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- once every two weeks!  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”!