The Boss RC20XL is a phrase looper.  Simply put, if you activate this guitar pedal, it will record a section of your guitar playing, whether this be a chord, a riff, a lick o

r a full chord progression and repeat it over and over in the form of a loop.

So what’s the point in this guitar pedal? And why would you want to create loops? Well when you practice the guitar or play alone, often it is hard to hear or understand how a particular lead section will sound without hearing it over the chords. Simply play the chords first, the loop pedal will then record this and repeat it. perfect for practicing and getting any section nailed.

The Boss RC-20XL will give the ability to loop up to 16 minutes of audio spanning several different channels. This means that you can compose whole songs with this pedal. Using an optional pedal (at additional cost) you can move between these loops. You could therefore record a verse, a chorus a bridge and loop through them to compose a whole backing track to a song.

Once you have recorded one part you can overdub more parts on top of the loop. This allows you build on each loop to really achieve best results.

The Boss RC-20XL can be used as a practice tool but it can also be used for live performances. Check out youtube for some songs that people have performed using this guitar pedal to see what it really can do.

Another great aspect of the RC-20XL Loop Station is the ability for your recorded loop to be quantized. This means that if you stop your loop slightly late, the pedal will alter this for you so it fits into a perfectly timed loop. No longer do you have to press the guitar pedal to the millisecond - it is done for you.

The ease of using the RC-20XL loop station is simple. Set your desired tempo by pressing the tap tempo button or  the right hand pedal in time with the beat required. You can then press the left pedal to be counted in with 4 beats. Play your loop and once complete, press the left pedal again and the loop will immediately start to play.

There is an option to add a microphone as well as a guitar and you can also add a CD or similar in to make your own loops - a cd of samples is actually included with the pedal to get you started.

i have so far found the sound quality of the RC-20XL Loop Station to be extremely good. No additional humming noise and minimal loss of tone. I managed to start using within a few moments and the easy to follow instructions quickly allowed me to get started with minimal fuss.

Of course, as with all Boss guitar pedals - the quality and robustness of the pedal means its i extremely unlikely to break -  but you do get a 5 year warranty with it - great stuff.

There are literally hundreds of guitar effects pedals to choose from – some creating noises and sounds that you would find hard to fit into, what I would call, normal music.

Guitar effects pedals can be bought as single pedals, multi effects pedals or rack mounted effects processors. Multi effects pedals will often have a whole bunch of different guitar effects to use but generally the quality is not as good as single units. Of course, the more you spend the better they become but this can cost hundreds, even thousands of pounds.

Here I am going to outline some of the more commonly used guitar effects pedals that the majority of guitarists use. These are based on single “stomp box” type effects units. These can be easily chopped and changed to get the sound that you want from your guitar.

Distortion / overdrive pedals

Whilst the two guitar effects pedals above are different they do have similarities. Basically they take your clean sound and convert it to an overdriven or distorted sound. This gives you a rock type sound found on thousands of songs. Examples are Nirvana, Jimi hendrix and many other.

Wah Pedals

This is a great guitar effects pedal. Rather than just an on/off situation this is an expression pedal. This means that you have anywhere in between on and off. Called a wah pedal because quite simply, it makes your guitar sound as though it is saying “wah”.

Delay Effects Pedals

This causes an echo effect to be added to your sound. A small amount of this can really beef up your solo sound. Players such as Joe Satriani use this to make their guitar sound up. If you are into lead playing it is well worth investing in this effects pedal.

Chorus Pedals

Another nice pedal that adds to both your clean and distorted tone is the chorus pedal. This beefs up or thickens the sound by almost doubling up notes in layers a very subtle way.

With guitar effects pedals there are huge differences in sound quality. Generally the more expensive it is, the better it will be. It is also very true, especially with the examples above, the older the effects pedal is the better quality sound it will produce. As the famous saying goes – they don’t make things like they used to.

I want to bring to everyone’s attention a fantastic post by a member of the forum regarding how to go about starting to teach guitar.

If you are a guitarist then you may have considered using your skills to help others - and earn a bit of cash along the way. Getting the students is the easiest part - the hard part comes with knowing what to teach when they are there.

I am certain you will find this post useful

http://forums.ollysguitar.com/viewtopic.php?p=888#888

Come and join in the discussion.

Join our discussion

CLICK HERE

This relates specifically regarding how chords are built by using the major scale. This is fundamental inforamtion for any musician as well as any guitarist.

The major scale is the building block for everything musical so it is important to try and understand how it works and how it relates to chords.

Get this under your belt and learning anything else to do with the guitar or anything musical will become much clearer and a lot easier to understand.

If there are any aspects that I have not been clear on then please either leave a comment here or feel free to comment in the forum and I, or another member of the forum will be happy to assist you.

If you have a guitar with a Floyd Rose tremelo system then you may struggle with changing the strings. I have written and article on how to do this over at the Forums

http://forums.ollysguitar.com/viewtopic.php?t=149

Thanks

My main influences are rock based including Satriani, Vai, Queen, GnR and many more.

So What is a scale. Well very simply it is a chain of single notes

played one after the other until you reach the same note one octave higher than the first. A note that is an octave away is simply the same note, higher up in pitch.

You probably already know a scale in your head without realising it.

Do - Re - Mi - Fa - So - La - Ti - Do

Singing the above is in fact a major scale. Note the octave here - Do and Do are the same notes but the second is higher than the first. In fact looking how many notes there are, it is in fact 8 which is where the name ‘oct’tave comes from. An octagon as 8 sides, an octave has 8 notes.

So what? Why bother? Well there are many reasons why scales are important, certainly if you want to be a lead guitarist it is essential. If you decide scales are not for you then fair enough but if you simply have to learn one scale to get by with guitar and indeed any music. This is the major scale.

Why is the Major scale important? Well everything in music relates to the major scale or resolves back to it. Perhaps you have heard or seen extended chords such as Cmaj7 or a C#6 - well simply a Cmaj7 is a Cmajor chord (you know this shape) with the addition of the 7th note from the C major scale. Likewise the C#6 is the C sharp chord with the addition of the 6th note from the C sharp major scale. Sound confusing?

Don’t worry so much about this now. The important thing is to realise that learning the major scale will help you know an awful lot about guitar and music in general so………… learn it!

You already know how a major scale will sound so try figure it out on the guitar. We will look at some actual major scale patterns next time

As always please feel free to leave a comment and any questions and I will do my best to help.

I apologise for the lack of lessons recently. I have been extremely busy trying to get the Guitar Forum  up and running. Please feel free to join and contribute here.

Lessons will commence  again very soon. If anyone is struggling with anything so far or would like more information an a specific topic then please feel free to contact me.

Have a great year everyone!

Olly

Here is the place to ask any questions about the guitar, including any of the lessons and reviews here at Olly’s Guitar World.

We would welcome any guitarist whether you have not picked up a guitar before, been playing 5 minutes, 5 years or 50 years. Come and  contribute you thoughts, feelings, lessons and resources for everything guitar related.

Look forward to seeing you there.

Olly