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!

“Farmer’s Daughter” (Beach Boys cover)

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By Jim Fusco:

Hello all! Here’s another song for the Laptop Sessions! This one is by request for an early Beach Boys tune called “Farmer’s Daughter”.  It’s a pretty cute little song (only four chords!) made exponentially harder because of the fact that it’s ALL sung in falsetto!  But, as Brian Wilson was about when he recorded this, I’m in my early 20s, so I think I hit the notes!  I, for one, love the songs from the very early Beach Boys albums.  It was definitely a different time.  It was before the Beatles made it big in America and there was an innocence to the music.  Of course, that’s why I love the music I love- I try not to listen to too many depressing songs.  For instance, I was starting to get in to Elliot Smith’s music.  But, as anyone who has heard of Elliot Smith knows, his songs are almost always dark and with an overtone of suicidal thoughts.  Elliot was a great musician and songwriter.  But, I could never become a huge fan because of the songs’ subject matter.  Listing to music has always been a source of joy for me, so I’ve decided to stay in my happy pre-Vietnam music world, smiling all the way. 🙂

Although, I will admit, “Farmer’s Daughter” is a bit too “vanilla”, even for me.  But, Brian Wilson sings it so sweetly and it works.  In fact, many of the songs from their early albums are a bit embarrassing to listen to now.  Remember “Chug a Lug”?  Probably not- it’s not that memorable.  But, basically, it’s about drinking beer…root beer!  I’ve played that song for people over the years and it’s embarrassing every time I do.  But for some reason, I really like that song.  It’s just a song a bunch of teenage friends, brothers, and cousins wrote and sang together for fun.  And their voices are so “cute” that you can’t help but smile while singing.

Speaking of SMiLE, I wonder if these early songs gave Brian Wilson some influence over his most notable work.  He wanted SMiLE to be something fun- something that was brilliant, but also made you not take the music so seriously.  He always seemed stuck in a child-like state.  I wonder if he looked back on these early songs and thought, “Yeah, I’d like to get back to that fun again.  How do I do that while still sounding cool, complex, and relevant?”

One other album I love so much (which you’ll see plenty of videos from here on the music blog) is the Beach Boys Christmas Album from 1964.  It’s one of my absolute favorite albums of all time.  Why?  Well, it fits all the criteria I listed above!  It’s great music with the wonderful innocence and happiness of Christmas built right in.  Nothing puts a bigger smile on my face (musically) than their Christmas songs.

I hope you enjoy.

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“Step Into Christmas” (Elton John Christmas Cover)

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By Jim Fusco:

Welcome to your Christmas 2010 edition of the Laptop Sessions with Jim Fusco!  I couldn’t let the Christmas Season go by without presenting a cover song music video for you, so I present Elton John’s Christmas classic “Step Into Christmas”.

You know, growing up, I never loved this song.  I think my father wasn’t a huge fan of it, so that tainted my view.  But, as time went on (and I became a bigger Elton John fan) I realized that this is a pretty great tune.  In it, Elton says, “I’d like to thank you for the year.”  Obviously, he’s talking to his many fans and I’d like to do the same: THANK YOU for another great year here on the Laptop Sessions acoustic cover songs music video blog!  In the past year, I’ve seen the term “Laptop Sessions” come up as a search suggestion in Google.  That’s pretty cool and means that plenty of people have been searching for this site!  Also, I’m only a few days away from reaching 800,000 YouTube views- 80% of the way towards my ultimate goal of a million!  I have had renewed ambition lately to promote the Laptop Sessions blog and my YouTube videos, so I hope I keep it going- my goal is to reach a million YouTube views sometime in 2011- hopefully the first half!

A funny note about “Step Into Christmas” by Elton John: the chorus always seemed odd to me.  I, for the first 26 years of my life, always thought he said, “Eat in the evening, come along with me.”  I thought that was such a stupid line!  I mean, Bernie Taupin couldn’t think of anything else you could do at Christmas other than eating in the evening??  Well, I decided that I should find out for sure if that was the line- turns out I was wrong.  He really says, “Eat, drink, and be merry; come along with me.”  Wow- I was WAY off!  Well, to be fair, I don’t think I ever would’ve guessed that- how did they fit those words into that short of a time-span?  Well, I figured it out and included it in my song.  I’m glad I did- there’s been a few Laptop Sessions cover songs videos where I sang incorrect words because I thought I knew them.  They’ve always haunted me.  For instance, on Brian Wilson’s “Live Let Live” video, I sang, “Pure Pacific, just as sure as the sky.”  I had no idea what that meant, but since Van Dyke Parks wrote the lyrics, I figured I shouldn’t ask questions.  Well, I did decide to ask questions, and it turns out the line is, “Blue Pacific, as azure as the sky.”  Ohhhhh, THAT’S what he said!  Brian has gotten a tad bit of a slur in his later years, and “as azure as” is hard enough to say anyway!  So, I botched that line.  I’ve never been proud of that video as a result.

Anyway, I hope everyone has a great Christmas!!  I’m happy I got in this Christmas cover song today.  This year, I’m hoping to have one of the most memorable Christmases ever and I’ll be sure to tell you all about it after the big day comes.  I can’t believe it’s just a week away!  Until then- MERRY CHRISTMAS!!

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“Laughing” (The Guess Who Cover)

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Hello everyone and welcome to another new edition of the Laptop Sessions with Jim Fusco!  I’m excited to bring you this new acoustic cover song music video tonight from a band I absolutely loved growing up.

