Tag Archives: acoustic song

“Time” (Ben Folds Cover- Jim’s 1st on Piano!)

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By Jim Fusco:

Welcome to another edition of the Laptop Sessions on the best music video blog on the web.  Tonight, I bring you my first Laptop Session on the piano, which I actually learned to play before the guitar.  In fact, I taught myself piano- it’s actually very logical in the way it’s set up, so once you learn some of the chord patterns, you can just go from there.

Anyway, tonight’s video is a cover song of the piano master, Ben Folds, and probably my favorite all-time song from him: “Time” off “Songs for Silverman”.  Weird Al joins him on the choir-like backing vocals, which is one of the reasons that this track is my favorite.  I realized, though, that the song is great on its own, so that’s why I wanted to do a Laptop Session of it.

You may notice that the vocals are a bit “airy”.  Well, you see that microphone in front of me?  Perfect placement.  I even make sure to sing directly into it most of the time.  Well, I wanted to get the whole piano sound.  My ZOOM H2 microphone actually has 4 mics in it.  The two on the front are put in a 90 degree angle and the two on the back are placed at 120 degrees for a “wider” pickup range.  I wanted to use that 120 degrees to pick up the piano and my voice.

That only works if you turn the freakin’ microphone around!

So, you couldn’t hear my voice at all and the piano was very muffled.  But, through the magic of equalization, I managed to brighten the piano sound and bring my vocals out of the mix and salvage the video.  I had two others I recorded at this session (originals) on my fiancee’s piano, but those had to be scrapped.  I’ll go back again and re-record those, making sure this time to turn the microphone around…

I hope you enjoy tonight’s music video.  I guess I can’t plug the word “acoustic” tonight, but I guess it’s considered an “acoustic piano” as opposed to an electric piano.  Have a great Sunday and make sure to stop on back for another video the Laptop Sessions acoustic guitar AND piano music video blog!

“Strummin’” (Original Jim Fusco 12-String Acoustic Guitar Song)

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By Jim Fusco:

Welcome to yet another edition of “Original Wednesday” here on the best music video blog in the universe: The Laptop Sessions!  “Original Wednesday” is the once-a-week occurance where we put aside our acoustic rock cover songs and play you an original from our vast catalog.  Tonight, it’s my turn, which comes but once every three weeks, so you know it’s going to be a good one!

“Strummin'” is a song off of my album “That’s All Folks” and was also a bonus track on my earlier album “Formula”.  It actually appeared as my first music video on the Enhanced CD portion of that disc.  I put the video up on YouTube- you can see how much thinner my face was then…and it was only 2004!  Watch the song HERE.

This is a very simple song…well, actually it uses a few jazz chords that I learned while taking my only guitar class in college.  I already knew how to play, but this class filled in a lot of the music theory for me, and I was the best student in the class.  I was actually the only person in class to play Billie Holiday’s “God Bless the Child”.  So, I took a couple of those great sounding jazz chords and turned them into a song of my own.

I needed to finish this song for that music video, which we were going to film the next day.  We even got clearance to use my old high school’s auditorium to tape it, so we had to get it recorded and done right.

So, I wrote the rest of the song quickly and tried out my newfound soloing technique that I also learned while taking that guitar class.

All the lyrics in this song are true-life lyrics.  But there’s a line at the end, “Highly doubt this song will make me a star.”  For some reason, I always thought that this would be the song to make me a star- just because it’s so different and clever.  I hope all of our loyal visitors will send this video around to their friends- if anything, it’ll give you a smile.

Enjoy this song tonight and make sure to come back on Saturday, when I’ll be premiering my first-ever Laptop Sessions cover song on piano.

“The Girl I Knew Somewhere” (Monkees Cover)

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This video was recorded a few weeks ago in my big Monkees phase, which was brought on by getting the deluxe edition of the Monkees album “Headquarters”.  While the album as a whole isn’t perfect (there are more than a couple throwaway tracks), there are some great band-written songs, especially those by Mike Nesmith.  Actually, this song is sung by drummer Mickey Dolenz, which I think is the right choice. One of the bonus tracks on the CD is the original sung by Nesmith, but it’s in a lower key and is nowhere near as upbeat. My second-favorite song of all time in “You Just May Be The One” is on this album.

I couldn’t get “The Girl I Knew Somewhere” out of my head.  I’ve known the song for so many years, but never knew how to play it.  So, I started by teaching myself that deceptively simple riff and then the whole song took off from there.

Tomorrow will truly be a day of mourning after Jeff’s imminent crushing Homerun Derby defeat at the hands of the future 3-time (in a row) champion, Jim Fusco.  I plan on doubling Jeff’s total…from all three prior games combined.

For now, enjoy this edition of the Laptop Sessions and this great Monkees acoustic cover song.  I hope you’ll come back tomorrow for the next long-awaited Chris Moore cover song.  Maybe Chris will do Patsy Cline’s “I’m Sorry” to console Jeff…

“Sweet Dream Baby” (Roy Oribison Cover)

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By Jim Fusco:

Welcome, welcome to another edition of the Laptop Sessions with me, Jim Fusco!

We’re all very excited here in Fusco-Moore Productions Land because of our upcoming Homerun Derby Show for WCJM Free Internet Radio this Friday.  I sincerely hope it pans out.  We should be able to get six of the seven original members of the cast to play!  Expect appearances by Jim Ross and Howard Cosell, too.

Today, I bring you another Roy Orbison tune called “Sweet Dream Baby”.  It’s a really easy song to play, so it might be a good choice if you’re just starting out on guitar.  The only problem is the guitar strumming beat, which is a little tricky.  The lyrics are simple, but again, how can you argue when it’s a good tune and was  a hit on top of it?   And yes, my version is devoid of the slightly out of place female background singers that are in the original.

I can’t believe I’m not putting a new artist on the Sessions today.  Actually, I won’t be putting a new one on for probably the next month, but who knows when the inspiration will strike.  Chris, Becky, and I did some collaborations the other day that you’re going to love, so I hope you’ll keep coming back to check us out!  Remember to use the “Share This” link at the top of every post to send these songs to your friends and loved ones- you are really our best hope for making the Laptop Sessions as popular as we all think it should be!  See you tomorrow with a great Chris Moore Acoustic Cover Song here on the greatest music and video blog in the world: The Laptop Sessions!