Re: Tapping -- What are the tricks to staying synched to your rhythm section

["Mark Smart" <marksmartus@gmail.com>]

Definitely harder with a drum machine than with a human drummer who can (as long as he is willing) follow your looped track.

 

I use drum loops (very much like a drum machine) to play live. The way I do it is to record the drum sound INTO the main looping unit mixed with my bass and/or guitar sound. Then I hit the Play or NextLoop pedal on the Echoplex at the beginning of the next chorus to get the timing of the recorded loop correct. Once that's going, I shut off the original drum loop that is still playing (by hitting Stop on my RC-20). This means that there is a bar or 2 where you can hear two copies of the drum loop going (hopefully pretty well synched up), but that's not a big deal. You can hear me doing this in the "Shiny Stockings" mp3 here:

 

http://www.marksmart.net/bands/jazzlooping/jazzlooping.html

 

Getting a drum machine and a looper to synch up for a long time is not going to happen no matter HOW good your timing is, unless there is some kind of MIDI or electronic synch.

 

--
Mark Smart
http://www.marksmart.net