You see, in my early years, CDs were just becoming popular.  My father, being the music fan he is, was constantly buying music on CDs so he could have a pristine digital copy.  Fortunately for me, I got to hear many “Best Of” albums when he got them.  So, even though he probably had a couple Guess Who vinyl LPs, listening to these old hits on CD was like hearing them again for the first time.  So, as a kid, I was really into bands like the Monkees, the Moody Blues, and The Guess Who- and my love for them lives on today!

I’ve wanted to play the Guess Who song “Laughing” for quite a while now.  But, I could never really figure out the intricate opening section.  The “chords” are actually just augmented versions of one chord (based around an “A” chord).  So even though they all sound like different chords, it’s just a matter of moving one finger up or down one fret!  That’s pretty easy to play, but not so easy to figure out.  Songs like this, to me, raise a flag.  Songs that have these funny, intricate chord progressions (like making interesting variations on one chord) are almost always done like this: the guitar part came first and the rest of the song came later.  That is, Burton Cummings of the Guess Who was probably sitting down with his guitar, playing that opening section.  From there, he added those variations and all of a sudden, a song came to him!  That’s in contrast to the other form of songwriting (which I’ve been doing, but takes much longer to compile a full list of songs) where a tune pops into your head.  Then, you head on over to your guitar or piano to figure out the chords that go to it.

Either way of writing a song is fine by me (though my brother Mike is very much a purist for the “pop into your head” method), and I think songs like “Laughing” prove that fooling around with a couple of chords on the guitar can result in a big hit song.

The vocals are also great on “Laughing”.  That goes for both the soulful lead and the good backing vocals.  This song is pretty dynamic, too- it has three distinct tempos.  Plus, I think it’s the only song I’ve ever heard with in-tune laughing!

So, Christmastime is upon us.  Personally, I had an incredibly busy Thanksgiving weekend.  Between our two Thanksgiving get-togethers, the Jets game/TNA Wrestling night, midnight shopping at the outlets and other stores, another family get-together and sleepover Friday, a party and bar-hopping for my brother in law’s birthday on Saturday, I was POOPED by Sunday!  We finally got to put all the Christmas stuff up in the house and I must say, it looks pretty great.  I’m so excited for this Christmas- it promises to be (gift-wise, at least) one of the best yet.  I’m holding out hope for getting a couple of different gifts.  I’ll be posting on December 16th and the 30th, so I’ll be able to share the rundown of all my Christmas presents then!

I hope you enjoy tonight’s music video post of “Laughing” by the Guess Who.  If you know it, then you know it’s a classic tune.  If you don’t know it yet, then I think you’ll really dig it!  Have fun shopping and I’d love to hear from everyone how their Christmas season is going so far!  See you in a couple weeks for an all-new acoustic cover song music video!

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“I Told You” (Thorns Cover)

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By Jim Fusco:

Wow, how long has it been?!?!  I’ve been so incredibly busy that I keep looking back and saying to myself, “Hey, hasn’t Thursday just passed?”  Between work, refinancing a mortgage, ditching cable for DirecTV, working on the house and lawn, and much more, I can’t believe it’s already almost Christmas time!  I’m really excited about it and hope to have some more free time to do videos and just enjoy life, you know?  I’m most excited about writing and recording my new set of songs- I’m already up to 13!  Plus, we’re hoping to get our basement finished soon, and that means I’ll have a brand-new “studio” of sorts to record my videos in!  I’ll have more room, be able to use instruments I haven’t touched since I moved-in over a year ago, and will have much better lighting.  Plus, who wants to see a printer in the background, anyway? 🙂

Onto tonight’s video!

I have such a long list of videos to record now, but I’m starting here with a song I’m sure you’ve never heard of.  Normally, I like to take songs that weren’t originally “acoustic” and turn them into the classic Laptop Sessions “a man and his guitar” format.  But this is just a great song and shows that a true simple acoustic guitar tune can be just as good as a fully produced song.  Sure, the Thorns (a band formed by three mid-90s solo acts to form a sort of “supergroup”) sing in great three-part harmony on the song.  But, I’ve never been able to find other people to sing in that range with me on a consistent basis.  So, I’m going it alone on this one!

Doesn’t the guitar part just sparkle on my new Martin?  I truly love playing this guitar and it makes all of my videos sound that much better.  Now, I’m not knocking the nylon string guitar.  That guitar is so easy to play and I love its mellow sound.  It’s great to sing with because you don’t have to fight with the loudness of a steel-string guitar.

On a side note about “I Told You”, I believe I read that Van Dyke Parks (of Beach Boys ‘SMiLE” fame) plays the accordion on the original recording.  The Thorns used a lot of older musicians and collaborators on their only album from 2002.  Jim Keltner, the drummer for the Traveling Wilbruys, plays the drums on the whole album!  Now that’s pretty cool.  One of the songs even features a bass harmonica, which is used on the Beach Boys track “I Know There’s an Answer” from “Pet Sounds”.  So, this album was an instant winner with me.  If you haven’t heard the Thorns self-titled album, please do yourself a favor and get it.  You won’t be disappointed.

One final personal aside for a moment- I’ve been going-through the audio versions of every single Laptop Sessions acoustic cover and original song I’ve ever recorded.  I’m up to 221 videos now.  That’s GOTTA be a record!  I wanted to do a project where I chose my favorite videos and recordings.  But, I’m over 150 songs into the list now and am no closer to compiling a list.  I hope I get popular enough to have my own historian someday.  That way, I won’t have to keep track of all this myself. 🙂

It’s good to be back here on the site.  I sincerely hope that I’ll be posting regularly from now on, but who knows.  Something always manages to come up.  Have a great couple of weeks and I hope to see you again in early December!

NOTE: This video was remastered in 2020 for improved picture and sound.

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