M Britt Kemper Profiles

  • Straight ‘B’ cabs are rounder and fuller sounding.
    Angled ‘A’ cabs are tighter and tiny tiny bit more breath and high end.


    I have 10 Marshall 1960 cabs here in my live room of various types. Black Back 55hz, Green Back, Vintage 30 and G12 75’s

    5 are the B type and 5 are the A type.
    One of my favourites out of all of them, I have never looked to see what is in there and I don’t want to know. ?

    It’s pre JCM800. I suspect they are Black Back but someone could have swapped all the speakers out. Sounds really nice though with my Mesa Mk3 amps.

    Thanks, man. Even after all these years there are so many things I don't know about all this stuff.


    The only Marshall cab I have (couldn't bear to sell it in the Great Post-Kemper Amp Purge) is a newer 1960A from the 90s with V30s. I haven't run full stacks since the 70s but now I wish I'd also bought the B cab so I could hear the difference.


    And yeah, sometimes it's more fun to just enjoy the magic than trying to understand the magic. :)

    Kemper remote -> Powered toaster -> Yamaha DXR-10

  • I'm very interested: Do you have experience with a real Plexi and Greenbacks? How does the imprint compare to your ears?

    no. Although I had a vintage 1960A cab with pre-rola greenbacks I only ever used it with my Mesa’s. My main amp for most of that time was a Rev G Dual Rectifier. To be honest I never liked the combination of the Recto and the Greenbacks so the cabinet actually sat in a cupboard for nearly a decade. I sold it about 8 years ago so any experience/recollection I may have is definitely clouded by the passage of time.

  • Hi Wheresthedug! I'm actually aware of things you mentioned here but it's a very good summary of things I still sometimes forget. In this particular situation though I found the difference between the profile and what the speaker produces bigger than with other profiles. I feel I have taught my ears a bit to understand what the sound differences are that I should expect. But again, there are profiles sounding closer comparing headphones/Kabinet output than this one. As I often say, it feels like it's a different EQ curve. Knowing how much people talk on the internet about old Greenbacks, new Greenbacks, broken in or not, Alnico or made in China - no two speakers will sound perfectly alike.


    All that being said, I changed the way I EQ now. With Marshall-like amps I now take out bass and add some mids to get back the bottom end. Knowing this is how many Marshalls got used in the past it actually made the Greenback imprint much softer to my ears (softer meaning less fizzy). Now I find the imprint fits well with the profile, only lacking some oomph (guess that's the Kabinet).


    I'm very interested: Do you have experience with a real Plexi and Greenbacks? How does the imprint compare to your ears?

    Coming back at you, my Waza speaker sounds tame in comparison to the greenbacks, but the 212 kone with greenbacks imprints, sound like a greenback to my ears on the plexi profile from the 2020. I wish they where a bit smoother on the high end, but it sounds like a greenback 95%. Might be bad synergy. What I found is, for getting that smoothness I like, a lowpass filter works wonders, as mostly the things I dont like, come from the high end of the spectrum. And for the mids, I just use the main EQ, its sounding great to me. I forgot to record, but to be honest, I got lazy. And I still find the V30 unbereably harsh for my ears, but greenbacks with a bit tweaking are great.

    The answer is 42

  • lonestargtr when are you going to release new amps packs?

    That is a good question indeed. I assure you all I have been working. I can't keep up with ToneJunkie's pace. I'm not sure if it's because I'm older or my kids are older or just the current state of the industry. Lonestar's original singer left (again) in February so that began about a month of finding a replacement, rehearsing, doing a couple of shows, and then we were off again for two months. My son is graduating high school today (a valedictorian, no thanks to me) so there's just a ton of stuff going on at home.


    I have also been on a bit of a tone search as well. I'm always looking for unique amps that I haven't profiled yet and have found a handful and profiled them. It's getting harder to find things that are different enough from what I've already done to make it worth the process of buying/selling and the time and cost that entails. Gear, especially amps, seem to be moving much slower nowadays.


