Here are the loop jams I captured from the month of June. So many new developments this month. A new bass! A new couch! Also some music was made.
Some time ago I filled the 100 memory slots of my Boss loop pedal, and lately I’ve been going through overwriting the old with new recordings but not changing the rhythm from whatever was there. So pretty much every one of these loops started as “here’s some preexisting rhythm, figure something out”.
The embedded clips below all show the same thumbnails, but I assure you they are each set to jump the right unique moment. Full video here.
Loop 1
I wanted to get something low-fi and mellow, and one way to get that is with some vibrato (like via my Julia) and then to EQ down to a narrow range. I used my Pitch Fork for a quick and dirty bass without having to swap instruments. And of course some tremolo (via the Monument). From there it’s slow jam town.
Loop 2
I love playing with my pedalboard and an electric guitar. But… sometimes it’s great to set up a mic and keep it to acoustic instruments. First the nylon guitar that I learned on as a kid. Then the acoustic bass I got from a used shop in college. And then the bouzouki I got this past summer in Greece. It’s not often that I use the bouzouki for the final lead layer, but I think this jam slaps.
Loop 3
This is my friend’s song “Dance with Me” that I wanted to practice a bit before she and I performed it later. I created both the verse and chorus in my loop pedal so I could particularly practice playing through the transitions. Since the original song doesn’t have any drums, I used the loop pedal without any rhythm track.
Loop 4
I wanted to do something with more of a distorted and fuzzy core, using the Wave Cannon. Wild response swing from the acoustic jams? I don’t use the Q-Tron often (because it’s a very particular flavor), but that’s what’s giving the wah-like envelope filter on the first half of the lead section.
Loop 5
This one started with me noodling something simple out on the keyboard, a locked chord with a descending root note sequence. Just some slow simple chords with tremolo on top of that. Behind me you’ll see the new couch we got for my music space; something wider than a chair so that I can play while in it, or someone can visit while I play.
Loop 6
The acoustic bass seen above in loop 2 has been my only bass guitar for over twenty years. As a birthday gift to myself this year I bought an electric bass guitar, a Squire Precision. So obviously this loop needed to start with the bassline. I put a strong chorus effect to the chords over top (via the Julia), an effect I generally don’t use much of but it felt right here. The best part of this loop is the slide down and pause that breaks up the flow.
Loop 7
Still getting into my new bass, so I had to start another loop with a bass focus. Bass harmonies! Since the bass was doing more work, the chords are minimal (but with an aggressive amount of tremolo). The halting rhythm of this one took me longer to figure out, meaning my daughter had to pop in and tell me it was late and to turn it down. So I didn’t get as much time to jam on this one as I often do. A good reminder to break out the headphones for late night.
Here are the loop jams I captured from the month of May. I actually had the pleasure of playing with a friend multiple times this month (that’s a video for another day) but that did mean fewer solo loops than usual. A couple of these loops were however based on chord progressions from her songs, part of practicing to play more together.
I’ve been making and recording loops like this for a year, and dropping them on YouTube for at least half of that. But that’s not a great format to give extra detail. So I’m going to try delving into that here on the lob to discuss my opinion on each loop, as well as the effects and thought process behind each. Do you think I should keep doing this? Give me feedback (as comments on the video or wherever you can find me) about which loops you liked the most (that’s why they’re numbered).
The embedded clips below all show the same thumbnails, but I assure you they are each set to jump the right unique moment. Full video here.
Loop 1
This one has a relaxed slow vibe that is what I’ve really been enjoying lately. It’s also got a longer repeat with the chord progression than most of my recent loops, giving more space to be dynamic with the lead. A slow jam with a bit of overdrive crunch and some delay… I can sit in that groove for a long time.
Loop 2
I don’t start enough jams on the bouzouki. This one started with a simple riff, and then from there I just wanted to keep everything acoustic. So add an acoustic bass and a little bit of reverby trumpet (not an instrument I’m strong with, but something I love in the mix). And the only place to go from there is to keep it acoustic and layer on a jam with my Taylor.
Loop 3
This chord progression is from my friend’s song. We intend to play this and other songs of hers at an upcoming small festival, so I thought I’d practice over the core structure. This isn’t really the right rhythm though (side effect of defaulting to using my rhythm looper pedal), but it provided enough to toy with. I went with a vibrato lead because the whole thing felt old timey.
Loop 4
I started with a bass line just by using the Pitch Fork to down-octave my guitar (a common option for when I just want to get moving quickly). Add some tremolo chords on that and… we’ve got another slow jam. These days these are my favorite place to sit.
Loop 5
Another example of workshopping something over a chord progression from a song I’m supposed to be practicing. I liked the downward motion of the simple faux-bass. Given that arrangement, a fuzzy guitar sounded appropriate. And if I’m not mistaken, this is my trying out the Wave Cannon to get some middle-of-the-road distorted tones.
Loop 6
I try to film the whole process of creating the loop so I can include the original samples for the edit. This was an example where I had got interrupted, had to step away after starting the loop, and come back and recreate it. Which gives me a lot more ability to be precise in planning for an end destination (instead of what I usually do which is just layer until I’m happy). The key part was the second layer here with the fixed “pedal tone” (not a single pedal note, but a stationary repeating section). It felt right to keep a clean tone on all those first bits, until the contrasting tremolo chord sequence came in. Just a bit of overdrive for the lead tone, with reverb coming from the Afterneath if I’m not mistaken.
As I learned to play guitar first, my bass guitar playing is a but too… guitar-like. Poking around on YouTube I came across a video that goes through 50 songs to learn on bass. I thought I’d try walking through that myself, grabbing tab for each. And as long as I’m doing that, I might as well share.