Singular Sound Aeros Loop Studio Review

Summary

• Pros: The Aeros Loop Studio has up to 36 independent loops per song, an intuitive waveform display, great sound, simple layout, and MIDI.
• Cons: A little expensive, and a bit of a learning curve.
• Overall: One of the best loopers on the market if you’re a songwriter or loop live.

Compare Prices

• Amazon: Singular Sounds Aeros Loop Studio
• Guitar Center: Singular Sound Aeros Loop Studio

Full Review

The more features you pack into a looper pedal, the more it blurs the boundaries between different types of pedals. For example, the JamMan Delay is a Frankenstein-style combination of a looper and a delay pedal. And the Boss RC-10R and NU-X JTC Pro are like the love-children of a looper pedal and a drum machine. But any looper, especially a multi-track looper, blurs the boundaries between looper pedal and multi-track recorder almost by definition. The Aeros Loop Studio takes this to the extreme.

With six overdub-able tracks on each of six parts, a waveform display while you record, and other features, the Aeros Loop Studio blurs the boundaries between a looper and a multi-track recorder. The price might be high, but so is the sonic potential!

Is the Aeros Loop Studio the Ultimate Multi-Track Looper?

When you first look at the Aeros Loop Studio, the sheer amount of functionality is frankly baffling. The Aeros is only 20 cm wide by 15 cm (back to front). It has just four footswitches and a dial surrounding an 11 cm display screen. Of course it’s bigger than an average stompbox, but for all its capability, the Aeros Loop Studio looks disarmingly simple. The key to how Singular Sound has done this is two-fold:

First, three of the the four footswitches are used in a context-dependent way, with the footswitch’s functions varying depending on the mode you’re in. The display will also show different functions depending on which mode you’re in.

Second, the Aeros has touch-screen functionality. So, for any deep menu or settings changes, you don’t need a million buttons and dials. The options are just displayed on-screen and you select the function you want.

From these basic building blocks, the Aeros Loop Studio achieves a lot. The basic structure of any given song is split between “tracks” and “parts.” A track is one waveform on the main display (running parallel with other tracks). A “part” is a collection of these waveforms corresponding to the part of the song (i.e., verse, chorus, bridge, etc.). You can either record in 2 × 2 or 6 × 6 mode. This means you can record two tracks for each of two parts, or six tracks for each of six parts.

Straightforward Looping Controls

The Aeros Loop Studio works basically like any other looper but with tons of locations for recording loops. So, you hit either the middle or right footswitch (depending on the mode you’re in) to start recording, hit it again to playback your loop, hit it again to overdub, and so on. If you hold down the button, the switch controls the undo/redo function. You can also double-tap to mute the current track.

Create Complex Songs Using Loops

The beauty of the Aeros Loop Studio is the sheer number of loops you can incorporate into a single song. You can use it with one track as described above and it works like basically any other looper. But then you can have another loop running in parallel by starting the process again on a separate track, with a maximum of either two or six depending on your mode, and of course overdubs on each are unlimited.

The waveform display really helps here, because when you’re recording on a different track you can always see what’s going on with your previous tracks at a glance, including the locations of new measures. Then, if you’ve put together a great verse section for your song, you can hit the left-most switch to start a new part, giving you a whole new space with the same number of tracks to work with.

Using the Modes

The main difference between the two different modes (2 × 2 or 6 × 6), aside from the number of parts and tracks you’re allowed, is how the switches function. With 2 × 2 mode, the middle and right switches control the looping operations for a specific track, while in 6 × 6 mode, the middle one selects the track and the right one controls the looping operations.

The Aeros Loop Studio Inspires Creativity

It’s hard to overstate the songwriting potential of this simple set of tools. All loopers are songwriting tools to an extent, but this is so close to being a fully-fledged DAW that you can operate with your feet that it’s almost scary. There’s also a mixer, where you can adjust the master volume or the level of each specific track using the huge roller wheel on the right of the display. And you can store 3 hours of mono or 1.5 hours of stereo recording on-board (all 24-bit), with an SD port and a USB connection if you want to expand this.

MIDI and More

And this isn’t even scratching the surface of what the Aeros Loop Studio has to offer. There is in-built quantization and the looper waits until the end of the measure to start recording something new. Or if you want you can set it completely freeform. It has MIDI ins and outs so you can sync with drum machines, effects and more (especially Singular Sound’s BeatBuddy). It also has stereo 1/4 inch ins and outs, aux input and output, and a spot for an expression pedal. The thing even updates itself over wi-fi. Plus, there is Bluetooth capability that will be incorporated in a future update (described as being there “for reasons” at the time of this review).

In a nutshell, this is a looper for the 21st century.

Putting it All Together

This review could be twice the length and still just be scratching the surface of everything you can do with the Aeros Loop Studio. The short version is that if you’re looking for a looper as a songwriting companion, it’s easily the best option on the market right now, and it’s hard to imagine anything better coming out in the near future. The fact that you can legitimately do all of this on-the-fly, as in, literally build a 36-component song on stage without so much as a stutter or an awkward moment bending forwards to mess around with buttons and dials is mind-blowing.

On top of this, the sound quality is excellent and the mixing options give you fine control over the sound of the finished product. The waveform display on the screen is also incredibly useful, giving you a very clear and intuitive visual representation of where you are in your loop and what’s going on with the whole song at a glance. It’s a simple choice that adds so much to the pedal and it’s potential as a songwriting tool.

There is, of course, a bit of a learning curve before you’ll be producing complex soundscapes live on stage. But the key functions are pretty easy to describe and the manual isn’t even that big. It’s more a case of getting used to the layout and the navigation than it being necessarily complicated. For example, you don’t need to remember many button press combinations or anything like that to get it working.

A Few Gripes

As far as downsides go, the Singular Sound team is constantly updating what it can do. For instance, you can’t lock a single track to continue through to the next part of the song, but you will be able to soon. However, there are a few minor gripes like no phantom power for condenser mics, and no option to have an aux input for one part only and an ordinary 1/4 inch input for the others. But this is nit-picking. These small issues won’t limit most guitarists.

The biggest problem is the price. It definitely isn’t cheap. Of course, it’s not something you’d want to invest in if you’ve never used a looper before. But frankly, the reason they put the price so high is because they know that people will pay it. You simply can’t find anything with this much capability anywhere else. And what’s more, Singular Sound has executed it almost flawlessly.

Is the Aeros Loop Studio Worth Picking Up?

You betcha! If you’re serious about looping, especially as a songwriter, this comes highly recommended.

Where to Buy the Aeros Loop Studio?

• Amazon: Singular Sounds Aeros Loop Studio
• Guitar Center: Singular Sound Aeros Loop Studio

Singular Sound Aeros Loop Studio Product Clip