Tom Laverack

It is a rare occurrence when an artist’s compositions frame a film project. But, that is just what has happened to former Just Desserts frontman Tom Laverack and his introspective marvel, Cave Drawings on Sojourn Records.

Three of Cave Drawings' songs, "Precious Little," "No Shame," and "Running Out of Road," were used for Larry Fessenden's feature, The Last Winter. "Precious Little," produced by Mark Ambrosino, stretches the vast, colorful musical landscape of Laverack's mind with sharp, insightful, poetic lyricism. Bolstered by strong sidemen such as Jeff Langston (Antony and the Johnsons) and Marc Shulman (Suzanne Vega), Laverack finds the freedom and the flow in the breezy opening track, "Coney Island Heart." Slowing down with reflection, Laverack's tools of description become the soft spoken prose of "Kickin' Around." And, powering Cave Drawings' rhythmic counterpoint, Ambrosino finds the catchy, simmering soulful stretches brewing inside of "Childhood Friend."

A deeply satisfying listen, Tom Laverack's Cave Drawings rewards with each sublimely successive playing.
Cave Drawings will be released January 22 on Sojourn Records.
-Bill Whiting - Honest Tune Online

With twenty years gone by since his debut album, Tom Laverack has honed his writing and performing into a perfectly matched set. His voice and songs meet one another on varied turf and go gallivanting about the hillsides. World-weariness runs through the the entire set in a way that a man two decades younger couldn't have fully comprehended. "Not much changes from place to place but the scenery," Laverack sings in "Dead Dog". The soulful, horn-bolstered "Running Out Of Road" delivers on its title with a certainty tempered by a still-unquenched thirst for life. "Foolish Enough To Think" weds pop smarts to a rough-and-tumble groove and leathery vocals. The title song, rich with allegory, hypnotizes along the course of its folkish structure, punctuated with Joni Mitchell-like chordal turns and thoughtfully compelling drumming.
-DAVID GREENBERGER - (NODEPRESSION.NET)

Backed by an understated and cleverly arranged ensemble, singer-songwriter/ guitarist Tom Laverack offers lyrical gems about everything from alcoholism (Alcohol) to
homogenized rock radio (Last Rock and Roll Band).

For fans of Mark Eitzel, Bruce
Springsteen,
Replacements. - CMJ

It (Gift Horse) is a simple and thoughtful record… It is a collection of long melancholic
songs played with an exquisite sense of balance between keyboards (used here instead
of a piano) and stringed instruments. It is not, as one might think, an obvious,
traditional lament in the "roots" vein… because Laverack is nearly always only himself.
If someone really wanted to make a comparison, I would suggest the name of
Bob Dylan (the more mature Dylan of the 80's) whose spirit flutters here and there in
the more animated episodes of the album, "Killing Time" (superb) or "Five O' Clock
Shadow", both of which display electric instruments used more sparingly elsewhere.
However it is not in the quantity of watts used where one should look for the most profound
meaning of Laverack's music, but in the moderate pop spirit of the delicious"Crossin' Kansas", in the "cinematic" blues of "Where Are You?", and most of all, in
the sad melodies of "Bodiless, Hot Dog Vendor or Wallet" which can be considered sublime exercises of introspection, able to give voice to an entire universe of abandoned
people. If you are in syntony with the idea of another rock writer who entrusts his own soul to the neck of a guitar, then "Gift Horse", is your record.
***1/2
-Gianfranco Callieri - Roots Highway

...the best of the writing-notably a detox diptych and an acrid call to arms and alms-kept me listening for the sprawling masterpiece I had somehow missed. It wasn't there.
But I never got tired of the good stuff. B - Village Voice

With pop/rock moods and poetry, along with a vocal style that conjurs Petty and Dylan,
Tom Laverack's 14-track CD, "Gift Horse", is a look into the mouth of an artist
who is masterful at painting musical tapestries of typically dark adult life. The record
starts with "Smile On You", a reality punching confession of the common effort,
'starting out but wishing that you were through, trying to hide that you haven't a clue.
.you'll never concede that your pretty little dream will not come true'. Brutal and honest.
Track 2, "Hold Out", is a simple subtle inspiring tune of dedication, 'if i fall down
i'll try to get back up and i'll catch you rain in this paper cup, and you can call my
name, and i will come'. Track 9, "Five o'clock Shadow", is a NYC ode that touches on
Lou Reed influence about city street observations, 'i saw these cops holding onto a
woman who was crying out and in pain, she fell to the sidewalk with a cops foot on
her so that she couldn't run away'. The sweetest melody and sentiment on a record
of sometimes brutal discouragement, is found in "Ragdoll". Picking up with the same
tone of dedication as "hold out", Laverack sings, 'i could be your rag doll and be
there where you are'. The guitar work approaches a pedal steel and adds understated
instrumental beauty to the song. Laverack leaves a final imprint of futility in
"Hot Dog Vendor" as the protagonist accomplishes little in an effort to not become a
hot dog vendor. But, the record overall touches a relative core of universal insecurity
in its language. The music serves to prop up a world that Laverack seems to revere
and deject at the same time - and end up with glimpses of love and resolve in what
are unconditional dedicated songs of partnership. Superb.
-Don Kimenker - Earbuzz.com

In goes Just Desserts' stark raving, uh, stark
"Almost shook you up"/"Flashing Blue"
(Bar/None). Singer-songwriter Tom
LaverackÃ?s jagged folk-rock cuts to the bone straight through the most opportune
vein, not unlike the song of American Music Club's Mark Eitzel. Recorded live, with
Laverack on guitar/vocals and band mate Larry Fesenden on sax/vocals, "Almost
Shook You Up" chillingly depicts a numbed-beyond-belief protagonist whose wife
has split, whose daughter has vamoosed ("Said she'd rather be anywhere than in
this morgue you call a home"), and whose mom just died-and still he's blank.
Disturbingly real. So too "Flashing Blue," taken from Sentimental War (I'm ISO it)
wherein Laverack and Fessenden trade ragged lines about the jittery
dead-endedness of detox hell, accompanied-but never overwhelmed-by
mood-manipulating organ, bass, guitars, and drums. Gripping stuff. - NY Press