Tag Archives: cover songs

“Excitable Boy” (Warren Zevon Cover)

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By Chris Moore:

There’s lots of good stuff happening here at guitarbucketlist.com! I’ve been spurred on by Jim and Jeff’s recent plans for releases and by all of Jim’s tireless work designing the website, so I have a couple “extra’s” for you today.

First of all, I posted my review of Ringo’s Liverpool 8 album a half hour ago. (Another goal of mine this year is to write at least brief reviews of all the new albums I buy this year.) In the coming days and weeks, you can look for reviews of both Sheryl Crow’s and Jack Johnson’s new albums that came out today.

In addition to the CD review, I have also posted a second “Behind the Scenes” video. I had the idea to make this short film when I was recording the session for Warren Zevon’s “Excitable Boy.” It’s really cheesy, but it was easy and fun to make, and I wanted to share it with you all.

Finally, of course, I have posted my second song from one of my absolute favorite artists, Warren Zevon. You may know him for “Werewolves of London,” but he has written so much more! This is one of his more well-known songs and I hope you enjoy it. It’s somewhat disturbing, but if you think about the overall idea of the song, it’s actually an interesting statement from Zevon.

I hope you enjoy all the new posts to be found on the site today, and you can look forward to all-new material from Jeff and Jim in the days to come as “a session-a-day keeps the viewers…um, coming back to guitarbucketlist.com” continues!


“(What’s So Funny ‘Bout) Peace, Love, and Understanding” (Elvis Costello Cover)

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By Chris Moore:

Hello and welcome to another all-new Laptop Session, brought to you by the music blog devoted to great new rock music. My acoustic cover song tonight is not a new rock song, but it is a classic by an artist that did release an excellent album this year. That artist is Elvis Costello and the song is “(What’s So Funny ‘Bout) Peace, Love, and Understanding.” I had actually planned on recording (and did, in fact) record a different song for my session tonight, but after I finished that one, I went on to this Elvis Costello tune and liked how it came out so much that I had to post it tonight. For whatever reason (the amount of time that I had been singing previously, the air conditioning taking all the moisture out of the air in the house, or my allergies), my voice was somewhat rough for this recording. Normally, that would be enough for me to put down the guitar and wait for another day. However, I think it worked for the emotion that is supposed to be conveyed by this track. Aside from the very end of this take when my voice is simply too shot to hit the notes I wanted to hit (please feel free to laugh at the ridiculous look on my face), I’m happy with how it came out.

This is one my favorite Elvis Costello songs of all time, and it’s a perfect track to bring to this music blog, as it has been recorded as a cover song previously by such bands as the Wallflowers. It’s a fairly simple song with simple chords, simple but great lyrics, and a simple message that I know Ringo Starr would love, and it translates very well to acoustic guitar. That being said, Jim and I did some research tonight and were shocked to find that although he is listed as #80 on the list of best rock artists ever, he has had very few songs chart well, especially on the Billboard Hot 100. It’s amazing that his most popular songs really aren’t as successful as you might expect for an artist of his standing. That either says something about him or, more likely, the system. (Especially considering that this is a system that barely recognizes the existence of such talented and influential acts as the Moody Blues…)

If you’re a regular viewer of the Laptop Sessions, you’ll get another dose of Elvis Costello very soon — his new rock music on this year’s Momofuku is some of my favorite from him and is easily in my personal top four or five albums of the year (and this is saying alot, as I’ve heard somewhere approaching fifteen new albums this year already!).

Whatever you do, don’t go too far; Jeff will be back tomorrow with an all-new acoustic cover song music video for your listening and viewing pleasure…

See you next session!



“Automatic” (Weezer Cover)

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By Chris Moore:

Welcome to a fresh new Tuesday installment of the best acoustic cover song music blog series in the universe! That’s right — not just the country or the world, but the universe! Of course, I said the series is good, so that doesn’t guarantee that I’ll be any good, so you’ll just have to take your chances tonight…

Tonight’s music video is an acoustic cover from the new Weezer (Red Album). “Automatic” is track nine of ten — a powerhouse of an electric number with a great distortion guitar riff — and written by drummer Pat Wilson. I read that Wilson actually played the guitar for this one and frontman Rivers Cuomo sat at the drums. If you search YouTube videos like I did, you’ll find that there are some live versions of the songs from the Red Album already available and the one for “Automatic” is definitely worth checking out, if only for the alternative arrangement of the band.

I love to see when the bands I love switch it up a bit and allow other members to take the center stage, if only briefly. Some great bands that have done this on a regular basis are the Band, the Beatles, the Beach Boys, the Barenaked Ladies, the Moody Blues, and — now — Weezer! Still, many of my favorite musicians and bands are really one-man shows with a band to support them. Take Jakob Dylan (Wallflowers) and Adam Duritz (Counting Crows) just for a couple examples. Dylan and Duritz are two of my favorite songwriters, and although I like their bands, it is really their songwriting and lead singing that makes me love the bands and continue to buy their albums.

Even as I’m writing this, I can only think of one real exception to this songwriter-over-band preference of mine. Namely, Matchbox Twenty. I love Matchbox Twenty, and I have since their first album. I have bought every album and even loved their recent EP. But I just didn’t understand why Rob Thomas had to go off separately and try a solo career. For all intents and purposes, he really IS Matchbox Twenty. I mean, up until the EP, he wrote literally every song on each of their releases!

Exception aside, I have thoroughly enjoyed the new Weezer album, and I hope you have too. If you haven’t, you should really check it out. I found that the first couple tracks threw me a bit at first, but I quickly fell in love with a number of the songs — such as “Though I Knew” (a previous Laptop Session I recorded) and “Miss Sweeney” (a bonus track on the special edition).

Well, I’m off to do some work to promote all the great things happening here at the music blog. If you haven’t already, you should really check out the past couple days’ worth of posts — there is some great stuff, and much of it is FREE! There are live concert tracks, TNA pictures, and of course, great acoustic cover songs!

And, guess what?… Jeff Copperthite will be back tomorrow to post yet another all-new awesome acoustic cover, so don’t miss it…

See you next session!



“The Freshmen” (Verve Pipe Cover)

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By Jeff Copperthite:

It’s that time again – thumpin’ Thursday! Today I introduce another band to the sessions. It’s the Verve Pipe with their hit song “The Freshmen” from their album “Villains”.

This album is one of my personal favorites, as it was among the albums I listened to before a cross country meet in high school. I would listen to this album front to back. “Cattle” is my favorite song off this album. The song I bring you today probably ranks 4th or 5th on the album for me. Still, it is among my favorites.

I hope you are continuing to enjoy the Laptop Sessions daily. Every day a new video, and every day a new milestone. I have crossed 25k views, and at some point yesterday the video for “Horse With No Name” became my first video to eclipse 2k views.

Tomorrow, Jim will be back with another hit. See ya then!

Editor’s Note: Unfortunately, Jeff’s acoustic cover song music videos are no longer on YouTube, but we decided to keep his cover song blog posts up.  We figured these music blog entries would be good for posterity’s sake and because Jeff always gave such insightful posts each Session.  We hope to see Jeff’s impressive catalog of acoustic rock songs here on the Laptop Sessions cover songs and original music blog again in the future.  But, for now, please make sure to check-out hundreds of other acoustic cover songs from all of your favorite bands here on the Laptop Sessions music blog!