Author Archives: Jim Fusco

About Jim Fusco

Jim Fusco is a singer, songwriter, guitarist, and all-around musician. Learn all about him and his creative works at http://jimfusco.com!

“I Need You” (The Beatles Cover)

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By Jim Fusco:

Happy Thanksgiving to everyone and welcome to this special holiday edition of the Laptop Sessions music blog with me, Jim Fusco! Tonight, I bring you a great Beatles cover song in “I Need You”, written by George Harrison.

I’ve always been a huge fan of George Harrison’s songs, as I’m sure you know by now. To me, he helped make Paul McCartney and John Lennon better as songwriters. Why? Because they were given a different perspective on each album. I honestly wish the songwriting was more balanced throughout the Beatles recordings.

Tonight’s Beatles cover song is the first of a “Twin Spin” of sorts. Two weeks from now, I’ll be debuting another song with the same name: “I Need You” by the bad America. Gerry Beckley, the writer of that song, is a huge Beatles fan, and I think there are some definite similarities between the two songs. The endings of both songs sound very similar to me, and I think it was done purposefully by America.

“I Need You” is one of the earlier songs George Harrison wrote for the Beatles. In the beginning, you could tell that George really was the “quiet Beatle”. He wrote songs with a self-lamenting tone to them. Another example is “Don’t Bother Me”.

This acoustic cover song music video took me only one take. That happens when I both love the song…and know all the lyrics. 🙂

I’m not going to get all gushy and emotional about Thanksgiving here on the music blog, but I will say that I hope you have a great day. It’s honestly my favorite day of the year- you have everything to look forward to!

And, I hope you enjoy tonight’s acoustic Beatles cover song music video. Oh, and as a quick update regarding my re album, “Those Around Us”, I have the final album art and it looks AMAZING! I can’t wait to debut it to the world. I hope to see you for part two of my “I Need You” cover song video mini-series!

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“Tuning In” (Original Song by Jim Fusco)

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By Jim Fusco:

Welcome to another edition of the Laptop Sessions with me, Jim Fusco!  Tonight, I bring you an original song that first appeared on my 2009 album, “Halfway There”.  Let’s get the promo stuff out of the way first: You can buy the album “Halfway There” with 12 original songs on my website at http://jimfusco.com/albums/halfway-there.html.  I play all of the instruments on the album and sing all the vocal parts, though there are a couple of guest appearances throughout.  The album, which you can buy on iTunes as well as on CD, features a beautiful album cover painting from Ben Quesnel.  I made him a website for his original artwork at http://bqartstudio.com.  The album cover ties the whole album together- the feeling of being only “halfway there” in life.

“Tuning In”, tonight’s original song music video, is about two people that are having a tough time finding time for each other.  As we all grow up and start to work for a living (after graduating school, hopefully), we find it hard to fit in all of the things we were accustomed to doing.  I know I found it difficult.  All of a sudden, your days are completely filled.  Plus, when you get home, there are chores to do around the house, plus cleaning, cooking, and the laundry.  No time is left over for anything fun anymore!  My future wife and I were in that situation for a while.  We eventually made everything work, but for a time, we would barely ever see each other.

I can recall the exact moment when I came up with the idea for this song, “Tuning In’.  Every week, we would get together and watch the TV show “Boston Legal”.  But, during this time period, we were both very busy, as I mentioned earlier.  I recall seeing a pattern: the ONLY time we’d see each other was to watch this one-hour long TV show!  Thus the line, “I’m tuning you in an hour a week…”  Of course, looking back on it all, I’m sure I was exaggerating a bit.  But, like I said, it was tough getting used to being so busy all of the time.  We went from spending every waking moment together to only seeing each other when all the chores, homework, and day jobs were done…hardly ever.

I chose to do “Tuning In” tonight for a few reasons:

First, I like the song!  Of course I do- I wrote it, right?  But, this one always gets me because I love the style.  I came up with that interesting strumming pattern (kind of start-stop thing I do with the guitar) and it’s got some cool chords thrown in there.  Plus, I think it’s one of my best choruses up to that point in my musical career.  It’s got a good hook and in the recording, I was able to use a neat vocal effect, too.  I got three vocal background parts and recorded each of them twice.  The result was a nice full effect that I borrowed from Bareknaked Ladies- they used the technique on their “Barenaked Ladies Are Me” album (specifically the song, “Bank Job”).

