Looper pedals?

[Robert****]

Anyone has experience with looper pedals? BOSS has one, what other alternatives are there and which would you recommend? I have never tried one but it seems like it would be fun to have one.

Tell me more about what you can do with these units. If you have clips of examples, please post!

[Spudman***]

I've had the Boss Loop Station RC20-XL for quite a while now and I will say that it has become the most valuable piece of practice equipment besides the guitar and amp that I have.

For instance: When I come up with a spontaneous idea while sitting around by myself all I have to do is tap the pedal and capture whatever I came up with. From there I can make a loop of it and add layers to it. My ideas don't get lost any more. It's great for creating themes for tunes.

This summer I met a few guys that do solo gigs with them as well. There are some wonderful things that can be done with them.

The Boss has multiple inputs so capturing a mic or some other sound source is possible too. Phrases can be stored and recalled as well. One player used an acoustic and would thump the body to simulate a kick drum-sample that-then throw on a snare drum that he had miced-sample that-then play a guitar line-sample that-and then live sing and play riffs over it. Instant groove. The pedal has the ability to add or subtract phrases. He would turn off a phrase for a song segment then re-sample when it came time to add it back in. Very clever.

The pedal has few limitations for creativity in my opinion. I'm still exploring and am rarely dissatisfied with my results. I am glad that I bought one and will probably never get rid of it.

[tot_Ou_tard]

A looper sounds like a great idea for learning to play! Any other suggestions besides the Boss that Spuds mentioned?

[Spudman***]

Digitech makes the Jam Man Looper pedal too. It has a some features that the Boss RC20 XL pedal doesn't have. It's pretty divided as to which is better.
I've included links from each company so that you can compare if you like.

http://www.digitech.com/products/JamMan/JamMan.htm


To compete with the Jam Man Boss has a new looper pedal that will hold 15 years of samples. Just kidding. It's quite a bit though. It also has a lot more functions than the RC20 XL or the Digitech. The features kind of blow the Digitech away but the price is hefty.

http://www.bosscorp.co.jp/products/en/RC-50/specs.html

The good thing about having these new pedals on the market is that the older ones are now available more cheaply either used or new. If you can live with the limitations of the older pedals then you can score a pretty good deal on one which makes trying it out a lot less painful. I bought one only after seeing other players using them, listening to them and asking them questions about them. Some folks might not have that opportunity.

Still, if you are a stay at home/play alone player get one! It will improve your timing, give you new ideas galore and allow you save those ideas. For a reasonable price you'll get an instant jamming partner who only gets as buzzed as you do, always shows up, stays in tune if you do, never takes a break and won't argue with you or steal your girlfriend. Priceless!

[tot_Ou_tard]

Looking around I see that Boss has a new (cheaper and smaller) version called the RC2
http://www.bosscorp.co.jp/products/en/RC-2/index.html
with 16 minutes of record time.

[Leonidas]

I've been looking into a looper for a while, just haven't been able to justify the money for it yet. Theres a somewhat local musician in my area that uses a looper and does a one-man-band kind of reggae-blues thing. He is phenominal, and and has truly mastered effects/looping imo, all with an acoustic guitar. He would play a drumline, bass, some guitar rhythm, and loop them overtop each other, then solo/sing atop it all. His name is George Wesley, if you would want to check him out.

The Digitech JamMan was the pedal I had been looking at, but the Rc20 can be had for a much cheaper price, and may be all that one would really need. I did a quick search on eBay and found that the JamMan could be had for around 250, and the Boss for well under 200. Some single-effect pedals cost that much!

I'll have to put this on my list of "things I want but don't have enough money yet"....

[Robert****]

I was reading up on these things yesterday. The new BOSS RC-2 ($189) has some drum grooves built in, that would be an awesome feature to have. The Jam-Man or the RC20XL don't have that as far as I understand.

You can store your Jam-Man loops on a memory card and put them on your computer. That is cool. If you came up with a great groove you can just transfer it to your computer. Sounds easy-peasy. Spudman, can the RC-20XL do this?

