Too much emphasis on "in the room" sound....Flame suit on!

Dude, I'm not standing anywhere near you ...

Would be interesting to see the comments from the "live" users and the "home" users and know which side they sway towards. Personally the biggest factor I find, and what make the most significant difference, is the venue/stage and acoustics of the space the performance occupies. Certainly the kpa allows for a more consistent sound as there's no mics competing with reflections and bleed from other sources. That's good in my book.

Actually quite often there's a lot of in the room tone on records, distant micing produces quite a different sound to close micing, and while modern pop is all very very ultra close mic'd (and often just pod's) it's not a sound we think of for the kinds of classic tones many of us were used to growing up. Just because some production prefers that sound or even the most popular current records do (or you do), doesn't mean it's what everyone aspires to, there's such a thing as too dry and unfortunately reverb plugins only go so far to resolve the issue, mostly suffering from being far too linear in nature.

It's also a case of the sound that people want to hear when practicing with an amp, the bloom you get from room diffusion, the responsiveness. Something about the dynamic range of an amp as opposed to the dynamic range of a recorded amp is quite different too, which affects the feel (or at least the responsiveness), and thus how you play.

People want to have creative choice, it's why when you record drums you record the room to blend in with it, even drum sample libraries come with a room control, because that livens up the sound a little and gives you the option to go from a totally dry to a much more live sound. I don't see why guitarists wouldn't want the same level of control, or why any engineer wouldn't desire to have that much control at least during tracking even if they eventually go for the completely dry sound, sound control is good.

You could even take it all the way to the opposite end of the spectrum and go with the converse argument which is this - I really don't see why wanting to sound like a Pod would be an ideal that anyone wants to attain either. One of the biggest failings of modern recordings is the lack of error, the lack of soul the lack of feeling and the over polished "perfection" going on, if we really wanted to listen to CASIO demo tunes then we'd buy a CASIO keyboard, not the latest generic "hit" from Dr Luke, Simon Cowell et al. The 80's (where the synth-pop really hit mainstream) has a lot to answer for.

The thing is each genre of music has it's own set of sounds, and every artist has their own preferred sounds. You are unlikely to want much or any room sound in most industrial metal, you're quite likely to want to emulate the sound of an amp in the room for lots of classical jazz. There's a world of sounds in between and the idea that a current limitation is actually a good or positive thing because e.g. "no really who'd want it sliced anyway?" is really just an apologists and pretty short sighted argument.

Your'e forgetting one critical thing though. Mojo.

For playing live it's the same though, but there it's not the room and reverb but the dynamics of the experience (which I touched in in the last post), feel is king and what gutiarists talk about when they want "amp in the room" sound playing live is they want to hear and feel the guitar as if it were coming out of a backline, what happens FOH is the engineers choice, it's about their own little cocoon on stage.

If someone is used to hearing and playing with a real guitar amp, getting used to a standard wedge monitor or even worse IEM's is going to be fairly crushing, no guitar sound interaction is dull for many guitarists, they don't go on stage to play in a studio.

Performance is theatrics, it's all about ego, and so you need to make people feel comfortable and in their zone otherwise they'll never get in *the* zone when playing, that goes for live or recorded. So if someone wants to have the same sound and feel when they're on stage and the rest of the band and the engineer is fine with that then why shouldn't they? Again just because you don't want or like that doesn't mean that everyone else should have to go the same route or consider the limitation an advantage.

The trouble is the bury the head in the sand approach isn't going to persuade anyone else to come over from using real amps live to using something like the Kemper. And unless it really can say it's as comfortable an experience as the real deal then that's going to be a dealbreaker for many, that's why there are plenty of solutions that attempt to give you the same effect as having a real amp at volume on stage, hell the Kemper itself comes with an amp'd up version for that very reason, I've no idea how successful it is, if it can't really give you the feel of the real amp as played direct and not through a mic in a control room then the answer is not very. There are lots of good and rational reasons to not have a backline and not use real amps live but mojo isn't among them.

