Band in a box pedal

When I first saw the video demo, I knew I had to have it... With the SD cards, I can make and store as much digital quality music as I want. I've got karaoke tracks on one card, original music on another, etc; I had to find a way to work around not being able to hear the second layer in real time, but now I have a portable digital recording studio that fits in a few Samsonite cases and a couple of boxes... I think it was well worth the $ outlay... I spent $250 on my reverb pedal... another $50 bucks for a digital recording device of this caliber? No hesitation whatsoever... I love the digital age... and I love Digitech for innovating just what I needed for my own musical creation. As an added bonus, I can interface with my computer to move this stuff around... I'm looking forward to what software innovations they will come up with next. Very impressed!

DigiTech JamMan Stereo

This unit exceeds all my expectations.
I intend to make my own loops and singles using Band In A box, realband and cakewalk.
This will allow me to use when I need them insteasd of my laptop computer.

Fantastic Sound Quality - Great for Practice/Live Performance

As a first time loop pedal user, I can't say I have much experience or skill using the JamMan right out of the box so bare with me here. But its been about a week since I've had mine but I can already tell its going to largely effect my song creation process. I was initially surprised at how great my guitar sounds during loop playback- it barely loses any tone and doesn't add any unwanted noise or distortion if the input level is set correctly. I have yet to test it with vocals, but I'm sure it sounds great with an SM58 or any other popular dynamic (can't say I would ever try a condenser/phantom box). Getting used to the metal stomp switches has proven to be a little rough without shoes on compared to using a flat plastic pedal (original JamMan), but I'll probably get used to it over time. The amount of storage on this thing is fantastic, with room to expand. The backing tracks are great for jamming with yourself or keeping tempo in a live environment. Besides a slight learning curve for users unfamiliar with looping in general, this product has an impressive amount of features and an ease of use that makes it perfect for practice and live performance. For someone just getting into looping/sampling, I probably should have started off with a basic JamMan, but for loop veterans this is highly recommended. I only wish I had gone with the delay/looper mega combo version!

Strengths and Weaknesses

This pedal is fine if you want to record all your loops at home and then use them as a kind of "band in the box" during gigs. You will not be happy with it if you rely on live looping during a gig unless each of your songs comprises only one loop. This is because, after creating a loop on the fly, you have to kneel down and press the save button before selecting a different program number ready for recording a different loop.

So if you're into recording your loops at home, the manual has no example of how you record several loops, each with the same tempo, that make up a song. Here's the way you do this. Start by selecting an empty program and tap the tempo you wish to use for the whole song. Now save this tempo (without any musical overdub). Now copy this program to as many different programs as your song requires.

Let's say your song requires a intro, a verse, and a chorus. Before recording the music for the intro, make sure Auto_Record is OFF. Let's say your song is in 4/4 time and you want to give your drummer 2 measures of clicks before starting the intro. Tap the Record button, wait for the first 4 clicks (these are not recorded) and THEN WAIT AN ADDITIONAL 8 CLICKS (these give you the 2 measures of clicks for your drummer). Record the music for your intro and tap the Record button at the end of the intro. The JamMan will automatically quantize your intro so it is an exact number of beats. When saving this loop, remember to save it as a "Single" loop and make sure the Stop mode is "Finish".

You can use the other programs that have the empty click track already recorded for your verse and chorus loops. Again, make sure Auto-Record os OFF and, after tapping the Record button, remember to wait for the 4 clicks before playing the music. When saving the verse and chorus, save them in "Loop" mode with the "Finish" stop mode.

After recording your intro, verse, and chorus loops, you can step through them, cue the next loop before the current one is finished playing, and all loops will have the same tempo.

Hope someone out there finds this long-winded explanation helpful.

Not Reliable

Warning! These pedals are another fabulous MADE IN CHINA product. I've owned both this pedal and the smaller single mono pedal and had circuit problems with both of them. I only had this one a couple of weeks before it just stopped recording loops. I'm not a big digitech fan anyway.

I very seldom give bad reviews for products, but this is one of them