By Jim Fusco:
I’m sure a couple of people are picking their jaws up off the ground for this one…
If you know me, you know I would never say, “Wow, you know who I should do a song from? Lenny Kravitz.”
It’s not that I have anything against him- his popularity just came at a time that I wasn’t listening to any music on the radio, i.e. the past 25 years… But, somehow this song worked its way into my head.
It literally took me over a half hour to finally figure out that this song was done by Lenny Kravitz. I would have bet good money that this was written and sung by Smokey Robinson with the Miracles. Have you heard the studio version? The strings, the beat, the high vocals, the great bass line- it HAD to be Smokey! Plus, it has that classic Motown sound to it and I truly believed this song was recorded in 1964.
So, all I knew was the tune and the words, “Baby, it ain’t over ’til it’s over…” How does one search for that? I wish I could just hum into my iPhone’s Shazam program and have it tell me what I was thinking of. I finally found a different version by some woman and realized it was the song I was thinking of. I kept coming across Lenny Kravitz’s name, but said, “Nah, it can’t be him” and kept looking. Finally, I clicked on his version and sure enough, it was the exact one I heard in my head! Who knew?
I was very happy to finally perform this song and I’m even happier that I’ve brought a very popular artist to the music blog for the first time. Gotta respect a man that plays a great guitar, has a high range of vocals, and writes his own songs- that’s pretty much my criteria!
This song is easy to play- same for verse and chorus: A, Amaj7, Asus4, D, Dm on a 4th fret capo. This comes out to C# and F#, but it’s much easier to play it with the capo. I’m glad it was easy to play because it’s not the easiest song to sing. I find I sing better with my eyes closed- you’ll see I do it a lot in songs with a high range to them. I do it a lot here, but I hit all the notes and am very happy with this performance.
It’s been a busy week- Chris said it all about the Moody Blues concert. It was a fun time and I was happy to have gone both with family and friends from work. The baseball card show I went to in the morning with another colleague from work was a blast- meeting the likes of Orlando Cepeda, Steve Carlton, and even Ric Flair! I got baseballs signed by Ralph Kiner and Ken Griffey Jr. and a ton of cool new cards, including printing plates and signed jersey letters.
This weekend looks to be slower, but I have a lot of wedding video to edit and, as of tonight, I still haven’t started. Becky moving in has proven quite stressful and involved, as I had to setup her computer (and the one back at her parents’ house because the move screwed-up their internet situation) and still cook, etc. The house is coming along great, as well. I spent a lot of time there today, just looking around and imagining where things would be. The back yard is especially exciting, as I truly believe we’ll have room for whiffle ball, which is very important to me.
Finally, did you get a chance to check out the Twitter widgets up at the top of the Laptop Sessions homepage? It shows the updates for Chris, Jeff, and myself. I update all the time and it allows me to keep in touch with the Laptop Sessions viewers on a much more consistent basis than I previously could. Well, have a great night and I’ll be back next week with another great acoustic cover song. As Dana would say, “Until then”!!