Daily Archives: September 1, 2010

“Sweet Talkin’ Woman” by Electric Light Orchestra (E.L.O.) Cover

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By Jim Fusco:

The 2010-2011 season of the Laptop Sessions with Jim Fusco has now begun!  Back here again after taking the summer off and that’s the way it looks like the schedule will go: September to June.  That way, I can take time off while my wife is off from work.  I’m excited to bring you a whole new crop of Laptop Sessions acoustic cover song music videos!  In between, I’ll be posting articles, reviews, and more.  There’s a lot going on in this noggin’ of mine, so let me update you on a couple of things I’m up to:

  • I had a nice summer, taking a cruise to Bermuda and doing many activities (mostly that my wife wanted to accomplish during her time off)
  • BIG changes are coming to my suite of websites, including the simplification of everything.  This starts with the removal of fusco-moore.com and the FMP Music Store.  They’re just not necessary anymore.  I’ll keep the MoU site online just for old time’s sake (and, it looks cool), but everything else will be taken down (except for WCJM, of course).  I’m conceptualizing a new JimFusco.com and we’ve been doing some photo shoots to give me some new content.
  • I also have a new Twitter account for my music: jimfuscomusic.  Easy enough, huh?  Please follow me so you can get up to the minute updates on all of my musical ventures!
  • I’m working on a new vocals-only project, but this is more for my own usage.  I always put so much work into my vocals that I wanted to showcase them on a special collector’s album.  More to follow.
  • Finally, and most importantly, I’m working on new songs!  I have nine so far and will probably go to 15 so I can, for the first time, record everything and pick out only the best.  I think this will be important to make the best album I can.  But, I’m not giving up on “Halfway There” just yet, so I’ll be promoting that in the meantime.  We’re still probably a year out before I release anything new.

So, that’s what’s happening.  Now, onto tonight’s video!

I’m back with “Sweet Talkin’ Woman” by Electric Light Orchestra.  This is a great classic rock tune that I’ve known for as long as I can remember.  The song, written and sung by Jeff Lynne, is one of my favorite ELO (or E.L.O., whichever the search engines prefer) songs.

I knew the song started on the “C” chord- you can just hear it in the original recording.  What I didn’t know, however, was that this song is really easy to play.  I mean, when you hear an Electric Light Orchestra song, there’s so much going on that the songs sound like they’re really complicated.  But, even after taking three months off, this still only took me one take to get right!  No, I’m not perfect- I did practice quite a bit off-camera.

I think I got the song down really well and made it my own.  Again, this is definitely a pared-down version from the original, stripping-away the multiple instruments and backing vocals.  The backing vocals presented a bit of a challenge, so I had to pick what I believed to be the “lead” backing vocal note and sing that where necessary.

I hope you don’t notice that I’m getting over a cold.  I’ve been practicing guitar like mad lately, but I’ve been giving my voice a rest after a really bad cold.  You know how the cough lingers with you for weeks afterward?  Well, it’s only been a few days and I’m really holding back in the video.  I can’t even laugh without going into a coughing fit!

I hope you enjoy tonight’s video and that you’ll follow me on Twitter (@jimfuscomusic) so you’ll be the first to know when all my new acoustic cover song music videos and blog posts come out.  So, until next time, here’s “Sweet Talkin’ Woman”!

More Laptop Sessions covers

“The One For Me” (Chris Moore original) – Original Wednesday

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By Chris Moore:

Welcome to September, a truly promising month for new music from the likes of Steven Page, Ben Folds, and Weezer!

Today, I’m taking a break from our regularly scheduled Original Wednesday program of previews from The 2010 Project to bring you a song I just wrote last week.

Specifically, a song I wrote on Monday of last week.

You may be wondering, why Monday?  Well, August 23rd — aside from being my friend and sometimes-collaborator Alberto Distefano’s birthday — marked the fifth anniversary of my first date with my girlfriend Nicole.  Because we broke up for three months in late 2008, we’ve decided to officially celebrate our anniversary on the day we got back together for the first time, January 2nd.  (I’m personally a fan of this date for all its implications of the new year, fresh beginnings, resolutions to be made, and all the promise this invokes.  And, although it’s only a week after Christmas, the original date was only a week before her birthday, so proximity to other occasions is not a factor.)

Thus, August 23rd has become the anniversary that we’ve promised to honor, but without monetary expense in the name of gifts.

We never said anything about not spending time to make something like, say, a song!

I spent the better part of my morning last Monday writing, playing, and perfecting “The One For Me.”  It is one of the — if not the — best love songs I’ve written, in my opinion.  And, for those that don’t know, my opinion is that my love songs are generally sub-par.  The version which you will hear in the video below is the first full performance I committed to tape last week.  I’ve been playing it numerous times each day since and it has progressed considerably from the form it is in on this session.

Why post an out-of-date version?

For one, I like the idea of showing off a fresh song, without having practiced it or worked on it.  What is Original Wednesday, after all, if it is not a place to celebrate the writing process?  In addition, I’m trying to imagine a spot for this song on The 2010 Project, so it may show up there.  If it does, you will hopefully be able to tell how much it has progressed since this video.  (And, it will have turned out that today is indeed another installment of the preview series.)

So, without further ado, I give you “The One For Me.”  I hope you enjoy it, and I hope you’ll tune back in for more exciting new material here at the Laptop Sessions as we move into the fall season.

See you next session!

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