The second reason I chose “Tuning In” as my original song of the night was because I’m not quite ready to debut a new song from my upcoming album, “Those Around Us”.  Yes, all of the songs are recorded, mixed, and mastered.  But, I’m waiting for the album cover (again painted by Ben Quesnel- and it’s AMAZING) so I can produce the discs.  I’m so excited, but I want to debut Laptop Sessions acoustic music videos of the new songs once I have a release date set for the new album.  I’ll keep you posted- it’s going to be soon!

I hope you enjoy my original song, “Tuning In”, another step forward (in my opinion) as a songwriter and producer.  And I hope you’ll check out the album “Halfway There”, as well- it would mean the world to me if you listened (and bought, of course) the album.  Let me know what you think of “Tuning In” in the comments section!

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“Let’s Spend the Night Together” (Rolling Stones Cover)

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By Jim Fusco:

Welcome, everyone, to another edition of the Laptop Sessions with me, Jim Fusco!  Tonight, I present my first acoustic cover song music video as a member of the YouTube million-view club!  Well, I don’t know if there actually is such a club for YouTube channels that have over a million unique video views, but if there is, I’m glad to now be a part of it!  I honestly believe the second million is going to happen ten times faster than the first and I can only hope that number goes astronomically higher from there!  I want to issue a heartfelt THANK YOU to everyone who has supported the Laptop Sessions acoustic cover songs series over the years and I hope you’ll stay with me now and in the future!

Let’s get to tonight’s music video:

Tonight, I bring you a solo acoustic live performance of The Rolling Stones’ classic song, “Let’s Spend the Night Together”.  It’s such a great song and is by far my favorite tune from the Stones.  You know, we haven’t done enough Rolling Stones cover songs over the years and this is my first step in rectifying that situation.  Honestly, when I look back on the days when we used to do a video every single day, it blows my mind that such immensely popular bands like the Stones weren’t covered more often.  Now, I’m only doing about 15 to 20 cover song videos a year, so it’s a coveted spot.  I take a long time to choose the songs I’m going to do, and I hope all of my regular viewers have noticed.  I want to choose songs that will have some staying power, but still remain true to my love of obscure (but still great) songs, too.

Today’s video, “Let’s Spend the Night Together”, is famous for a couple of reasons.  First, it was a big hit for the Rolling Stones in the mid-60s.  I love how the recorded version kind of has a party-like atmosphere.  You can tell the focus was on the energy of the song- not making sure every instrument or background vocal was done perfectly.  The second reason for it’s fame?  Well, the Rolling Stones also made a big splash when they came to America to perform on the Ed Sullivan Show.  They chose “Let’s Spend the Night Together” as the song they’d play for the show.  Well, the subject matter was a bit taboo for the time and Ed wanted them to change the lyrics of the song to “Let’s spend some time together.”  I shouldn’t even say, “wanted”- it was more like “forced”.  So, Mick Jagger went along with it, though he did roll his eyes at the camera when singing the line.

I bring “Let’s Spend the Night Together” to you with the original lyrics in tact, with my favorite line being, “We can have fun just groovin’ around.”  Let’s just say it took me a few takes to get that right, as the word “groovin’” really isn’t used anymore and I kept saying what people would normally say nowadays.  Anyway, I think this song was perfect for an acoustic cover version- I hope you agree!  I’ll be back with another music video for you.  This week, I received the final masters of the music and secured Ben Quesnel to paint another album for me!  He painted the “Halfway There” album cover (amazing!), too.  See you next time!

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Jim Fusco Reaches ONE MILLION YouTube Video Views!!

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The Laptop Sessions with Jim Fusco is proud to announce that Jim has now reached one million YouTube video views on his acoustic cover song music videos!

This is a milestone for the Laptop Sessions site, as Jim set this goal when starting the acoustic cover song music video series over three years ago. Jim wanted to put an end to bad YouTube covers forever- a million views down and he’s well on his way!

Here’s hoping the million arrives ten times faster!

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