Tag Archives: music reviews

“Maybe Katie” (Barenaked Ladies Cover)

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Welcome to your Terrific Tuesday edition of the Laptop Sessions!  Tonight, I’m the first person to post using our brand new WordPress 2.6.1 version of the blog.  Of course, on your end, you shouldn’t see any difference, but on our end, the difference is vast…and great.  For one thing, our visual editor won’t mess with our code anymore, so we’ll be able to post chords to our cover songs more often than before.

Okay, on to tonight’s video.  Tonight is a classic one in terms of my live performances.  The “band” of Chris, Jim, and Becky (see Chris’ post a few days ago) was formed in 2004 and we loved to sing this Barenaked Ladies song, “Maybe Katie” in concert.  Then, we didn’t realize we were singing it in the wrong key- a half step below the original key.  Rest assured that for this video, we fixed the error, as all the Laptop Sessions songs are always in the original key- the ONLY way it should be!  Listen up, cover song musicians on YouTube and elsewhere: YOU REALLY STINK IF YOU DO IT IN THE WRONG KEY!!!  There’s no exception to this- if it’s out of your range and you change the key, then you don’t deserve to do the song.  I sang “Baby Please Come Home” by Darlene Love at our Christmas party in the original key and that song is ridiculously high.  You didn’t see me take the easy way out.  And this is why our motto is “Putting an end to bad YouTube covers FOREVER!”  Wow, the tangents tonight…

Moving on, this song is off of one of my favorite albums, “Everything To Everyone”.  I do believe that it’s probably their fourth best album behind “Gordon”, “Barenaked Ladies Are Men” (the almost 30-track version), and “Maroon”.  This album has some input from the other band members, which if you’ve read some of my past rants, means a lot to me in a band.

We do “Maybe Katie” a bit differently than the album’s version in the sense that the BNL version has some heavy electric guitars on the chorus and middle sections.  Our version is completely acoustic and has more of a “folk” feel to it.  That’s what happens when you don’t have a drummer handy…that isn’t already reserved to play the solo like I am.

I hope you enjoy tonight’s Laptop Session.  Thanks again!

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“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!

More Laptop Sessions covers

“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.

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Music Reviews – One Heart, Professional Vocalist

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By Chris Moore:

One of the key criteria in judging a solo act is in the singer’s range and catalog of material. From the sounds of his seven track sampler, professional vocalist Andi Dawson, also known as One Heart, has managed to not only select a wide range of rock and pop numbers for his repertoire, but also to master the subtleties of each of his diverse tracks.

From the first vocal notes of “Smooth,” the singer’s attention to detail is clearly evidenced by the vocal effect that is strikingly similar to the one used famously by Rob Thomas, who helped score a number one hit on the Billboard Hot 100 for Santana at the turn of the millennium. And yet, a few tracks later, One Heart has slowed down and, going back to the seventies, taken on the smooth tones of Eric Clapton’s “Wonderful Tonight.” Gone is the bravado necessary for a rocker like “Smooth.” Instead, he delivers a vocal true to Clapton’s original, complete with subtleties in inflection and overall delivery.

Suitably, his voice drops an octave for the early sixties Del Shannon hit “Runaway.” His timing is impeccable on One Heart’s version of “Brown-Eyed Girl.” And One Heart has left no decade of rock music unexplored, faithfully translating Queen’s early nineties hit “The Show Must Go On,” Bryan Adams’ eighties hit “The Summer of ’69,” and a mix of fifties tracks in “The One Heart Rock & Roll Medley.”

The medley, the seventh and final track, fades with a take on “Rock Around the Clock,” originally by Bill Haley & His Comets. It is quite fitting for the set to end with the oldest songs presented, and yet with a number that is every bit as upbeat as their opening track.

Based out of Portsmouth in the United Kingdom, One Heart is the perfect solution for anyone planning the music for an event such as a wedding. Judging from his tracks — available online at www.one-heart.co.uk — this solo vocalist will bring a wide range of popular music sensibilities to his performances. This seven track sampler alone draws from mostly top ten and top five hits from artists as diverse as Elvis Presley to Queen, from eras as early as the 1950s to as recently as the new millennium. This supports the promise on the official website that “One Heart is an act that has been carefully designed to supply entertainment to all present.”

Having contributed regularly to the “session-a-day” Laptop Sessions acoustic cover songs project, I have quickly become an expert of sorts and indeed quite particular when it comes to judging the quality of covers. One Heart consistently demonstrates a mastery and a faithfulness to the original studio recordings of the songs he performs.

His music is solid, his vocal range is more than adequate for the range of artists he has chosen to cover, and his selection is vast — what more could you desire in one singer?

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