Ok, well.
My "music career" is the same as yours, VESMedic, and i've been doing a lot of session work and recording the past couple of years.
I also do not acknowledge mojo anymore than i do placebo. If one isn't a good reason, the other shouldn't be either.
While i see what Per means, i think it's unprofessional.

The main reason i'm looking for an 'amp in the room' sound is rehearsing.
When you want to hear a band mix live and not through a PA, the most common ground for guitar sounds is guitar amp sounds -
get in a room with your bass player, drummer and singer, crank your PA with one of Lasse's profiles and watch everyone duck for cover.

It's not that anything is wrong with them, but nothing carries that high-frequency content live - not your singer on a 58, not your drummer's snare 5 meters away, not your bass player's 8x10.
Now, get all of the above recorded - with a condenser for your singer, a compressor for your snare top and parallel overdrive for the bass - and you'll need that on-axis close-mic'd sound - but it will not sit well in a band mix live.
For reference, what works for me in the studio i can carry over to rehearsals with the master EQ on (-0.5, +1.8, -4.5, -1.8 ).

And yeah, you know. Bedroom warriors.

Well I guess lots of us on this forum are most of all bedroom players, used to playing next to their amp.
I agree with you, for live use and recording, the Kemper is just perfect.
Now yesterday just for fun, I switched on my tube amp, a cheap Bugera V22, which I hadn't played for months. I kept switching between my kemper (through Power Engine 60 with a frfr speaker) and the Bugera.
Verdict: the tone from the Kemper is better, but the feel is different. And I got to say there's this little something I like which you can't get through frfr.
But again, this is for bedrrom playing, at a low volume; during rehearsal, I can feel the air pumping through my frfr cab no problem.
++

Actually I get what VESmedic1 wants to say in his initial post.
And I agree completely.
The term 'in the room' as I see it used in all the forums over and over describes more the inexperienced guitarist who wants to bathe in his own sound and has zero experience with
- his potential FOH sound.
- the sound of his band altogether.

This is also the kind of guitarist who is stepping into frequency territory with their bassplayers and keyboard players as well.

It doesn't mean they are bad players, they often do amazing clips on YT with some boutique gear.
But they are totally inexperienced from a live/FOH/band perspective.

I agree with VESmedic1 too, but there's probably only one thing I've learned in 30 years of guitar playing: You play as good as you feel. Personally I don't need this amp in the room feeling but I can understand players who are needing it to feel good (and play good). Nothing wrong about that. And I don't think it has something to do with inexperience because "amp in the room" was the way to go for generations of guitarists. There simply wasn't an alternative.

for the best "in the room" sound experience you have to play in a room

I also get where he's coming from I just don't think it's that simple. The elephant in the room is that the world of music has and continues to make great music that way.

It's not just the inexperienced either, that's a convenient caricature, it's a straw-man. In using that you're really arguing against what "in the room" means to you, not what it may mean to someone else. To me for instance "in the room" when live means an enhanced and dynamic range and occasional treble wolf notes typical of playing a real amp as opposed to an amp sim or ampp in isolation (which tends to have a more "limited" range), coupled with acoustic feedback harmonics caused by large volumes of air being moved and on record "in the room" refers to a distant mic'd sound that you occasionally here on some jazz, quite a lot of stoner rock and some British classic rock records. In my opinion if you encounter frequency muddyness then you need to fix your arrangement and playing before you start thinking of fixing your signal chain and EQ.

There is nothing wrong with wanting to attain a sound or feel that you have heard and enjoyed. It's why we use products that try to emulate the sounds we have heard and want to attain ourselves like the Kemper.

Maby i have misunderstand the usage og a Kemper. but i tought the sound should copy the sound the way your amp is heard trough a PA. And i simpli liked this tought with same sound and tone in every event, no micing up cab. no boomy bass because of mic, no noise from mick and no feedback problems. and most of all little weight and a lot less to carry

at home i favour the varm open sound from my tube amp ofcorce! but i play 95% live trough a PA. I easyly understand that guitarist want that warm pure sound trough their Kemper monitor too!! its close in my DXR8, but not the same.. but i can get realy close to my tube amp tone after micking up trough PA! The problem is that we all want to hear what we are used to!

