RE: Tape looping/sequencing

[Hans Lindauer <hans@ernieball.com>]

I had fun making some tape loops on an old Teac 4-track, 1/4" machine.  I
just cut loops of blank tape and threaded them into the machine, and then
recorded onto the four tracks.  You can do some cool stuff that way.  The
Teac records at 7.5 or 15 inches per second, so you can record some of the
tacks at each speed, which makes them play at half or double speed,
depending upon which is engaged.  You can also flip the tape around and
record some of the tracks in reverse.  You can  also use the sync head to
change the timing between tracks.    

It would be fun to play around on a machine with 24 tracks, and with
vari-pitch, and with a high-end console with lots of aux sends, and with
racks and racks of outboard gear, and with an intern bringing me coffee, 
and
with some guy that I could call who would come in and re-patch everything
the way I wanted it, and with another guy who would come in and figure out
why it wasn't working correctly and fix it, but I digress....

As far as splicing goes, what I was doing only required a single splice.  I
just overlapped the two ends of the loop and made a 45 degree cut through
both ends at once with a razor blade.  Then I used one of the little pieces
of silver tape that comes with the reel to join the ends after I butted 
them
together.  I used scotch tape after I ran out of the silver stuff, and it
worked great.  You need to line up the ends of the tape really well so that
you won't hear a transition.

Have fun!


-Hans


-----Original Message-----
From: Bowerbird@webtv.net [mailto:Bowerbird@webtv.net]
Sent: Thursday, December 07, 2000 1:34 PM
To: Loopers-Delight@loopers-delight.com
Subject: Re: Tape looping/sequencing


I'm interested in constructing closed tape loops, ol'-skool
sequencing/editing/sampling. I'm not really interested in real-time
looping.  Right now I have an Akai 1700. I bought it a few months back,
not knowing how downright impossible it would be to get any information
whatsoever on the basic techniques of tape editing.... what basic
materials do I need?, -what type of adhesive do I use to splice? What's
an "editing block"? Please excuse the dumb questions- I really am this
clueless about it.