The album image of a bird in a cage with a wolf sniffing 'round it, groaning for a bite, (developed by Kathryn Swezy and Charissa Ruby) seems the appropriately surreal depiction of Larkins captured as prey, but still swinging. She, in fact was cited and prosecuted habitually by a home rule city which creatively enacted new zoning laws to prohibit Larkins' house church from existing in the artist's home. Beyond the question of grandfathered rights became, 'Does the Constitution of the United States prohibit government interference into all religious expression or just the religious expression that has become incorporated as a 501(c)(3) organization?' Is religion a matter of the human conscious or a matter for a tax status? For, while no victims existed and no harm or burden was put on anyone by Laura's religious expression, she was tried as a criminal and convicted for disobeying the new zoning law, and sentenced to six weeks in jail, a year's probation and other fines and costs, a punishment which nearly claimed her sanity. Instead, the caged bird began to write and sing. So, this trial wasn't supposed to happen in America. Yet it did. So, Amendment One guaranties 'redress' for government grievances and 'freedom of religion,' and Laura decided to trust God and fight for what was right rather than to lay down and be bulldozed away or become bitter. Her music was her child's play therapy during these long four years. Friends helped record and produce these songs. Laura's mission is to alert and educate people regarding the roots of their citizenship and where hope can still be built. Sales from this album are donations to various home assemblies in Colorado. Anyone who has been the victim of defamation or has been burned by systems of justice will appreciate the fire and ice of Laura's lyrics and memoirs written in real time. Her joy, never more apparent, springs from standing on solid ground in the presence of her higher power, God, who miraculously made her household thrive even while neighbors and an entire city government took shots and bites out of her for four years. While the legal fire raged, redemption began. In this pop album, she explores what home really means, and where her hope is built. Her new album Bird Cage plays alongside a courageous new book, Poetic Justice: Building Poet's Rest (yet to be published). Together they tell of an uncanny journey in a Colorado neighborhood which managed to steal the sacred use of home from her family. Slowly and honestly, she is transformed from angry victim to composed victor, which after all, is the meaning of her name. Demetrios Masters came alongside with his Masters Rhythm Studios, authentic Greek guitar and mandolin, and sweetened rock bass skills, and brought in Kim Masters and his friend Darren Ross who both laid down drums, and then brought in Frankie Z on keys, Rob Landreth on jazz guitar and Adam Ray, for layers of amazing Latin flavored solo guitars in Home Sweet Home (Tango) and the hymn My Hope Is Built. Melissa Thompson is the soaring background vocalist, and Kathryn Swezy, the folksy background vox on this album. Together, this group of amazing friends and musicians make up the new and authentic band, Pleasurefeat. Distributed by Joy! Distribution. Proceeds of this album go directly back to supporting house hold mentoring ministries such as Horizon, Open Door Fellowship and Poet's Rest. These groups of people are trying to intentionally integrate their faith and what they say they believe with authentic action...not just for a couple of hours on a Sunday or sabbath, or religious holiday, but in daily mentoring, support and wrestling through the everyday struggles where the rubber meets the road. Where Laura's music differs from other Christian or spiritual genre's is that she says she began to see that Christ was not merely the savior of her soul for some time after death, but that he wanted to sit with her in her 'criminal state' and walk with her not as the victor, but as the wrongly accused and sentenced and punished. He, after all, knows what it is like
