Profiler Stage Connections - Overdriven Guitars Sound Fizzy and Digital, but Sound Great through a Cab

    Hey cats. I know that this must have been answered a dozen times somewhere but I can't seem to find a good resolution.


    When I run my Profiler Stage through a Seymour Duncan Power Stage 170 and into a Marshall 1960 Lead 4x12 cab, it sounds pretty fantastic. Low to loud, I can get a satisfying tone out of it. The problem comes when I try to record with it. Overdriven guitars come out sounding thin and fuzzy. You know that digital clipping kind of sound? Well, that's what's going on. Input signal is not too hot and not clipping so that doesn't appear to be the issue.


    My path is guitar into Kemper input --> Main Output Right XML to DIGIDesign DIGI003 (input with phantom power turned off) --> ProTools or Garageband (same issue with both DAWs). There must be some setting that gives me a great tone and removes the digital sound I have going now, but for the life of me I can't find it.


    Help! The goal of the Kemper was to let me downsize and record ferocious tones at bedroom volumes but right now I'm not feeling the Kemper tone love (unless I play loud and proud through a cab, that is).


    Thanks

    Make sure you have the cabinets turned on in the Rigs you are using, so they are present in the Main Outputs.


    In the Output Menu, you can turn off the Monitor Cab (this also turns off Cabs in the Poweramp Output. )


    If you already have things set up that way, and have edited the EQ in the Rigs to sound their best through the guitar cabinet, you have likely EQed them to not sound their best Through the Main Outputs.

    My suggestion is to use Rigs for recording that sound appropriate to you through your studio monitors, without being edited for your guitar cabinet. The unedited versions of the rigs You already use may work for you.


    If you want to be able to use the same rigs for recording as with your guitar cabinet, I suggest starting with unedited rigs that sound good to you through your studio monitors, and then using the Monitor Output EQ to globally all profiles for your guitar cabinet.

    In addition to Paul’s suggestions, make sure you aren’t overloading the inputs on the interface. Is it still applying the mic pre when using XLR? If you keep the output gain very low or swap to using the 1/4” jack output to bypass the mic pre on the interface.


    Also, if you are record in mono I would set the Main outs to Stack or Master Mono rather than just using one side of the stereo setting. If you have any stereo FX after the stack you only get half the sound using your method. For example a ping pong delay will only get the ping or the pong not both.

    Thanks paults and Wheresthedug. I will give these suggestions a try.


    I definitely tweaked the EQs to sound good with a cab. I have some recordings I did with it early on that sound pretty amazing (fuzzy in a good way), but I have been creating rigs and using those, which might be part of the issue.

    Don;t rule out duff profiles....


    I was running what I thought was a great sound into a cab. as soon as I went direct, sounded crap. Turned out my profiles were crap but I didn't know because the cab hid them..


    This might be the case...the only way to check is to test via headphones and/or direct into a PA.

    Use high pass and low pass filters when recording. If you are mixing with bass and drums, some of that top end fizziness will disappear by drum overheads and hi-hat.


    To thicken your sound, try doubling your tracks. Boost mids to push the guitar forward (foreground) in the mix and cut mids to send the guitar back (background).

    Larry Mar @ Lonegun Studios. Neither one famous yet.

    Allan,

    While im recording and i switch from guitar to bass, id rather just hit a switch to bypass the kemper so my bass can go direct to the board.

    Rather than unplugging and moving this and that to do the same thing. My other boards, you step on a switch, or use the tuner out mode and the signal is unaffected, so id get just my bass?

    As GLParrishamn and others have said. The EQ you setup sounds great on an amp etc because the speaker is rolling off the freqs above 5k.


    When I adjust my profiles, I EQ them thru my recording setup into studio monitors since I record only and never play out.


    A trick I learned along the way was to EQ the sound before the AMP section in the profiler. If you roll the highs off before the AMP you get mellower distortion with less fuzz. Then I run another EQ on the output of the CABINET to do the final EQ.


    Looking at a typical 12" speaker you will see a sharp high freq rolloff at around 4-5kHz. So I usually start with the 10kHz dialed all down and the 5kHz rolled -3 to -6 dB. Then I tweak the 2K for brightness, usually 2-3 dB works great. So you could try having this EQ setup for when you are recording and turn it off when going thru a cab/amp.


    EDIT:

    The tone you get from an amplifier is added harmonics. Say you are playing a 1kHz note on a clean amp. It will sound like a bell. When an amp gets turned up you start to hear multiples of that frequency (harmonics). So you will start to hear 1k, 2k, 3k, 4k, 5k, etc. Usually the odd harmonics are heard much louder so 1k, 3k, 5k, etc. These higher frequencies extend all the way out. So all that FIZZ you are hearing are these much higher freq harmonics. By EQing or using a speaker, you are killing off the very high freq harmonics.

    I hope some of this made sense to somebody :/

    Quote from MR hYD3

    Allan,

    While im recording and i switch from guitar to bass, id rather just hit a switch to bypass the kemper so my bass can go direct to the board.

    Rather than unplugging and moving this and that to do the same thing. My other boards, you step on a switch, or use the tuner out mode and the signal is unaffected, so id get just my bass?

    there are several ways I can think of doing this but it isn’t really the subject of this thread. I’ll reply in your other thread about this issue.

    Another thing to think about when you switch from an amp to a studio setting is where your amp is when you are dialing in sounds.


    Most people have their amps on the ground so the speaker is below you by a few feet. The higher the frequency the more directional it becomes. So when you EQ a sound on the floor, you tend to have way too much high frequency dialed in. This is because the high freqs are aimed at your feet/knees and not your ears.


    Put your head right next to the speaker for these settings and it will sound very harsh and have way too much bite.