I have not had the Kemper for a long time and only tested it last weekend! Looking forward to play it this weekend too, and i think the Kemper is going to be my main live amp in the future!

Bedroom warrior here. Never played in a band, never experienced playing through a cranked tube amp.

What I HAVE experienced is a lot of blanket statements about "room tone", "pushing air" etc... Since I'm mainly interested in recording my songs in good quality, comments about these things have driven me to foolishly buy a number of equipment/plugins/IRs etc... Lately I'm learning that for the kind of music I make, these things are mostly red herrings. I can play fine through headphones, so why should I worry any further about "feel", when I don't FEEL I am missing out on anything. That is MY particular playing paradigm, so I think I should stop looking for a golden solution - to a problem that may not exist. Further, if the "room tone", "pushing air" etc. is not something that is evident in most modern rock recordings - why should I worry about this? For now, I'm just ecstatic that I have the opportunity to record - silently - the sound of a (close-miced) cab, and get a really good result. (I DO want to learn how to properly mic up a cab, but that's not in the cards right now).

Discuss!

It's all about what you are used to.

I don't play "in the room" for more than 25 years now, so that's what I'm used to.

1) To work in studios (amps --> control room, miked cabs --> recording room) and there I'll always hear the guitar-sounds from studio-monitors.

2) When I'm on tour -playing mainly bigger venues- I'm using in ears and I don't hear the direct amp-signal. Often amps and cabs may stand under or behind the stage.

For me the KPA is the perfect tool, because it is exactly made for my purpose. If you're used to play next to your amp/cab and that's your standard situation, the KPA will sound different to you. You'd have to put your cab into another room (soundproofed), mike it up and listen to the signal via studio-monitors, that's what the KPA is all about.

good thread guy's !!! are there any profiles out there have been succesfully profiled using ambient room mic's ?
i,ve always used a little of the "room" mixed in with a closed mic for recording (mixing) but mix percentages vary depending on how you want the guitar to sit in the mix .
not sure this would work live at all but very useful for recording in my opinion.

I'm in agreement with the OP. I spent most of my early years with junk equipment trying to make it sound like the recorded stuff I was listening to. That is how I hear guitar. With the advent of modeling in the late 90's, I finally found the "tone I hear in my head", and it has only gotten better over the years. I get "amp in room", but it's not important to me.

Quote from plek

good thread guy's !!! are there any profiles out there have been succesfully profiled using ambient room mic's ?
i,ve always used a little of the "room" mixed in with a closed mic for recording (mixing) but mix percentages vary depending on how you want the guitar to sit in the mix .
not sure this would work live at all but very useful for recording in my opinion.

Th KPA can't profile time-based effects like delays or reverbs; the same goes for the reverb of the room. It does, of course, profile how the room affects the FREQUENCY RESPONSE at the mic's position.

I think it's a rather useless description. I played the KPA through a guitar amp in the room and it sounded awesome. Took it to an outdoor even, sounded very thin.
I got a good sounding room. But outdoors.. Worse than if recorded by a mic losing the entire low end. So the room shapes what you think you are hearing. Too Many Variables of amp position, your standing position, type of speakers, etc.

The KPA is perfectly able to compensate for what you think you might be lacking. I don't think it's a "lacking" so much as a "different" because you are typically using different speakers.

I suspect the biggest culprit is volume. Most I suspect do not listen to their Kempers at anywhere near the volumes of their amps. Crank the hell out of your Kemper and tell me if it is missing something!

At that point, when your ears are splitting and the objects are falling off your shelves, you'll stop bitching about the "amp in the room" and go "Holy... SHIT!!"

The whole article is a great read but scrolling down to the single mic placement there is a mention about getting an amp in the room sound: http://www.soundonsound.com/so…es/guitaramprecording.htm
I'm curious if there are profiles that have mics placed 4 - 8 (or more) feet from the amp?