forcing a single identity, TAURO chose the songs that felt strongest – a decision that gives Act I its warmth and range.

“Act I gives the listener a glimpse into the TAURO world,” Tauro shares. “It’s a joint effort of myself and Brendan, already coming from slightly different musical backgrounds and influences… Then throw in our three main collaborators – Kintaro Akiyama, Thom D’arcy and Moose and you have so many more worlds that collide. We chose what we felt were the strongest tunes vs. trying to be genre-specific to keep the algo’s happy. Creativity and overall feeling was priority for us.”

“Crüel to Be Distant” distills that spirit into four minutes of sun-kissed unease. Produced by Thom D’Arcy, the song came together from a studio session built around acoustic guitar, Wurlitzer, bass, and drums, then slowly expanded into the warm, glistening arrangement heard today: Radiant guitars, lush keys, aching pedal steel, and melodies that seem to melt in the mind like butter. It goes down smooth – almost too smooth – which is exactly why its emotional tension works. TAURO wrap a song about avoidance and suspicion in instrumentation so welcoming that the ache has time to sneak in. “Something don’t feel quite right / you’re just a little bit off,” they sing, and suddenly the breeze carries a chill.

Something don’t feel quite right
You’re just a little bit off
Something deep in the pitch of your voice
That I’m not sure how to clock

But baby it’s cruel to be distant
Anyone would agree
And I’m a fool cause i missed it
You’re keeping something from me

“‘Crüel to Be Distant’ came together in an interesting way,” Tauro explains. “We were in the studio with Thom D’arcy, and the three of us came up with the basic structure – pretty much the entire song without lyrics or melody. nothing was coming to mind for any of us, so we all went home. that night, Thom sends us a rough version with lyrics and melody. Brendan and I loved it and immediately felt connected to the lyrics, so with a few tweaks here and there, that’s what you hear today.”

This immediate connection makes sense: “Crüel to Be Distant” captures a feeling most people recognize before they can prove it. The song is not about dramatic confrontation so much as the small atmospheric shift that comes before it – the pitch of a voice, the dodged conversation, the partner who is physically present but emotionally somewhere else. “But baby it’s cruel to be distant / anyone would agree / and I’m a fool ’cause I missed it / you’re keeping something from me,” TAURO sing in a chorus so sweetly catchy it almost softens the accusation. Almost. The hook is gorgeous, but the hurt inside it is clear: Distance can be its own confession.

“We’ve all been in those relationships where you’re almost positive your partner is hiding something from you,” TAURO say. “Well, you’re lucky if you have NOT been in this position. But this song speaks directly to that feeling and almost gives comfort to the listener saying how it’s not okay to do that and it is ‘CRÜEL.’”

“Distant is someone who’s always avoiding conversation or confrontation,” they add. “Never wanting to talk about the root problem, and also just physically keeping their distance.”

Do you see your reflection
Stealing moments in time
Petty misunderstandings make me
Feel like I’m crossing a line

Some people might feel nervous
Some people just too shy
Some people know exactly what’s what
And don’t mind telling you lies

This emotional clarity is what keeps the song from drifting away on its own beauty. “Crüel to Be Distant” is dreamy and polished, but it never loses sight of the person standing inside the ache, trying to trust what their body already knows. The final lines sharpen that realization into a boundary: “It’s a hard line and I don’t like the feeling / of being the one who stays / hard line and I don’t mind you leaving / you were never here anyway.” It’s a devastating turn because it names the relationship for what it has become – not a shared space, but an absence dressed up as connection. TAURO make that truth feel warm, golden, and strangely freeing, like stepping out of a room where the air has gone stale and finding the night still soft around you.

But baby it’s cruel to be distant
Anyone would agree
And I’m a fool cause I missed it
You’re keeping something from me

“I hope listeners feel understood and even validated for how they feel if they’ve ever felt a similar feeling,” Tauro shares. “And if not, I hope they just enjoy the catchy melodies and pedal steel guitar! This is not the first song about an ally being sneaky, nor will it be the last.”

Across Act I, TAURO reveal how many different moods can live inside their irresistible, soft-edged pop.

“Great Minds,” the record’s opening track and their most popular song to date, emerges from a sweet haze, its breezy, hypnotic pulse carrying the lingering disorientation of a breakup. Even as the lyrics revisit a relationship the narrator would rather leave behind, the music drifts forward with an almost weightless ease, its chorus suspended somewhere between memory and escape. It’s a beguiling introduction to the duo’s musical world – richly melodic and disarmingly accessible, with an emotional undercurrent that grows more compelling the longer you listen.

“Bad Bad Feeling” brings a different energy, its throwback, Motown-inspired groove lending a playful, propulsive rhythm to the exhaustion of a relationship worn thin by repeated arguments. “I feel unseen, I feel unheard,” Tauro sings, the frustration landing all the harder for how effortlessly the chorus rolls off the tongue. The song dances through a familiar kind of romantic disillusionment, its soulful bounce offering a delicious contrast to the growing desperation underneath. Fittingly, its spontaneity extends to the recording itself, with D’Arcy arriving at the studio having already laid much of the musical groundwork.

