“Tired of Killing Myself”

Larry Fessenden, a renowned independent filmmaker who has directed numerous feature films is also the heart of Glass Eye Pix, his production company that supports and collaborates with a host of up and coming indie directors and artisans. Both as a producer and as a director Fessenden has advocated for the importance of artistic collaboration and support throughout his career. So when fellow Just Desserts singer-songwriter Tom Laverack co- founded the record label Sojourn Records with Mark Ambrosino in 2007, Fessenden was the first investor to step up and support the endeavor. A year later, Fessenden and Laverack broke ground on what would become Lost in Love with Ambrosino producing and engineering the project at his Madhouse studio.

The duo, with a few exceptions, largely pulled from material they’d written and first recorded in their early twenties. As Laverack states “(the songs) are like old photographs you stashed in a drawer. But over time the magic there kind of shines through. And it does represent “our sound” whether we knew it or not.” Both Fessenden and Laverack agree that they have returned to where they began as a duo and that there is something right about the fit, like an old shirt or worn but comfortable pair of shoes.

Having officially launched their recording career in 1988 with the release of Sentimental War, the band’s debut “concept album” garnered great reviews and impressive local radio airplay. However, the five-piece unit that Fessenden and Laverack began to perform with quickly fizzled and left them playing again as a duo in performance venues and clubs in downtown NYC.

Fessenden’s blossoming film career and Laverack’s aspirations as a solo artist put Just Desserts on hiatus for several years. However in 1999 they released a second album Give Up The Ghost, recorded again with Wharton Tiers (best known for his work with Sonic Youth and Dinosaur Jr.). Two songs from this album were featured in Fessenden’s cult indie film Habit.

Indeed Fessenden has featured Laverack’s or Just Desserts’ music in all of his films spanning from his first feature, No Telling (a film for which Laverack also composed the orchestral score) and continuing through Habit (1995), Wendigo (2000) and most recently, The Last Winter (2006).

As Fessenden states when speaking about collaboration, “I take great inspiration from working with other artists both in subordinate roles and as the boss; it seems to reinforce a sense of community and belonging. My collaboration with Laverack is my longest-running.”

Lost in Love captures this spirit and uses it to fuel the patchwork of songs here that hark from different points in time but are unified by a very present heart and soul.