App Profile: Jam Looper

RespectableReviewer-jose

Rating: 4/5

Often, I just want to record some ideas just to see where they could go. This app might not replace your studio, but to me as a hobbyist, it has everything I need to express myself creatively. I do have one complaint, which is not the developer’s fault. The iPhone has a terrible mic and it really takes away from the overall experience. An app that I think is magical is Dolby On, it removes noise and almost gives you studio quality recording, but in terms of actual functionality I find this app way better. If this app had the same recording capabilities as Dolby’s I would see myself drafting an entire album on it. I like the effects on this app, and I respect the developers for allowing us to try them for free, in the end I only used reverb, but I look forward for more. Tldr: Great app, good functionalities, needs software to improve recording quality/noise reduction.

A G H A N I M

Rating: 3/5

I mainly gravitated toward this app for the ability to multi layer tracks. This helps me write a quick lead idea over a chord progression without having to run to my DAW. That being said, it’s sufficient for riffing over but the recording when it comes to multiple tracks is wanting. For example, when I record more than one track and go to trim the second track, there is a delay when it starts which makes trimming such a burden. On top of that, it appears to get exponentially worse the more tracks you add. I tried a basic drum beat, chords and a lead and the last track started with an almost 8 sec delay. This ends up making it so that I use this app for raw ideas only and move on right away after some basic noodling. If the devs goal is to get that $9.99 premium, I don’t see where that value is coming from. Not a bad looking app at all but solely an issue with the playback latency/delay. Minor issues with sliding samples/recordings around on the timeline. Doesn’t feel very intuitive. For reference, I’m using an iPhone 13, so I should have more than enough processing power and I tried this app for about 4 months.

icon/trident

Rating: 5/5

I’ve been using this app for a while, and one thing that I’ve realized is that professional music needs professional equipment. It’s pretty funny to me how most of the 1 star reviews say that the app is laggy or has a background noise, when the issues are most likely the users fault. One example is that different headphones pick sound up differently. Some headphones may have a delay which could make multiple recordings integrate badly. Also the app only picks up sound that’s there, so if there’s background noise, then it’s probably from the real world and not the app. The only background noise from the app is the beeping from the metronome, which also makes sense, because if the phone is making noise then it’s probably going to pick up on the noise. Basically, to make sure problems don’t occur, your going to want to use at least decent headphones.