My first looper

I don't know about the gig, but for a looper like that with a USB interface, I recommend leaving it connected to your rig at all times within easy reach for recording ideas with just a press of your foot.

Does it loop an Am note?

That could be a boon for me.

I have the electro harmonix 2880 which allows you to lay down as many as 4 tracks and has a quantize feature so that when you kick the button it stops exactly in line with whatever bpm you have set up.  It is awesome.  

My biggest problem is that it requires foot coordination, which I lack. I can't dance, can't play drums, either. I'd have an easier time learning to juggle than to work hi-hat and kick drum pedals at the same time.

But it sure is fun. I spent a good half hour this morning jamming to the chord progression from "Take it To the Limit". I'm also having a good time with percussion experiments and have discovered some useful drum patches on my synth that I didn't even know were there.

I really should do some real work today. Later. Yeh, later, for sure.

Well as a guitar player, you do not have to do quite as much as a drummer.  You still have one leg to stand on most of the time.  

Its just when you want to turn the echo off, put the distortion on, rock the wah wah and punch in the vibe pedal, you need to be an octopus.  And if you need to change settings while you are doing all of that, you also need to be shiva so that you have an excess of arms.

Maybe that is how I can make my fortune.  I will create an 8 legged, 10 armed shredder who will play a quadruple neck (guitar, bass, 12 string and ukulele) while he constantly adjusts settings on his pedal board.  

Anybody have any luck live looping with a drummer? Play guitar riff once recording it as a loop, start the loop, play over the loop etc. all the while the drummer maintains the beat.

I know it can be done, because I've seen it done. I can't say I know what the trick is, though, as I haven't yet mastered it myself. But watching it being done properly, it appears to be a matter of hitting the footswitch exactly on the beat. Otherwise, the looper tacks on (or loses) a few milliseconds that only become noticeable after the loop has repeated a few times.

I don't know which unit she's using, but K.T. Tunstall does a good job of using some sort of a looper on "Black Horse & The Cherry Tree" when she does it solo.  

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HYEU91d8ngc

bitflipper


It's amazing what you can do with an A minor chord with enough repetitions. 

Sheesh!  Bapu could have told you that!

bitflipper


Thanks for the link, Jan. It's amazing what you can do with an A minor chord with enough repetitions.

This looper has encouraged me to develop a novel new methodology: I call it "practicing". Haven't done it for years! What a revelation.

You're very welcome Bit.  It impressed me how she set up the structure of the song to do all of that in Am.  I originally saw another clip where the intro was longer and--while she didn't actually stop to explain what she was doing--it was almost like a demonstration.  I'll have another look to see if I can find that clip. 

bitflipper


Thanks for the link, Jan. It's amazing what you can do with an A minor chord with enough repetitions.

This looper has encouraged me to develop a novel new methodology: I call it "practicing". Haven't done it for years! What a revelation.

If you haven't done so already, check this one out:
 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=izrL7pBdkaw
 
A fellow with the ID TobyC posted the link in the X1 forum a few weeks ago.  The young lady, who's vastly talented, is Toby's daughter.  He said she got so involved when working this number up that her foot became injured ... a cautionary tale, I guess.

Congrats on entering the wacky world of looping Dave. Delays and loopers have been my most interesting and inspiring tools over the years. I've spent many many hours layering up looped material, jamming, and just "going with the flow" as the loop warps and evolves. Be sure to check out this site of you haven't yet: http://www.loopers-delight.com/loop.html. You'll get lots of opinions about gear, performances, some info on techniques, etc.
 
For me looping tended towards slowly evolving soundscapes more than jamming over chord progressions. Sometime I would start with a progression or a simple beat as a metronome to set the starting pace then let that fade out or get overlayed by new material as the mood dictated. It does take a bit of practice to get the footswitch timing just right on the loops with tight timing but the effect is cool.
 
I'd recommend putting some switchable effects between your sound source and the looping device so you can introduce effects on new layers if you want to. That helps to vary the texture of the loop. I am not familiar with your looper so I don't kow hat features you may or may not have but make sure you explore the options that it offers for capturing and playing back the audio, punch in, overlay, etc. If it has individual layers that can be recorded, muted, unmuted that brings all kinds of compositional control. Don't forget the reverse and speed-changing options too - much fun can be had with those.
 
For me longer notes and slower tempo pieces worked better than uptempo material. My favorite gear for looping is an electric guitar, some foot pedals - including at least 1 delay pedal, and the almighty ebow . I haven't done much looping lately on the keyboard but was just looking at Mobius looper http://www.circularlabs.com/ again and thinking it might be just the thing to kick start the creative juices.
 
Anyway, sorry for the tome, back to your original question. For live use, the best thing I can say is that looping, for me, is all about personal abandon and has been best received by others when I can let go and get completely into what I am doing - if I am liking the groove then it tended to be interesting to others.
 
Have fun.
 

Mebee you can looper some cool sounds with some Neal Peart grooves, yes?

bapu


Mebee you can looper some cool sounds with some Neal Peart grooves, yes?

mebee he can loop up something to allow him to become a Jazz Organizt!!!

 I think you will find it pleasantly interesting once you get the hang of it Dave.

Phil Keaggy uses loopers all the time in a live setting. If you can get past the fact that he is demoing a new Roland amp with a looper,check out some of what he does with it. Incredible stuff.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tq30Y1VgD4c

dmbaer- she is one very talented girl! Thanks for that link.