“We showed up to Thom’s studio one morning and he already had the instrumental mostly built. The chorus just came right away,” the band recall. “Cynthia’s on organ, which was new territory for us, and it pushed the song into this more classic, soulful space.”

“You Got Something” offers another striking highlight, its more spacious arrangement leaving the most vulnerable parts of the performance exposed. A question as simple as “did you ever really love me?” carries enormous weight in this tender, unhurried ballad, where the absence of sonic excess only magnifies the emotion. Further into the album, “Change Is Strange” settles into a smoldering slow burn, its brooding atmosphere heavy with the anticipation of an overdue reckoning. As the repeated promise of change hangs over the music, the song gradually sinks deeper into itself, resolving in contemplation rather than catharsis. It’s a beautifully restrained moment, an aching acknowledgment of how difficult it can be to accept an uncertain future, even when you know the present can’t last.

The album’s closing “Looking Out” offers one of its most affecting shifts in perspective. Having survived the pain of a relationship that left its narrator feeling trapped, TAURO arrive at a fragile question of mutual care: “Now I’m looking out for you / are you looking out for me?” The uncertainty remains, but the willingness to reach toward another person gives the record a moving sense of possibility.

Across Act I, the production passes between Kintaro Akiyama, Thom D’Arcy, and Spencer “Moose” Muscio, each helping shape a distinct corner of the album’s musical personality. Tauro and Canning’s shared gift for melody binds those varied sounds together, giving their debut a wonderfully natural sense of cohesion. The result is an album as musically curious as it is emotionally perceptive, full of unexpected pleasures and beautifully unresolved feelings – a first chapter that leaves plenty to discover, and plenty to look forward to.

Sweet as a summer breeze and sharp where it counts, “Crüel to Be Distant” is TAURO at their most inviting and quietly incisive – a lush, glistening pop reverie that turns emotional avoidance into something you can hum, sway to, and maybe even recognize yourself inside. Its warmth is undeniable, its chorus irresistible, but the song’s real power lies in the way it lets beauty carry a boundary. Distance may be cruel, but TAURO make clarity sound radiant.

In conversation with Atwood Magazine, Cynthia Tauro reflects on the spontaneous musical chemistry behind Act I and the freedom of following an idea wherever it leads. Read our interview below, and stay with TAURO beyond the golden-hour glow: Their songs only grow more revealing as the night unfolds.

It’s a hard line and I don’t like the feeling
Of being the one who stays
Hard line and I don’t mind you leaving
You were never here anyway

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:: stream/purchase Act I here ::

:: connect with TAURO here ::

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Stream: ‘Act I’ – TAURO

A CONVERSATION WITH TAURO

TAURO (Cynthia Tauro): We’re essentially a pop group who don’t want to be pigeonholed with, “Oh they sound like this or that.” We’re getting our project off the ground and there are so many ways to present musical ideas, so why stay in a narrow lane. We’re here to have fun making music and hopefully affect people’s lives in some small meaningful way.

TAURO: Carole King, Stevie Wonder, Norah Jones, Boards of Canada… Right now, I’m excited about collaborating with more people who are aligned with the sound and vision of TAURO.

TAURO: “Crüel to Be Distant” came together in an interesting way. We were in the studio with Thom D’arcy, and the three of us came up with the basic structure – pretty much the entire song without lyrics or melody. nothing was coming to mind for any of us, so we all went home. that night, Thom sends us a rough version with lyrics and melody. Brendan and I loved it and immediately felt connected to the lyrics, so with a few tweaks here and there, that’s what you hear today.

TAURO: We’ve all been in those relationships where you’re almost positive your partner is hiding something from you… well you’re lucky if you have NOT been in this position. but this song speaks directly to that feeling and almost gives comfort to the listener saying how it’s not okay to do that and it is “CRÜEL.”

TAURO: Distant is someone who’s always avoiding conversation or confrontation. never wanting to talk about the root problem, and also just physically keeping their distance.

TAURO: “Crüel to Be Distant” is a group effort (as mentioned above) which dictates the entire essence of the album. Brendan and I started writing together because we love writing music and feeding off of other peoples energies and ideas in the studio. this song was a very collaborative effort which depicts what the album is all about.

TAURO: Act I gives the listener a glimpse into the TAURO world. It’s a joint effort of myself and Brendan, already coming from slightly different musical backgrounds and influences. My major influences are Bill Evans, Carol King and Sting. Brendan’s range from Air to Frank Zappa. Then throw in our three main collaborators – Kintaro Akiyama, Thom D’arcy and Moose and you have so many more worlds that collide. We chose what we felt were the strongest tunes vs.  trying to be genre-specific to keep the algo’s happy. Creativity and overall feeling was priority for us.

TAURO: I hope listeners feel understood and even validated for how they feel if they’ve ever felt a similar feeling. and if not, I hope they just enjoy the catchy melodies and pedal steel guitar 🙂 This is not the first song about an ally being sneaky, nor will it be the last.

We’ve learned that being open to ideas with no prejudice or assumptions, is the best foot forward.

TAURO: Right now, we’re listening to… Yebba, Saya Gray, Freddie Gibbs, Daniel Avery, Badge Epoch. Would recommend ALL!

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:: stream/purchase Act I here ::

:: connect with TAURO here ::

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Stream: “Crüel to Be Distant” – TAURO

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