The RC-2 seems really interesting, although the price for one is around the same a a used RC-20XL.

[Spudman***]

The RC 20XL will allow you to load anything you want into it via the mini stereo jack.

It comes with a sample CD and some awesome backing tracks already loaded into it. So yes you can put whatever you want into it. Want to jam over a Martin Luther King Jr. speech? Just load it in. Got your favorite 8 bar (longer or shorter) groove with full band accompaniment. Just load it in. You can do it from the computer or a CD player or even an mp3 player.

When I took mine to out of town gigs I used my mp3 player to load stuff. Way versatile machine.

Going the other direction:
The XL does not have a SD card option. You would have to transfer the file into the computer as a WAV the old fashioned way, line it in and press record.

[tot_Ou_tard]

A 2006 Summer NAMM video for the RC2 can be found at
http://www.sonicstate.com/news/shownews.cfm?newsid=3255

[Spudman***]

Zen here is zee most pwoaful looper pedal in zee worlt.
http://www.sonicstate.com/news/shownews.cfm?newsid=3266

Ziz is zo fun to vatch.

[Robert****]

Hmm, I think I have narrowed it down to the RC-20XL or the Digitech Jam-Man. Which one would you pick? The Jam-Man has better sampling rate and therefore better sound on the loops, from what I've read.

[Leonidas]

Ok I just thought of a potential problem with using one of these, unless I'm just completely missing somthing (which I probably am). If you were to connect this like any other pedal, it would be between the guitar and amp. Say you wanted to record a clean rhythm, then loop it and play distorted over top, using the amps distortion. Wouldn't this also make that previously recorded clean rhythm dirty?

Am I missing something here? I hope I am...

[Spudman***]

Leo

Nope. You got it right, but you just don't do that. Instead use an effect pedal to change the lead sound if you like. You don't use the amp's distortion channel.

I put mine at the end of the effect chain - play a clean or dirty part - sample it - play a clean or dirty part over it.

Or...

You could use two amps and a loop selector A/B switch to have the Loop Station play using ONLY that specific amplifier and then switch to the other amp for other parts.
That is a bit too complicated for my tastes.

[warren0728]

You got it right, but you just don't do that. Instead use an effect pedal to change the lead sound if you like. You don't use the amp's distortion channel.

but if you use an effect pedal, won't it affect the loop sound as well (assuming the loop pedal is in the same chain as the effects pedal)?

example: create clean sound with loop...then want to play lead on top of it through amp....the loop pedal must still be in the pedal chain and when you stomp a bad monkey (or whatever) won't that effect the loop sound....

ww

[Spudman***]

No it doesn't effect the currently playing loop if it is the last pedal in the chain.

It just plays what it captured (only) right to the amp. Your guitar signal will go through it while it is playing. The looped material is unaffected.

[warren0728]

very interesting.....

[Leonidas]

Ok, I understand... I just didn't even think of that, I usually get all my distortion/drive from my amp...

[Tone2TheBone]

Can someone explain in layman's terms how a looper functions? Someone keeps bothering me to get one and I don't have a clue as to how they work. I have seen demos on them but would rather hear it from people I know.

LAYMAN'S terms now.

[Spudman***]

Someone keeps bothering me to get one and I don't have a clue as to how they work.
LAYMAN'S terms now.

Someone...hummm.

They record what ever you input into them between the first pedal activation and the second activation. ie. Stomp the first time - starts record, stomp the second time - stops record. Then the pedal will most likely figure out the meter (beats per minute) and adjust the length of the recorded part to fit accordingly.

Next - while the first phrase is playing you can then 'overdub' another part on top of the first one. Then-you can overdub another on top of those two etc. etc.

Each subsequent phrase is captured the same way as the first. What ever is played between the two pedal stomps is what gets recorded.

The other thing they do is help you to play better, be more creative and have fun. Oh, while your phrases are playing you can set your guitar down and go get a cup of coffee, beer, or tea and pick up where you left off when you come back. The pedal won't erase your looped masterpiece until you either turn it off or change to another patch position. You can still 'save' the piece into the unit's memory for later recall.

Does that help.