How much do you like to change the EQ on a commercial profile

  • So, the title basically says it all, but I’ll tell you where I’m at. I started using iZotope Ozone EQ Match, to match my tone to the clean intro of SRV’s Little Wing. As I’m sure you’re familiar with the song, you know it is BRIGHT, lots of presence. I’m playing through my Suhr Classic S, playing through ToneJukies cleanest and brightest profiles of the Dumble Steel String Singer and a Blackface Vibroverb So my gear is as right as it can be, but damn the EQ Match makes the regular EQ sound so dark and flat. Of course ToneJunkie probably didn’t have the EQ set to Little Wing when they profiled it.


    All that to say, to get my EQ even close to what it needs to be to sound Like the recording and my EQ Match, i head to literally adjust the Presence all the way, and I feel a little weird. Tbh, I’m not sure why. I guess in my mind I’m subconsciously thinking that this is “ruining” the integrity of the profile?


    Does anyone feel kinda weird making extreme changes to the EQ of their profiles?

  • This is one of the reasons I have yet to buy a commercial profile. I hear lots of buyers EQing up and down. It's the same I do with the free profiles. But in the end, it's up to your to make it sound good. Purchasing power alone is not going to make it happen so trust your ears and not the settings. Crank that Presence to 11! I just want to hear good tone.

    Larry Mar @ Lonegun Studios. Neither one famous yet.

  • Usually those drastic EQ change tells me I'm not quite using the profile the way it was intended to when it was created, which is not necessarily a bad thing, but I'd rather get another profile that's closer already to what I need for that situation. Especially with the highs... I feel cranking those up to make it sound good at low volume is a rookie mistake. For example, many people whine that M Britt's sounds are too dark and muffled but while they probably wouldn't be my go to for recording as is, I found they have huge body/tone at gig volume and sit well in the live mix with minimal adjustment.

  • I think trying to duplicate a tone is a difficult task at best. Even if you had the exact same equipment setting in front of you, you would have to recreate the room, microphone placement, player and post recording production to get the tone right. I think you can get in the neighborhood with the profiles of the amp and add the effects you want, but to match a tone I think is going to extremely difficult.


    If you feel that cranking the presence gets you in that ballpark, I say do it. The EQ is there for altering the tone and it allows you to adjust up. Something I heard someone say comes to mind. If it sounds good, it is good. If is sounds like shite, it is shite.

  • For me it depends on the purpose. For Live I always use an EQ-Preset based on TJ. For me most of the profiles lack appropriate mids. They sound awesome on their own but hard to hear at rehearsal.
    I do not think that one should feel guilty by tweaking. The main issue is that one does not have the same guitar used dialing in the tone and second one does not have the same speakers being used to monitor the tone. So hard to achieve the same results anyway.

  • If I need to tweak just a tiny amount of little more presence or treble, fine. If I need to lower bass, becuase too many high gain profiles have waaay too much bass that won't work in a mix but cool on its own, fine. If I need to lower the gain becuase most high gain profiles have waaay too much gain, fine. If I need to tweak too much, forget it. Then there are other better profiles for me.

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

    Henry David Thoreau

  • If I need to tweak just a tiny amount of little more presence or treble, fine. If I need to lower bass, becuase too many high gain profiles have waaay too much bass that won't work in a mix but cool on its own, fine. If I need to lower the gain becuase most high gain profiles have waaay too much gain, fine. If I need to tweak too much, forget it. Then there are other better profiles for me.

    By that I should have sold my KPA. I have found none that fits my needs without adding mids. Most of the profiles are too scooped. I remember my former band mate having a custom amp by felleretta and all he did was tweaking studio sounds. And although he had way more Watts no one could hear a single note from him. It took me ages to get him to the midrange knob.
    And to sum it up I bhought hundreds of profiles and tried another hundred from RM. But that relates mostly to high gain profiles.

  • I would like to ask to all commercial profilers to leave all frequencies during the profiling process, and use the kemper equalizer to cut the frequencies they don't like.

    I think a frequency cut off at the source is lost forever.

    IMHO.

  • By that I should have sold my KPA. I have found none that fits my needs without adding mids. Most of the profiles are too scooped. I remember my former band mate having a custom amp by felleretta and all he did was tweaking studio sounds. And although he had way more Watts no one could hear a single note from him. It took me ages to get him to the midrange knob.
    And to sum it up I bhought hundreds of profiles and tried another hundred from RM. But that relates mostly to high gain profiles.

    Maybe you should get some other pickups with more mids. There are free and commercial profiles with enough of mids to cut thru.

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

    Henry David Thoreau

  • Maybe you should get some other pickups with more mids. There are free and commercial profiles with enough of mids to cut thru.

    I bought Harry Häussel PUs. Rock and Blues is not a Problem with them. Via tube amp a real dream. Kemper seems to be different (not worse or better just different).


    I would be pleased if you could recommend some free profiles. Deadlight, Choptones, Guido, TMS, SinMix,… did not bring me there.

  • For me it depends on the purpose. For Live I always use an EQ-Preset based on TJ. For me most of the profiles lack appropriate mids. They sound awesome on their own but hard to hear at rehearsal.
    I do not think that one should feel guilty by tweaking. The main issue is that one does not have the same guitar used dialing in the tone and second one does not have the same speakers being used to monitor the tone. So hard to achieve the same results anyway.

    I agree, getting the good midrange for live with the kemper is rather difficult...


    What EQ preset are you applying? Would help me a lot.

    Thanxs

  • By that I should have sold my KPA. I have found none that fits my needs without adding mids. Most of the profiles are too scooped. I remember my former band mate having a custom amp by felleretta and all he did was tweaking studio sounds. And although he had way more Watts no one could hear a single note from him. It took me ages to get him to the midrange knob.
    And to sum it up I bhought hundreds of profiles and tried another hundred from RM. But that relates mostly to high gain profiles.

    I feel the same here...

    that missing midrange is hard to tweak, any eq I apply seems not enough and then it completely change the tone of the profile.


    I just need a hot Marshall (1959 with more gain, 80’ rock sound) and it so painful to nearly get the « tone » of the amp but without the classic Marshall midrange that cut the mix :(


    If others can help, it would be great.

    I use a custom made one piece body mahogany telecaster with Sh4 bridge pup, never had any problem with punch and midrange before

  • There's not a single profile that I haven't managed to improve by adjusting the stack EQ - unless it was profiled using your exact pickups, it's unlikely to be spot on as is. The stack EQ does a very good job, even though it doesn't operate exactly like an amp EQ. However I find if you have to adjust anything much more than about 1.0 in any direction (maybe a bit more sometimes with bass roll-off), it's probably best to search for a different profile. I never use the Kemper's studio EQ, but only because it's fiddly to set, and if I need more precise EQ'ing I'll do it in my DAW.


    As for EQ presets... unless designed for a specific pickup/profile combo, unlikely to be much use...