    Last year, right as everything was shutting down, I converted my live rig from the toaster with some pedals in the fx loop to a pedalboard setup with the same pedals but with the Stage unit. This was just before the Kemper Drives came out and I just thought that the real overdrive pedals added a "girth" to the sound, not so much a tonal difference from the Kemper Drives. Perhaps it's just a slight volume bump with the real pedals, but I'm not sure. Also, I used a handful of different amp profiles but ended up using the same CAB section for all of them (magic cab) to keep the bottom end from shifting too much from rig to rig. The magic cab has a big bottom so anything not on magic cab seems to lose low end. All this to say that I've been experimenting at home the last few days with some new profiles of my favorite amps and making some merged rigs to try out in the upcoming shows. I won't know if it's a total success until I get hear them in a band mix, but I've actually been really excited about some of these new rigs. In the past I've not been as fond of the merged rigs but I wasn't merging them with a "favorite" cab, just whatever I was profiling with that day. The results then didn't sound different enough and there was something "detached" sounding whereas the studio rigs sounded smooth and "together" (perhaps purely in my head?). But since I was swapping the CAB anyway, I thought I'd try it and I'm currently enjoying the results.


    What's the difference? Well, to me, it's a "bigness" to the note. Single notes don't sound as compressed and overall, it just sounds bigger than it's studio counterpart. And I've profiled so many times using the same mics/cabs/etc and some days just sound better than others. Using magic cab preset has just been working for me and has a tonality that I find pleasing. The low end can be a bit much with some profiles, but nothing I can't tweak around.


    *Keep in mind, this is all just my journey to create rigs/performances for our live shows coming up. If I'm just recording, for instance, I have no problem using the stock studio profiles. When recording, it's all about finding the tone that fits in the track. For live shows, especially when switching from clean to dirty rigs, everything needs to sit in the same ballpark tonally, and keeping the cab the same definitely helps. And many times in our show, it's just guitar/bass/drums so my guitar needs to fill a bit of space. Other times, there is a piano with a healthy bottom, but I still need to fill that up when he stops. It's just finding the right tool for the job.


    I will probably release some new packs in the near future, but really want to do some road testing and I have more work to do on some others. Thanks for your patience!

  • Congrats to your son! It's always gratifying when they succeed despite being related to musicians. :)

    Last year, right as everything was shutting down, I converted my live rig from the toaster with some pedals in the fx loop to a pedalboard setup with the same pedals but with the Stage unit. This was just before the Kemper Drives came out and I just thought that the real overdrive pedals added a "girth" to the sound, not so much a tonal difference from the Kemper Drives. Perhaps it's just a slight volume bump with the real pedals, but I'm not sure.

    One of my go to profiles of yours is a Friedman with a Klon in front. The Friedmans in general sound excellent, but this one is special to me. I know you often do versions with Klon, Timmy, etc. so maybe you've already covered all the ground there is to cover. However, if you've been liking the sound of real overdrive pedals up front I wonder if there's enough variation / value in a batch of profiles along the theme of "real overdrive pedals in front" above and beyond what you normally do.

    Kemper remote -> Powered toaster -> Yamaha DXR-10

  • ... All this to say that I've been experimenting at home the last few days with some new profiles of my favorite amps and making some merged rigs to try out in the upcoming shows. I won't know if it's a total success until I get hear them in a band mix, but I've actually been really excited about some of these new rigs. In the past I've not been as fond of the merged rigs but I wasn't merging them with a "favorite" cab, just whatever I was profiling with that day. The results then didn't sound different enough and there was something "detached" sounding whereas the studio rigs sounded smooth and "together" (perhaps purely in my head?). But since I was swapping the CAB anyway, I thought I'd try it and I'm currently enjoying the results...

    I don't know if I got it right. That's why I am asking. With "merged", you mean combining a (new) direct amp profile with your favourite Kemper cab? In this case it is definitely not a merged profile. Or maybe I don't understand?

  • I don't know if I got it right. That's why I am asking. With "merged", you mean combining a (new) direct amp profile with your favourite Kemper cab? In this case it is definitely not a merged profile. Or maybe I don't understand?

