Beware the looper!!

PhilW1

BRISTOL86 said:

Come on baby, don't fear the looper
Baby take my hand, don't fear the looper

Brilliant,, shame I couldn't give 2 lols , cheered me up no end thanks

Snags

mrkb said:

munckee said:

 

Embrace the pain. The main improvement in my timing has been looper and jams. It’s still crap obviously but I find turning my volume knob down at jams allows me to play the most elaborate air guitar,

To be fair theres always four guitarists playing a four slightly different rhythms at the jams, so its difficult to know whos drifting - though as the drummer, Ive got a good idea .  The looper pedal doesn't lie!

Y'know, I've always had a suspicion that it's the drummer that drifts at these things ...



I'm waiting for the day when everyone decides to mute themselves and mime and suddenly there's just drums and a dodgy vocal.

Modellista

When using a looper to record a passage, run through it once first, and record the second time around.

The first one is usually a bit sloppy playing and timing-wise.  Second one you've got your groove on.  Plus it's really hard to start playing and looping at exactly the right moment - there's always a stutter or awkward moment when the loop joins.  Also keep playing for a moment after you've switched the loop to playback, it helps blend the join.

Modellista

Regarding metronomes, they're useful but horribly unmusical.  Maybe try a cheap drum machine and make a bit more of a realistic beat.  It's a lot easier to get the feel for, more realistic inasmuch it's closer to what a real drummer would play, and no less good at training consistent tempo.

PhilW1

Thanks for all the advice and encouragement. Gonna download Justin’s metronome and try and do some proper focused practice.

MichaelAT

bloomer said:

Listening to any kind of recording of yourself for the first time can be totally brutal. I had the exact same experience. Thought I was totally in time and even rushing or holding back in a musical way. But actually when I listened back it sounded like total crap and just completely out of time. The good news is it can be fixed with a little time with metronome and going through the pain barrier of recording yourself. Justin guitar has a good vid about this somewhere where he talks about playing in the pocket and how timing is something that can always be improved. Try setting a metronome to 40bpm and playing a single note on the beat. It's actually pretty difficult if you've never tried. Do a bit every day and you'll get there.

Good advice! A common practice is also using the metronome clicks not on every beat, but only for 2 and 4. So 40 bpm metronome speed would result in 80bpm actual speed. The key is to be able to subdivide the beat correctly. Also, 2 and 4 mimics a drummer in a typical groove with snare hits at 2 and 4.

So yeah - to address a recent comment - metronome is unmusical, but again you have to embrace the challenge and be able to play with swing and groove even to a 2-4 metronome. This makes playing to a proper drum beat, with more subdivision beats, super easy. So for me, it's definitely worth the challenge.

Finally, I started using Tomo's DVD's accelerate your guitar playing. I have bought it quite some time ago, but I hardly used it because it would take you 2 steps back in order to leapfrog from there. Anyway, there is a cool excercise where you set the metronome to 2 and 4, quite slow, and then go through a pattern of full / half / quarter / eight notes plus triplets. Again - painful, but super helpful and rewarding in the long run.

ICBM

rolls1392 said:

Sadly still lumbered with Epi VJ hence no fx loop or master volume!!

I am not convinced that the suckage is in the playing...

robgilmo

I picked one up on Saturday too, I didn't mess around with it much, but what I did record made me wanna cry, it sounded total pants, some of it was really good, surprisingly good, but some notes during solos just didn't want to be there, timing wasn't great, fretting fingers were on the wrong part of the board a lot, but Im seeing it as a tool to aid practise and refine skills so for that purpose it was money well spent.

pmbomb

munckee said:

PhilW1 said:

Embrace the pain. The main improvement in my timing has been looper and jams. It’s still crap obviously but I find turning my volume knob down at jams allows me to play the most elaborate air guitar,

that's amateur level, I've gone pro and done this in front of an audience.

xDottore

Oddly enough, I was watching this YT video last night and thought it very helpful, though haven't tried his tips out yet. Might be worth watching for anyone (like me) wishing to get the best out of a looper for practice: 

StanleyAccrington

I was going to start another thread about recording your playing and listening back to it, but this thread seems vaguely current. What have I been doing for the past 30 years? I recorded myself just playing  a 4 bar chord sequence....nothing that I would think as 'technical or difficult'.....like 'chop' chords on every beat in  4/4 time. Am / / /  Dm / / /  F / / /  G / / /.

I sounded shite. Buzzy strings...poor timing...hearing notes that maybe shouldn't  be there....I'll  stop there! In my mind I always thought that my chord playing technique more than made up for my limited knowledge of scales. Now I know that I can bang out the chords of my fave songs......only not as well or as nicely as I thought I could.