Anyone who has ever seen musician/comedian Reggie Watts perform has no doubt left mystified and enthralled by how one man could embody a full-on band and music production studio equipped with just a looping machine and his dynamic vocal stylings. Watts is known for creating sophisticated, polished-sounding hip-hop and R&B songs on the fly, improvising in front of a live audience and taking cues from his surroundings, then weaving it all together into a multi-layered musical concoction that would take most musicians a backing band and a week in the studio to rival.

Sure, the practice of looping is nothing new and has been a common technique used by musicians for years, some of whom are veritable one-man bands like Watts (Tune-Yards, for instance, is another fine example). But for those of us who may not have had occasion to experiment with looping machines ourselves, the process of creating these songs may not be entirely familiar. In the above video, Watts deconstructs all the various components of this 7:00 minute improvised track with the help of picture-in-picture videos representing each loop, allowing you to actually see his hands on the knobs triggering the corresponding audiovideo loops. Although the process is demystified, it makes Watts’ performance no less impressive.