Review: Boss Micro BR Palmtop Recording Studio
Pages: 1, 2, 3

Far-Reaching Effects

The Micro BR has two effect processors—one for individual inserts and one for reverb. The reverb choices are pretty limited with only a hall and a room to choose from, but you can edit the reverb time and tone. The reverb is actually not bad. It doesn't rival most reverb plug-ins, but for a box that fits in my pocket I can't complain.

The insert effects are grouped in three categories: guitar effects, vocal/mic effects, and mastering effects. There are 80 guitar effect presets, 20 vocal/mic effect presets, and 10 mastering presets. The guitar effects are so much fun—really inspiring and realistic.

I wish there were a few more vocal effects, but I really like the ones Boss gives you. I found them very hip with some creative, edgy vocal delays that make anyone sound like a rock star.

The mastering effects were decent as well. Again, I can't compare the Micro BR effects to the Waves Platinum Bundle, and I wouldn't begin to. But for what this box is and does, the effects are usable, abundant, and inspiring.

Using the effects while recording is intuitive but getting to specific effects categories after you've recorded a track is not. When you record your guitar, for example, you must choose the guitar input from the front panel, and when you press the Effect button, it automatically calls up the guitar effects group. But after you record, you may want to add a chorus or delay. To do that, you need to change the input to "Mic," press the Effect button, choose where you want to apply the effect (the track with the electric guitar), and then scroll through the 20 vocal/mic effects. That's confusing.

All effects are editable and can be chained in different ways. For example, a guitar effect includes five components to choose from: Preamp, Speaker Simulator, Noise Suppressor, FX (which includes compressor, chorus, flanger, phaser, and tremolo/pan) and Delay. Each one of the components is editable as well. So within the Speaker Simulator are 14 different amp models, such as a Fender Twin, Roland JC-120, Matchless, and more.

Chop-Chop, Mix-Mix

When you're used to a big computer monitor and software like Pro Tools, editing on the Micro BR can be frustrating. There's no solo or mute or automation, for example, so if you want to mute a track, you have to simply bring the volume to zero. The cool thing is that the micro BR can edit in measures. So I could tell it to copy the data from measure 26, beat 2, to measure 54, beat 3, and paste that at bar 1, beat 2. I wish there were a crossfade feature that made my edits a little less abrupt, though.

When you're done recording and editing your tracks, you'll want to Optimize. This removes any unkept takes from the SD card and saves you space. Optimizing doesn't delete any parts left on Virtual Tracks that aren't being used. It simply deletes audio that was recorded over and is not being used at all.

Creating a final mix of a song wasn't as obvious as the rest of the functions but it is spelled out pretty clearly in the manual. You have to enter Mastering mode by pressing the Exit and Utility buttons together a few times, choose an unused virtual track on which to record your final mix, and then press record. When your mix is done compiling, press Stop and the Micro BR asks you what format you want your final mix in, MP3 or WAV. You name your track and then your final mix is placed in the MP3 folder of the Micro BR's drive.

When you connect your Micro BR to your computer, just open the MP3 folder and find your final mix to burn to a CD.

Back Up, Dude

Remember I said there were two folders on the Micro BR drive and the other one is called Roland? Well, that's where all of your song data is stored. To back up, simply drag that Roland folder to your hard drive. That's it.

Note that the Micro BR uses its own proprietary audio file format, but you can bounce or export any track or track(s) to WAV or MP3 format if necessary to use in another application. I suggest exporting to WAV files because they're sample-accurate and will line up to your click track without any problems. MP3 files always add about 20 samples to the front of a file and require you to move or nudge your file to line up with your tempo.

The Lowdown

So, how and when would I use this? Personally, I wouldn't record and master a serious album on the Micro BR. Not that it couldn't be done; I'm simply spoiled using Pro Tools and computer based DAWs for my serious work. I think of the Micro BR as a portable sketchpad for songwriting. When I don't want to lug around my Pro Tools interface, USB dongle, microphone, and speakers, the Micro BR is absolutely perfect for songwriting or capturing fun ideas when the mood strikes. It's great for sitting with an electric or acoustic guitar and trying out new ideas and harmony parts.

I used the Micro BR over Christmas with my family to record a thrash-rock version of "The Little Drummer Boy." Then we did our own OK Go-ish video to it and emailed that to all the absent family members just to make them laugh. Basically, I chose a drum groove and played power chords on my brother's electric guitar. On the other three tracks, I recorded my family members singing lyrics I rewrote with stupid family jokes. For playback, I used one of favorite gadgets, the Sonic Impact I-F2 portable speaker.

To create the video, I hooked my Apple iSight camera to my laptop. Using a small application called G-Cam to capture the festivities, I aimed the camera at my crazy family and played the Micro BR into the line input of my laptop while we all acted like we were singing in real time. I then exported the video from QuickTime to a 5MB MP4 file and emailed that. It was quick and painless and kinda fun for everyone. I figured that recording a bad song and video was better than arguing or hearing about my brother's appendix surgery.

I actually bought another Micro BR and gave it to my computer-phobic wannabe rock-guitarist brother for Christmas. Within moments of opening the box, he had his distorted electric guitar playing with his heavy rock drum groove and was immersed in headphones and unavailable to anyone until dinner was served.

So I still say go with Pro Tools LE if you're doing serious demos, but if you need a songwriting sketchpad or just hate recording on the computer, the Boss Micro BR is one amazing gadget worth owning.

Gina Fant-Saez is the CEO of eSession.com, the owner of Blue World Music, and the author of Pro Tools for Musicians & Songwriters (Peachpit, 2006).

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