A record number of visitors to the Laptop Sessions Covers Music Video Blog!

By Chris Moore:

Even though it’s Jim’s day to post an acoustic rock cover song, it is with great pleasure that I make this official FMP announcement…

As of yesterday, the highest number of unique visitors we had in a day was 222, a record set back in April.  During that time, we were using a program that helped us invite YouTube friends and get more hits to our site.  We stopped using the program very shortly after hitting that record, but we always felt like it was a cheap way to make a record.  After all, we had the programs getting hits in addition to the actual viewers.

Well, we can feel guilty no more!

As of yesterday, our new record is 225 unique, in-the-flesh visitors to the Laptop Sessions music video blog in ONE day!  This is due in large part to two things that have never happened before in the history of the blog.  First, we have been gaining ground steadily in the search engines — Google, Yahoo, MSN — and now we’re actually coming up on the first page when people around the world search for terms such as “acoustic song” and even some songwriters and bands, such as “Ben Folds acoustic.”  A second benefit is that many people are curious about the Laptop Sessions based on various music forums that Jim, Jeff, and I belong to.  Hopefully, one day soon, those people will sign up for membership on this site as well, so they can leave comments!

That’s all for now.  Stay tuned for lots of great things to come in 2009, not only with the Fusco-Moore Productions Blog and the Laptop Sessions music blog series, but also with FMP Studios and the brand-new, redesigned WCJM site.

See you tomorrow for another all-new session!

“Temptation Eyes” (The Grass Roots Cover)

By Jim Fusco:

Tonight’s video blog entry is from yet another “new” band to the Laptop Sessions: The Grass Roots.

Chris and I have loved this song since my mini-obsession with it back in mid-high school.  For some reason, we equated someone I had a crush on to this song.  It was when I was first learning piano and learned how to play this song, which I was pretty impressed with.

I actually got to see the Grass Roots in concert a few years ago at the North Haven Fair here in CT.  Actually, I’ve seen a lot of great bands there, including America and Herman’s Hermits.  I always love getting to see a show there- you get to see some great acts and it’s just part of the general admission.  During my schooling years, the North Haven Fair was truly the only good thing about September.

This song, “Temptation Eyes”, is a bit “campy”, but I still love it and think it’s got a great tune.  It’s always a candidate for getting stuck in my head at a moment’s notice.

I hope you enjoy tonight’s Laptop Session here on the Laptop Sessions music video blog.  We’re happy to have all of you new fans here to listen to us!  

“Let It Ride” (Bachman-Turner Overdrive BTO Cover)

By Jim Fusco:

Welcome to yet another edition of The Laptop Sessions with, you guessed it, another new band to music video series!  Jeff, Chris, and I have really been turning up the heat on the new bands lately- I’ll be featuring another new one on Friday this week.  And I’ll give you a hint- let’s just say that today’s song is the first in my week of songs that start with “Let It”.  Now, remember, I already did “Let It Be” by the Beatles- that was one of my first ever Laptop Sessions cover songs.  So, we’ll wait until Friday to see what I pull out of my bag of tricks!

Today’s cover song is another one of those, “I was obsessed with it in high school”, tracks alongside last week’s “Temptation Eyes”.   I hope to do more songs from BTO in the future, but I have to be careful to transpose them from heavy electric to acoustic.  This one, I thought, was less about the great electric guitar and more about the great vocals.  I decided to up the passion on the vocals to account for using only an acoustic guitar.

We’re really moving along here on the music video blog- I’ve had a bit more (unexpected) time to work on this stuff, and with the efforts of Jeff and (especially) Chris, we’ll be getting hundreds of new viewers every day.  I can feel it- we’re right on the cusp.  I hope the extra work I did today will push us over the edge.  Either way, you can bet that we’ll keep doing great acoustic rock cover songs and continue to surprise you with new bands all the time!

Jim Fusco’s 100th Laptop Session: “A Simple Game” (Moody Blues Cover)

By Jim Fusco:

Welcome to my 100th Laptop Session! I cant believe I’ve actually done 100 already, but the thing I’m happiest about is that the blog is finally starting to pull the visitors we’ve always thought we deserved from all this hard work over the past few months. So, I hope you’ll click on the “Share This” button under the title of all of our music video blog posts and share our videos on Facebook, MySpace, and Digg. We keep coming out with the content- free acoustic covers and original songs every day of the year- and now we need your help to make this spread. Because, I’ll admit- after doing 100 videos, it was almost a necessity to get more visitors to keep the spirits high here at the Laptop Sessions. And, I can honestly say, these spirits have never been higher. So, expect higher and higher video and sound quality every single day!

Tonight, I bring you a song I find fitting for my 100th Laptop Sessions song. Out of all the cover songs I’ve done, “A Simple Game” by the Moody Blues (and made a big hit by the Four Tops) stands as one of my original “favorite” songs. Back on the “Best Song EVER” show on WCJM free internet radio, I chose this as one of my top three favorite songs of all time, along with “The Little Girl I Once Knew” by the Beach Boys and “Hey Jude” by the Beatles. Of course, this show was recorded in 2000 when I was only 15 or 16 and my favorite songs list has changed a little bit. I’d have to say “I’ll Feel A Whole Lot Better” by the Byrds and “You Just May Be The One” by the Monkees are my top two right now. But, “A Simple Game” is still up there for me, especially because it WON the “Best Song EVER” contest on WCJM!

A few years later, we did another “Best of” show called the “Song for the New Millennium Show”, and another one of my picks won: “All The Things” by the Byrds, which Jeff stole as a Laptop Session from me a few days ago. But, he did the cover song justice (as he does with all of his acoustic cover songs), so you should really check it out here on the Laptop Sessions Music Video Blog.

This song, “A Simple Game”, was never on a Moody Blues album- only a single. Mike Pinder wrote the song and the Four Tops took it and made it a huge hit, especially in England. But, I’ve always known the Moody Blues version, being such a big fan, so that’s the version I’ve stayed true to here.

I hope you enjoy my 100th Laptop Session- an expansive collection of acoustic cover songs and my own original music. Please stay tuned every single day here on the music video blog and we’ll continue to hit milestones, break records, and record great music!