Recording Tracks You Play On Your Kemper

  • Hello Kemper forum - I love my Kemper and the profiles I've accumulated (rarely use my tube amps anymore!) My "use case" is essentially recording tracks (Kemper to Presonus Quantum to Logic Pro X) that are going to be used on various streaming releases (iTunes/Spotify/etc.).


    I love the sounds/tones I've been able to get! I'm curious - what tips and tricks can anyone offer for plugins that they use on their guitar tracks (EQ, compression, etc.) to really get them to sit properly in the mix and do them justice?


    I play indie/post-punk rock, so it varies quite a bit in terms of tone and intensity. Thanks in advance for sharing your thoughts!

    -Rob

  • Hey man, I don’t really use much post Kemper stuff but I do record a D.I. Track for re amping. This allows me to change delays, reverbs and amps down the line if they don’t sit so well in the finished track.

    A brace of Suhrs, a Charvel, a toaster, an Apollo twin, a Mac, and a DXR10

  • My tip is to use your "built-in plug-in" : your ears :)

    There´s no magic tricks to get a good mix. It all depends

    on what other instruments and frequencies you are

    "fighting" against to get a nice spot in the spectrum of sound :wacko:

    Sometimes a really "ugly" guitar sound fits perfect in the mix ......

    A good plug-in though would be a 3-band compressor for "mastering" :thumbup:


    There´s probably as many ways to do it that there will be opinions

    on what I just said ..... Do I care ? Nooooo 8o


    If it sound good to you, it´s probably good enough ........ :/

    ( You bought a Kemper and like it, so I guess your ears works good )


    Cheers !

    The adjective for metal is metallic. But not so for iron ... which is ironic.

  • Well EQ is a must for mixing. In theory high and lowpass filter should be enough, but in reality, not enough. How, well it depends on the song. No one can tell you do this and that and it will sound good. It all depends on the sound(profile in this case), guitar and pickup(s)you use. I guess you already have a DAW and the stock plugins will do both for EQ and compression. If you need compression, well it may depend on your goal with a song, profiles used. Oh, and a quite expensive third party plugin so many pro use is soothe. It's kind of a dynamic EQ.

    Think for yourself, or others will think for you wihout thinking of you

    Henry David Thoreau

  • Hi


    How I mix rock and hard rock music to provide power is:


    Create 2 buss tracks, I call them Guitar Main and Guitar PP (parallel processing)

    On your audio track route them to the Guitar Main and Guitar PP buss

    On both those tracks cut the low end with a filter to remove any rumbling


    Turn the volume down on the Guitar PP track whilst recording and playing back and keep it there until you have all your guitars sounding good in the mix.

    On the Guitar Main add a bit of light compression to glue the tracks together


    When you are happy with your recorded guitar tracks:


    Adjust the compressor until your are happy with the Guitar Main

    On the Guitar PP put a hard compressor and compress the crap out of it, use extreme settings.

    Use a compressor that allows you to EQ the signal too but if you don't have one add one before and after the compressor and remove the low and high end so you are only compressing the mid range.

    Once it is compressed start to turn it up until you can hear it thicken the guitar then turn it down a little.


    To do this I use Fabfilter or the WAVES renaissance Compressors. Prefer the Waves but it requires an eq. For eq the stock plugins in Cubase are good but I again prefer Fabfilter as you can do an eq matching.


    One thing that will happen when you do this is the drums can become weak sounding so do the same process on drums too. This also works great on Bass, in fact anything.


    Sorry this was a convoluted explanation but to be honest I spent so long trying to eq and compress and use loads of plugins to get guitars to work and in the end this was the least complex option that worked for me without battling with downward changes when you adjust something first in the chain.


    I agree with both comments above, you can't be directed to what sounds best but you can have a standard way to do things. In regard to plugins don't go with 1 vender, there are loads of quality plugins that are free and not all plugins by all providers are good so pick and mix. Ones that generally get good reviews are Waves (cheap), Fabfilter (mixing) and Soundtoys (sound sculpuring)


    One thing I do and was mentioned above is Reamp as it is frustrating to capture a great performance to only find the amp does not sit in the mix.


    I have never used Logic so I am unsure what the stock plugins are like.


    Regards


    Mike

  • I have some quick tipps, perhaps they are useful. They can work but not in every situation.

    - Use a DI track for editing. It's much easier to see where the pick hits the strings in the DI track as in the amp track.

    - More distortion means less compression is needed because the distortion of the amplifier has also a compressing effect.

    - Sometimes a basic limiter can work wonders on the guitar just to tame the highest peaks.

    - If there is some annoying whistle in the sound roll the areas off with an EQ with a high Q factor just to get rid of this single frequencies. This works also really well with a dynamic equalizer.

    - Too much bass or too hot palm mutes can be tamed with a multiband compressor only working in the bass area