PURPOSE: To keep the regularity of the frequency sequence of pilot signals in case of consecutive recording or post recording by mutliplying a reproduced pilot signal and a pilot signal obtained from a pilot signal generating means directly or after shifting the phase of one of them at 90° and extracting two kinds of differential frequency signal to generate a control signal and correcting the pilot signal generation state.

CONSTITUTION: The reproduced pilot signal obtained in the output of a low-pass filter 26 is inputted to an analog operating circuit 37 and is multiplied by the pilot signal obtained in the output of a filter 16, and the output signal is divided into two by a dividing circuit 38, and differential frequency signal components having frequencies M and 3M are separated and extracted by band-pass filters 39 and 40. A pilot control circuit 46 superposes an off-track signal onto a tracking control signal 36 from an off-track signal generating circuit 47 through an adder 35 in case of joint recording or post recording to set heads 22a and 22b to the off-track state temporarily in one direction and discriminates the polarity of a control signal 45 in this off-track state and controls a control circuit 13 in accordance with the polarity.