Very poor sound with decent setup and profiles

  • Hey everyone,

    I have an issue. I want to record my first song with the Kemper Stage Profiler. The guitar sounds amazing through my Amplifi 75 that I use as a speaker, but as soon as I record the audio and listen to it through my headphones, it sounds very dry and harsh. I tried playing with EQ settings, the amplifier settings (definition, clarity, etc.) but it just doesn't sound good. When I listen to recordings of others through my headphones, it sounds great so I doubt my headphones are the reason. I start to wonder if it's the audio interface that is bad because I also never got a good sound with it when I used it for VSTs.

    This is my signal chain:
    Guitar -> Kemper -> Focusrite Scarlett Solo 2 -> PC (Cakewalk)

    I use very good profiles from Andy James.

  • 1. Check to make sure you are not clipping the input on you interface.

    2. Make sure the clock is set to 44k and spdif master.

    3. The Amplifi 75 might not be flat response. The headphones are most surely not so that will exaggerate any difference.


    You many need to dial them profiles in different for recording. Its best to do this with studio monitors as they tend to be flatter response.

  • Thanks for the input. I checked everything and all the settings are fine. I noticed that the sound through the headphones is great if I have them directly connected to the Kemper. When I use the headphones on the audio interface, the sound is terrible. Everything recorded through the Focusrite Scarlett Solo 2 sounds terrible. That's why VSTs never worked for me. Is this audio interface bad in general?

  • I can't imagine what I am doing wrong. The gain on the interface is very low so it doesn't clip. Everything is connected like seen in YouTube tutorials. Yet, the sound that comes through the interface sounds absolutely disgusting.

  • Ok, I will do tomorrow when I have time. The sound sounds very... dry. No fullness. It sounds like I connected my guitar to a 50$ amplifier. It's fuzzy and dry. With the Amplifi75 as a box, it sounds good. Bassy, full, great note seperation on complex chords. When listening to the recordings with my headphones, all this fullness is gone and it just sounds harsh to the ears.

    You'll hear what I mean tomorrow. :)

  • Or let me ask this:

    How should I approach recording a rhythm part with my Kemper and ensure that it sounds good on regular headphones? The fact that it sounds good on my speakers isn't reliable because the room vibrations add fullness to the sound and that might be misleading if with headphones, the guitar sounds so dry.

  • Sorry im a bit late to the thread but sounds like the same problem I had for years.My solution was I uninstalled asio4all (I forgot it was even installed) and then completely removed it from my pc.I then uninstalled ALL focusrite software the Re-installed the Focusrite software then restarted my PC then my kemper sounded incredible in my DAW. Good luck 👊