    In my understanding, any time you do a direct amp profile and "merge" it with a cab it is a merged profile. In the past, I've done them alongside the studio profile of the same amp and I wasn't as crazy about those. The merging process can only happen with a direct amp profile. When you add a cab to it, you hit the "merge cab" button, thus creating the merged profile. As I use one of 2 cabs most of the time, most of my cabs have a certain similarity but the amp in a studio profile does affect the cab portion of the studio profile. As such, I've created thousands of cabs even though it's probably only 1-2 cabs. The magic cab is simply one of those that I find works with most profiles. That is not to say that any IR would work as well with direct amp profiles. It would probably take a lot of trial and error til finding what you like, but so many options are out there these days.

  • Congrats to the valedictorian!

    Take all the time you need mate. Always appreciated.

  • In my understanding, any time you do a direct amp profile and "merge" it with a cab it is a merged profile. In the past, I've done them alongside the studio profile of the same amp and I wasn't as crazy about those. The merging process can only happen with a direct amp profile. When you add a cab to it, you hit the "merge cab" button, thus creating the merged profile. As I use one of 2 cabs most of the time, most of my cabs have a certain similarity but the amp in a studio profile does affect the cab portion of the studio profile. As such, I've created thousands of cabs even though it's probably only 1-2 cabs. The magic cab is simply one of those that I find works with most profiles. That is not to say that any IR would work as well with direct amp profiles. It would probably take a lot of trial and error til finding what you like, but so many options are out there these days.

    It is ONLY a merged profile (by Kemper definition) if you make a studio profile first. Then make direct amp profile with the same cab connected to the amp and don't change any settings. Then you load the studio profile and copy THIS cab (no other cab or IR, only this). Next you load the direct amp profile and paste this exact cab. Now you hit the merge button and saved it as a merged profile.


    No cabdriver algorithmn at work now, but a clean separation between the direct amp and the cab from the corresponding (!) studio profile.


    Everything else simply is not a merged profile! Hitting the merge button with any / another cab will lead to completely wrong results! If you just copy an IR or another Kemper cab to a direct amp profile you just should save it (not hitting merge button in this case). But again, just copying random cabs to random direct amp profiles is NOT merged profiles! And would be (unintentionally) misleading buyers.

  • It is ONLY a merged profile (by Kemper definition) if you make a studio profile first. Then make direct amp profile with the same cab connected to the amp and don't change any settings. Then you load the studio profile and copy THIS cab (no other cab or IR, only this). Next you load the direct amp profile and paste this exact cab. Now you hit the merge button and saved it as a merged profile.


    No cabdriver algorithmn at work now, but a clean separation between the direct amp and the cab from the corresponding (!) studio profile.


    Everything else simply is not a merged profile! Hitting the merge button with any / another cab will lead to completely wrong results! If you just copy an IR or another Kemper cab to a direct amp profile you just should save it (not hitting merge button in this case). But again, just copying random cabs to random direct amp profiles is NOT merged profiles! And would be (unintentionally) misleading buyers.

    That seems to be a pretty strict definition of a Merged profile and I'm not attempting to sell any such profiles, anyway. And as for completely wrong results... I respectfully beg to differ. And just saving a cab to a direct profile does not sound good. It works fine for doing that with studio profiles, but just adding a cab to a direct profile, at least the way I've been doing it the last few days, just sounds wrong.


    I'm not saying that this is the recommended way of doing things, nor am I saying that the manual is wrong (of course it's not). I'm just saying that I am getting great results for myself by doing this. It was an experiment to see if it worked and for me, it did. I do not know everything there is to know about the cabdriver algorithm, but there is absolutely no way that the direct amp profile "knows" what cab is being added to it, be it from the studio profile or another studio profile.

  • so there's just a ton of stuff going on at home.

    Family first. That's a good one and such an important focus in these days.


    It's getting harder to find things that are different enough from what I've already done to make it worth the process of buying/selling and the time and cost that entails.

    That's my thinking as well as I bought almost all of your packs and find myself often going back into some of them finding new gems which I hadn't too much on my radar in the past. So there's still a lot to discover. Can imagine it is not easy to find as much interesting stuff looking at what already is there unless you want to start to re-profile some amps you already have done in the past.


    One little request from my side could be new and improved profiles of the Belchy Bombs you have done long time ago. Those are so unique and only such a little handful of profiles is there. Still one of my absolute go-tos for the rock stuff besides the incredible 5153s from the CnG pack.


