“Waltz #2 (XO)” (Elliott Smith Cover)

By Chris Moore:

Hello and welcome to not only a brand-new Laptop Session, but the introduction of a new artist to our list of covers! Today, I’m playing “Waltz #2 (XO)” from Elliott Smith’s XO album. I actually just realized a couple weeks ago that he did indeed have an album between my two favorites from him — Either/Or and Figure 8 — and I had to get it. I’ve been listening to it ever since, and it feels kind of like a new album to me, considering that I thought I had heard all of his studio material.

Like I said, I’ve been listening to the album for over a week, and even though I still have several Bob Dylan and Johnny Cash “Laptop Sessions” videos, I just had to sit down and record this one (thus, the late-night, down-to-the-wire posting).

I hope you enjoy it; I certainly enjoyed learning it and playing it! Don’t forget to check out an all-new session from Jeff tomorrow, right here at https://guitarbucketlist.com !


“Tonight I’ll Be Stayin’ Here With You” (Bob Dylan Covers – Triple Threat Tuesday!!)

By Chris Moore:

Hello and welcome to not only another Laptop Session music video, but also a special treat from the three songwriters who bring you an acoustic cover a day EVERY day in 2008…

This is a little something we like to call Triple Threat Tuesday. What this means is today you will receive not one, not two, not four, but THREE video blog entries. Each video will be a cover version of Bob Dylan’s 1969 song “Tonight I’ll Be Stayin’ Here With You.” It’s such a great track that we couldn’t agree on just one person to record an acoustic cover of it… so all three of us will take a stab at it! This song originally appeared on the first fully country-rock Dylan album, appropriately titled Nashville Skyline. This album is filled with very simple, upbeat, and brief (under 3 minutes each) songs, not to mention they’re all sung in his “Lay, Lady, Lay” voice and Johnny Cash himself makes a special guest appearance on the opening track. I’ve heard better duets, but there are few things better than hearing two giants like Cash and Dylan harmonize (however loosely) on such a great song as “Girl from the North Country.” Dylan actually originally released that song on his 1962 acoustic album The Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan.

Personally, my favorite version of this song is Dylan’s Rolling Thunder Revue version, recorded in 1975 and released in the Bootleg series. He changes the words around and, although they’re a bit more blunt than the original, I love them and think they work well for this acoustic cover rendition. But that’s the beauty of cover songs — they give songwriters like us endless opportunities to perfect our own skills and to end some of our own style to the track. For instance, I can bet that Jim’s version will be faithful to the original, as he loves that album. He could have bet money that I would go for the obscure live lyrics, since I love Bob Dylan and have probably heard more live versions of this song than the average person should.

As Jim explained yesterday, I must follow up — it’s great to be back online. This music blog has been a lot of work for us and I can’t imagine losing the session – a – day promise this far into the game! We’re building more and more each day, and now that I’m on summer break from teaching, I’ll be able to devote all my attention toward my creative pursuits.

See you next session!


Jeff’s version is no longer on YouTube, but here’s…

Jim’s version: Recorded the night of, using my new video filters and amazing USB microphone- just listen to the audio quality of this acoustic cover song!



“One More Cup of Coffee” (Classic Dylan, New Cover!)

By Chris Moore:

Here’s a simple but great 70’s Dylan song, off the “Desire” album. I’ve always loved the words to this one.

As a brief sidenote, my essay book was supposed to be released tomorrow, but I’m still trying to figure out how to convert it into an eBook without paying a big fee. I would release it next Tuesday, but I don’t want to overshadow the MoU release (lol…), so I’ll probably just wait until later this month. :-)

As always, thanks for listening. Keeping with my New Year’s resolution to post at least one new Laptop Session every day this year, Jim and/or I and/or Jeff will see you tomorrow!


“Pack Your Love” (Indie Music – New Music)

By Jeff Copperthite:

Welcome to your latest version of Original Wednesday. Today I am playing a song from Jim Fusco’s album “What About Today?” called “Pack Your Love” (please visit http://jimfusco.com for more info).

This song is usually played as the back end of two songs in live shows, being preceded by another Jim Fusco-Chris Moore duo-penned song “Where Are We Now?”.

I have always liked this song because it has a great set of lyrics, and the chorus and chord progression are very addictive.

I am also looking forward VERY much to Jim’s upcoming album “Halfway There”. Knowing Jim as long as I have, I know it’s going to be a great work, and I know my future self is already tuning out in the office to the title track.

As always, Laptop Session-a-day continues! I just broke 5k views today in record time! I expect 6k to come even faster! Thank you to everyone who is watching and supporting our series!

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 origianal 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!