Hello all of you weekend warriors! It’s Jeff for today’s Saturday edition, and I bring another entry from one of my favorite bands STP, better known as Stone Temple Pilots.
I bring you a song from their album “No. 4” called “I Got You”. This is not the first time you’re hearing a song from this album, as one of my previous sessions Atlanta was also from this album. Not only that, but Jim in the near future will be performing a song from this album as well. We’ve got a good handle on this album now, so I expect the next time I do a song from STP it’ll be off of one of their other 4 albums.
Anyway, this song is a very peppy and catchy song, which is a bit of a contrast to some of the other songs on the album which have a more dark and aggressive sound. The recording itself has a lot of country-slide guitar going on in the background as well as a clean electric guitar solo before the final chorus. Even a bit of piano is thrown in. But for me, you get my regular tenor voice and my acoustic guitar – complete with assorted open position and barre chords.
I felt ultra-productive this past Sunday recording this and three other videos. Now I have to sit down and record more. I’m always open to requests, and I will be working on a request from a student in my school. Until then, enjoy today’s entry into the Laptop Sessions!
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!
It is my pleasure to welcome you once again to a brand-new week of all-new acoustic cover song music videos here at the Laptop Sessions. Following up my version of “Just Breathe” from Pearl Jam’s new 2009 album, I’m happy to present to you a new band to the blog and a new 2009 single.
If you’ve visited our site before, then you know that “New Music” is my niche here at the blog. I get a great deal of direction in terms of what to learn, record, or write about from the new music that I’m listening to, week by week. Up until last week, it had been a while since I delved into the new release racks for a session, so I’m attempting to make up for that tonight and later this week.
My video tonight is the mid-album cut “Cornerstone” from the Arctic Monkeys’ 2009 release Humbug. Previous to hearing this record, I didn’t know all that much about the Monkeys, and frankly, there wasn’t much that I found appealing. Since their rise to fame via the Internet in 2006, their work has been praised by some — Rolling Stone, for one — as outstanding, and it has also been disparaged as overrated. In addition, they received a backlash of criticism upon releasing their Who the Fuck are Arctic Monkeys EP merely three months after their debut album. Some called it a greedy move, while the band maintained that they wanted to release new material that they would be adding to their live shows. Now, I’ve certainly never been one to defend EP’s (Ben Folds and the Supersunnyspeedgraphic nonsense, anyone?), and I don’t plan to start here. Still, one should keep in mind that an album is typically recorded a significant time before its actual release — in this case, the EP was released seven months after the band finished recording their debut album.
Anyway, this album was recommended to me by a former student and friend who has tuned me in to some great material from Beck, Cold War Kids, and Harvey Danger — in other words, bands that I wouldn’t have listened to on my own. He described it as being more “slow and contemplative instead of just in your face punk music” which, for anyone who knows me, immediately got my attention!
While I rated this album as a “Maybe So,” it really is one of my favorites this year. It’s the type of album you can listen to again and again without it getting old. I love their style here: the songs are unique, and yet reminiscent of some of the greatest rock of the sixties, and their lyrics really make the music stand out to me.
Which brings me to “Cornerstone.”
I will never forget driving to school, listening to this song for the first time. I had been enjoying the album, but this song really made me stop and take notice. There is this devious tone in Alex Turner’s voice as he sings the story of a man searching for a girl who has left him. Did she break up with him? Has she died? Regardless, he is prowling the dirtiest-sounding dives, flirting and engaging with women of whom he soon makes an odd request.
He asks if it would be acceptable for him to refer to them by the name of his ex-lover.
No big deal. It doesn’t hurt to ask, right? Well, that’s not the case for most of the song. But you’ll have to listen until the end to find out how he fares.
In other new music news, I’m excited about picking up Bob Dylan’s first ever Christmas album, Christmas in the Heart. Of course, this is a mixed bag. After all, contrary to the fact that several holiday albums are coming out tomorrow, I think that it’s far too soon to start listening to Christmas music. I’ll probably end up listening to it once before I tuck it away for the day after Thanksgiving… The other question in my mind is whether or not the deluxe edition is worth the extra money. From what I can tell from the limited descriptions I’ve been able to find online, there are some greeting cards attached in the special edition. Well, how many? Do you save them or do you send them? How many people would truly appreciate a Bob Dylan Christmas card? Is his face on the cards? Could be scary to small children or residents of small New Jersey towns…
Well, that’s enough for tonight. I hope you enjoy my video. If you like it, you should mark your calendars for October 15th when the official music video for “Cornerstone” is set to be released. It has also been scheduled to be released as the second single from Humbug about a month after that.
My two-session tribute to Warren Zevon rolls on with what is probably my favorite Warren Zevon song of all-time, “Roland the Headless Thompson Gunner.” You have to know that I love the song if I’m willing to sing it, mid-song swear and all. I’m not quite certain what it is about this song that I find so appealing; I’ve always found the story mysterious and exciting, and the music fits perfectly with the lyrics. I’ve heard conflicting interpretations of the final line, “Patty Hearst heard the burst of Roland’s thompson gun and bought it.” I thought it meant she was killed, but I’ve heard others read it as her buying the gun at an auction years later.
Regardless of Patty’s fate, this is one of the big check marks on my Laptop Sessions list. You can look forward to many more Zevon tunes in the future! Don’t forget to come back tomorrow for an all-new session from Jeff, whose “Greenlight” EP comes out on February 24th at fusco-moore.com/store!
While certainly not the only remaster or reissue of the year, for my money, there is only one true standout: the beautifully arranged and packaged box set version of R.E.M.’s classic 1987 album, Document, perhaps most famous for its singles “The One I Love” and “It’s the End of the World As We Know It (And I Feel Fine).”