    Thanks for your work Michael, really inspiring stuff :thumbup:8)

  • That seems to be a pretty strict definition of a Merged profile and I'm not attempting to sell any such profiles, anyway. And as for completely wrong results... I respectfully beg to differ. And just saving a cab to a direct profile does not sound good. It works fine for doing that with studio profiles, but just adding a cab to a direct profile, at least the way I've been doing it the last few days, just sounds wrong.


    I'm not saying that this is the recommended way of doing things, nor am I saying that the manual is wrong (of course it's not). I'm just saying that I am getting great results for myself by doing this. It was an experiment to see if it worked and for me, it did. I do not know everything there is to know about the cabdriver algorithm, but there is absolutely no way that the direct amp profile "knows" what cab is being added to it, be it from the studio profile or another studio profile.

    Congratulations on your son's graduation. Sorry to hear about your singer leaving the band. That's always a pain in the butt.

    lonestargtr what is the Magic Cab?? Never heard of this.

    Rik


    Kemper toaster >Kemper remote> 2 x Alto TS310 powered speakers Furman M-8XAR

  • Congratulations on your son's graduation. Sorry to hear about your singer leaving the band. That's always a pain in the butt.

    lonestargtr what is the Magic Cab?? Never heard of this.

    Thanks. It was a cab preset I included in the 2020 pack. There was a time a while back when I was trying to figure out why some profiles sounded bigger and different from others, so I started experimenting with swapping cabs to try to "fix" some profiles that I wasn't as big a fan of because they sounded cloudy or muffled. I found that sometimes swapping the cabs fixed them. In my experimentation I found a cab from one of my most-used live profiles and just started adding it to other presets that I didn't like as much. Most of the time I felt it improved them, so I just saved the cab as "magic cab" as a preset so I could get to it quicker. I had actually saved a few different ones, but this one in particular got more use. It's strictly a personal taste thing, but I like it.

  • That seems to be a pretty strict definition of a Merged profile and I'm not attempting to sell any such profiles, anyway. And as for completely wrong results... I respectfully beg to differ. And just saving a cab to a direct profile does not sound good. It works fine for doing that with studio profiles, but just adding a cab to a direct profile, at least the way I've been doing it the last few days, just sounds wrong.


    I'm not saying that this is the recommended way of doing things, nor am I saying that the manual is wrong (of course it's not). I'm just saying that I am getting great results for myself by doing this. It was an experiment to see if it worked and for me, it did. I do not know everything there is to know about the cabdriver algorithm, but there is absolutely no way that the direct amp profile "knows" what cab is being added to it, be it from the studio profile or another studio profile.

    Don't get me wrong - if something sounds good, it is good. And I really like your profiles, bought most of them already.


    But people still think sellers of profiles have all the knowledge about the Kemper - at least know the basics.

    If you don't figured out the concept of (real!) merged profiles, what cab driver is doing, ... you should really catch up. It is worth to understand it.


    When you make studio profiles and tailor your tone with your mics until you like it. Now when you take this cab, of course it is not predictable how it will sound with a direct amp profile of another amp (or the same amp with different settings). Cab driver just estimates where the amp part ends and the cab starts. If you just copy that to another direct amp profile you are copying a cab that may still include a different flavour of power amp, is missing the deep resonance from the original because you balanced it with mics and now it sounds thin, ...


    Hitting the merged button in this case just is another random element and is definitely not intended for this scenario. We are now far away from anything "authentic" or capturing the real thing. Really!


    THAT is exactly why Kemper developed the real (!) merge procedure. That works and gives authentic results, when done right as written above.


    If you just want to copy IR to direct amp profiles and don't want to rely on luck or try and error to get authentic results, you have to capture those IR in a different way. (Hitting merge button still is not a solution at all). So it is possible to do direct amp profiles + IR / cab that sounds good and (almost) authentic, but it requires a quite different approach (for both parts) than doing studio profiles.

  • Thanks for the condescending tone. I have made plenty of merged profiles the "right" way and wasn't knocked out by them. Perhaps I'm just an idiot, like you imply. I never said, "do it this way". I just said I did it this way and I like it. As far as your opinion of how I get the tones I like for myself, I kinda don't care, but I do get offended when you imply that I'm stupid for not knowing better. Please move on.