Music
Press
...' In the the cosy warmly lit room of Rockwood Music Hall, Irish born singer-songwriter Tom Hayes took to the stage in a quiet sort of way. One final check of tuning, with the guitar raised to his ear, and the music in the house lowered. The room became eerily quiet. What poured out was a gentle guitar style i havent heard in far too long, and a voice that by end of his first song had at least two of the female attendees misty! My friend who dragged me along with promises of a free wine if i "just hear this kid", sat eyes closed, slowly rocking forward and back to my left. Few times in New York do you get to exist in a moment free of thoughts of the next, but whatever incantation this 23 yr old kid was workin', it was sure workin! this was my first time at one of Tom's shows, but not the last. Catch this kid while you can, before it gets expensive!" - Sunday Times
..There is an ethereal quality to toms music, that really draws the listener in, until the story is told.. (local press, London) - Rock Garden
....."Picking on a guitar, melody after melody effortlessly emerged, dressed with some of the finest lyrics i've heard at The Sidewalk.Just at home spiraling to a scream as a bare tonal whisper, he displayed a range and hold on his audience I have rarely seen. I sat as a full room breathed together, when they remembered to. This is a guy to watch"... - Sidewalk Cafe Show
Discography
E. P "Room 403" released 2007
Photos
Bio
With a voice and live set that leaves an audience stunned to silence, it’s no mystery how Tom Hayes has found himself at the center of a New York whirlwind. Moving to the city just two years ago from London, the Irish born son of a mechanic found the guitar when he was five. Raised on singers like Nina Simone, Ray Charles, and Billy Holliday, Tom began to sing at eight, yet it was far removed from the world of Soul or Rock he began. Studying the ancient Irish style of singing known as “Sean-Nos”, Tom would spend nine years learning its vocal acrobatics from those who kept the tradition breathing. Writing began to creep in however, and it wasn’t long until at the age of 18, Tom left Irish music to move to London . A new place and new people raised within him a new style of writing, and so his unique songs emerged. The following years would see him play the more major music festivals between the UK and Ireland.
With the summer of 2005 came a point when Tom felt he had to try New York City. A place he had been to a number of times and fallen in love with, it held the idea of letting go again, of everything and everyone he knew. To him it made sense that he would find something new. Diving in, the Lower East Side of Manhattan became his home, playing the dimly-lit back rooms of the East Villages’ open mikes. New songs came, and so too did the development of a voice that has earned itself comparisons to more adjectives than artists! Taken in as another longing soul by the local music scene, it wasn’t long until the more selective venues of the city were adding Tom to their calendars. Two years later and now packing out the highly regarded rooms of The Rockwood Music Hall and Pianos, there is no sense of a young kid out to find an answer anymore. Dressed down to just an acoustic guitar, there raises within his melodies a sense of solidarity and the ocean. The vastness of the Atlantic seems to ebb its way in and around his lyrics as well. Mix in with that a voice that can hang as clear as a gulls wail in a rising swell, or spiral down toward the waves of his verses with gnarled visceral desire, it doesn’t under explain how a quick glance around a room can find more than a few of the audience in tears. That space, and respect for silence, has gained him attention and many a review in the press as well. NYC.com has called him “the one to watch” for 2007, and a recent review of a pre-Christmas show at The Rockwood called his performance “breath-taking”. With a live album on the way, and a publishing as well as management deal in their final stages, my advice would be to listen to the music, and if you like it, get to a show! Before the whirlwind takes him away!
-Written by Mariah Harrington
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