Hi all! I’m about to post my very special Christmas Eve video, but before I do, I wanted to announce that (as of yesterday) I have passed the 70,000 views mark on YouTube. This is really exciting, especially considering that I racked up about 400 views since I checked yesterday, which is a lot more than average. Most of the credit goes to the “Green Christmas” video that I posted on Sunday, with help from Jim.
So, once again, thank you to all who are watching and enjoying the sessions. Please tell your friends about the Laptop Sessions! Tell your relatives! Tell your lovers! Tell complete strangers!
Seriously, though, thanks for watching, and I look forward to learning some great songs for you as we roll into 2009.
Well, tonight’s going to be a brief one, and I apologize. But I made up for it by calling in the big guns — aka one Jim Fusco for additional guitar stylings and harmony vocals — to make this video one my favorites that I’ve done. It’s certainly the best Christmas video that I’ve recorded. We had a lot of fun playing it, and I think that comes through on the recording.
I hope you enjoy it!
Oh, yeah, I should probably mention what song it is. This is “Green Christmas,” one of the holiday originals on the Barenaked Ladies’ Barenaked For the Holidays album. Second only to “Elf’s Lament” and maybe “Christmastime (Oh Yeah),” this is one of my favorite original tracks on the album. There’s just the right mix of humor and seriousness on this record, and I think this one leans more toward the serious side. I especially like the middle part — “Green, cause of everything I miss. All this missletoe, no kiss…”
Simply put, this was a lot of fun to record.
And it’s certainly not like we haven’t played it before. It’s been a while, but this song is officially part of our MoU Christmas Chord Book, Part II. That’s right, we needed multiple chord books to contain the number of songs we learned for our Christmas shows.
The reason this post is so brief is that I remembered and recorded my video much later than I would have liked, and then, Jim and I watched the SNL “Best of Christmas Past” DVD while wrapping our gifts for Christmas. It felt good to accomplish that while simultaneously watching some great skits — the Matt Foley “motivational speaker” Santa, Alec Baldwin’s “Shvety balls,” Eddie Murphy’s “Mr. Robinson’s neighborhood, and boy does the list go on… — and laughing (a lot!) together.
Hello and welcome to yet another all-new Laptop Session at your web blog for a session-a-day, guaranteed through December 31st, 2008. Now, that guarantee is swiftly running out, but don’t fret. We’ll be introducing a new schedule of performances for 2009 that will not only introduce many new types of posts to the blog on a regular basis, but also maintain a steady and prolific stream of new cover song music videos!
But, let’s focus on the present for now…
I had originally intended to record a Christmas song tonight, but I got busy with napping, fast food eating, Christmas shopping, and TNA Impact! viewing, so I decided to pull out my one and only “backup video.” If I haven’t already, I should introduce this video by announcing my desire to record a cover video for at least one song from each Wilco album. I’ve been listening to this band a lot these past several months, picking up their albums one by one as I find them on sale or used. I’ve already recorded a song from their third studio album, Summerteeth, called “How to Fight Loneliness” — that video is posted in the members only area of this blog (scroll down to the bottom to sign in and/or sign up!). Previous to that, I recorded “I Am Trying to Break Your Heart” from their critically acclaimed fourth album Yankee Hotel Foxtrot. This was a great song — easy to learn, fun to memorize the lyrics for the performance, and I even got a compliment from a former student who watched the video!
Last week, I picked up a copy of their subsequent album, A Ghost is Born. Ironically, I’m listening to that album now and — literally the moment I typed the title of the album (!) — I just heard Tweedy singing “a ghost is born…,” which is in the lyrics to the song “Theologians.” I don’t think that A Ghost is Born is as impressive an album as Foxtrot or as rocking and enjoyable an album as Summerteeth, but I’m warming to it. There’s a great deal of experimentation, particularly on the 15-minute penultimate track “Less Than You Think.”
But I’m not quite ready to record a song from that album yet, so I went back to the first Wilco album, A.M., which is the final album that I own thus far. This album was more of a straightforward country rock effort, reminiscent of their predecessor Uncle Tupelo. Tweedy himself doesn’t sound all that impressed with the album, but I think it’s actually the most upbeat of the Wilco albums I own. It’s certainly the best album to listen to in the car!
This is my version of the single from the album, titled “Box Full of Letters.” I don’t know what it is about this song — something about the combination of the guitar hooks, lower lead vocal that resonates, and the catchy chorus — but I love it.
And it puts me one step closer to having recorded one song from each album!
Good evening, one and all. This is my first solo Christmas song of the season, and I’m happy to contribute to the holiday spirit we’ve been building not only at the Laptop Sessions but also at the Fusco-Moore Experience.
(For those unaquainted with it, the “Experience” is what the condo has been dubbed. Why it has, I’m not exactly sure, but if you’d like to find out then give us a call…)
Seriously, this song is a classic number originally performed by the one and only Burl Ives. I still picture him as a talking snowman/host of children’s Christmas specials. But, alas, I didn’t have my snowman costume with me tonight, so I just wore my festive green shirt. I think it sufficed for the video. 🙂
The song itself has undergone the Chris Moore treatment, a combination of steady strumming and lower vocals. The harmonica solo is just about as “me” as they get. And this was actually a two-take song for me — a truly rare and pleasant surprise for me! I actually recorded a second song tonight; it’s not a Christmas tune, so I may record a different one if I get a chance, but it’s always good to have at least one music video in reserve. I wish I had recorded a surplus a year ago when I got sick mid-winter. Being our first-ever (and ONLY, I’m sure!) “Session-a-Day” project, I hadn’t anticipated having to record songs with no voice.
As you may recall, I turned to Bob Dylan’s recent catalog for those times that my voice was gruff or worse…
I don’t think you can underestimate how much music plays a part in our lives here at the Laptop Sessions. Take me, for example. Just this morning, I kept hitting the snooze on my iPhone alarm just in time to hear only part of the chorus to Warren Zevon’s “Lawyers, Guns, and Money.” Being cut off where it was each time, it sounded like, “I was gambling in a van” (instead of “Havana”). I don’t know why that struck me as being so funny — it’s a lot less funny now that I’m fully awake and thinking about it — but I ended up staying in bed longer than initially planned just so I could keep trying to hit the snooze at the right time.
I don’t know what that says about me. Probably just that I didn’t want to get out of bed and would do anything to justify staying in it!
I hope you enjoy my rendition of this Christmas classic and take it for what it is — my sincere wish that you all have a “holly jolly Christmas.” It’s just over a week around the corner; can you believe it? I know I can’t. For once, I’m actually ahead on shopping!
Now, if I could only be ahead on wrapping…
This is why I would be a terrible Santa. I would be trying to wrap the presents in the sleigh, between houses. The wind would be kicking up and blowing the paper around, blowing presents out of the vehicle. It would be bad.
