Looper

A looper records a phrase, then repeats it with no gap, so the end runs straight back into the start. While it repeats, you record another part on top, called an overdub, and the looper plays both. A few passes can turn one guitar into chords, a bass line, a tapped rhythm and a melody.

Set 80 BPM and four bars of 4/4, then play G, Em, C and D, one bar each. The loop lasts 12 seconds (16 beats at three quarters of a second each) and repeats until you stop it. Add a bass note on the root of each chord (G, E, C, D), then a melody, and you have the sketch of a song.

There are two ways to set the loop length. On a simple pedal you tap to start recording and tap again to close the loop, and whatever you played between the taps becomes the loop, so the second tap has to land right on the beat. Apps and some pedals let you pick a tempo and a number of bars first, give you a click track and a count-in, and close the loop on their own. The second way can’t leave the loop a fraction of a beat short, which makes it easier for beginners.

Loop Station is BOSS’s name for its loopers, from the one-footswitch RC-1 to the tabletop RC-505mkII that you play with your hands, and people often say “loop station” for any looper. On iPhone, looper apps do the same job with the microphone or with their own sounds. Record your layers on wired headphones (or the speaker, when the app plays its own sounds) and keep Bluetooth for listening back, because its latency makes every new layer land late.

Gelato Synth and Gelato Chord each have a loop recorder of the second kind, part of each app’s $4.99 unlock: pick a tempo and a number of bars, get one bar of count-in, then tap +1 to record each new layer, up to eight. Our roundup of looper apps for iPhone compares the options, and turning a loop into a full song covers what to do once the loop sounds good.