Quality of Kemper effects 2021?

    I know there are other posts about this in the past, but with the digital world constantly updating I wanted to get a current view.



    I'm thinking of buying a Kemper Stage and hoping it will replace my amp AND most of my pedalboard. I'm specifically looking for a small portable rig. I know the amp tones are awesome, but I'm wondering if the effects could replace my pedals. I have good quality pedals and I'm not expecting the Kemper to beat them, but if it's close then I'm happy enough, I'll keep the pedals at home for recording. Pedal-wise I use octave (POG), fuzz (Fuzz Factory), envelope filter (MXR), drive (OCD), comp (dynacomp), and delay (BOSS DD500). Those are the pedals id be hoping to replace anyway and perhaps have a small board with my remaining ones next to the Kemper. Any views or experience on the current quality of the Kemper effects? Are they comparable?

    I'm an effects junky, especially delay and reverb. I also use a lot of POG like high/low octave to make my leads and such sound organ-like. For me, Kemper nails delay, reverb, and octave. I'm more of an amp distortion person, but I think their green scream drive is an excellent boost.


    Another thing you can do with the Kemper that you can't with single pedals is stack them and put them in different orders per preset. So maybe if you want a real lush ambient wash, you can have a delay and reverb before your amp, and another delay and reverb after. Or maybe you wanna stack 2 different types drives before your amp, but have one footswitch to turn them both on at the same time.


    I'll put their delay and reverb up against the best boutique pedals any day. To me, the Kemper delays and verbs have lots of unique character that I didn't find with the a Fractal FM3 I owned (I owned 2 actually).


    If anything could use some improvement, maybe it's the fuzzes? But maybe I'm just not a fuzz person. The Kemper fuzzes tend to lean more vintage which isn't my jam.


    My advice would be to buy one from somewhere with a good return policy. Check it out, experiment with the effects, and don't be afraid to really really tweak things to see what happens. If you don't like it, return it and keep the pedals.


    Or....


    Buy one, use it with the built in effects you like, and keep some of your pedals to use with it.

    So far, the only kemper effects I have not bonded with is their Compressor and their Acoustic sim. Everything else is covered rather well.


    Welcome to the Party!

    Larry Mar @ Lonegun Studios. Neither one famous yet.

    Like 3

    That's great feedback, thanks! The drives were my least concern because I'm an amp drive person myself (I use the OCD with a Fender amp currently as my main drive option, but obviously something like a good Marshall tone will blow that out of the water).


    I'm really happy to hear the octave is high quality as that was one of my main concerns. Nothing digital I've tried has lived up to the POG yet. I'll still be keeping it, but it'd be nice to mainly leave it at home for recording and use the Kemper live.


    Have you tried the filter/auto wah stuff much yet?

    Thinking more about this - maybe a better question to ask yourself is can the Kemper sound as good with its own flavor as your pedals. Can you get it to sound exactly the same in a blind listening test? Probably not. But does what you gain in convenience and ease of use outweigh any advantages the pedals might have? I would say it's a good chance you'll think so.

    Oh yeah I'm not at all concerned with it sounding the exact same, good is good regardless of similarity. As long as the effects are of high enough quality in the first place then I'm fine with them being a slightly different flavour :)

    The Kemper has the OCD pedal already plus too many others. I still would rather have Keeley Compressor though and for my pedalboard (which I have not touched in over 6 months).

    Larry Mar @ Lonegun Studios. Neither one famous yet.

    Does the Kemper have an auto-wah/envelope filter effect? I have not seen one but not have not really looked either. Would be super nice for solos etc. ( I dont like to learn everything about it instantly. Takes all the fun out of playing with it)

    The drives, reverbs, and delays have received some very nice updates. And the new fuzz is pretty darn good for a digital fuzz.


    I think the modulation effects are ok, but they need an update as well imo.

    Quote from mooncat84

    The compressor isn't great eh? Hmm I still plan to bring a Zoia out live, so I guess I can get more detailed compression from it, so not a deal breaker.

    I’m not a fan of the Compressor but thats because it is modelled on the Ross and MXR Dynacomp style pedals which I hate. As you currently have a Dynacomp it might be right up your street though.

    Kemper has always been seen as the "poor cousin" when it comes to effects compared to Ax and Helix, but the changes recently have generally been greeted very positively.


    Im not a pedal person anyway but I think the only other issue to consider is that the effects generally are parameter based - i.e. not modelled on specific pedals ( there are some presets though). This is positive and negative - positive because there are many flavours and flex, negative because you might have to spend more time dialing in.


    Also do consider ( as mentioned) the convenience factor is massive....no separate power banks/front of stage plugs, issues with true bypass/buffers, not all pedals have presets, switching on multiple effects with press of one button etc.

    I am a tube amp and pedal guy. The amp I have been gigging with for the past 5+ years is a custom version of a Fender Vibrolux circuit with 2x10s in it. I bought my Kemper Stage right about a year ago. I have not been disappointed at all. I profiled my amp by itself as well as with a few individual pedals in front of it like I use live and it really did a good job of capturing the tones.


    I would echo the suggestion of buying one from some place with a good return policy. That way if you don't like it you can return it. Another thing I will recommend that I wish I knew about before I bought mine is that you can get one from British Audio and have it loaded with a bunch of MBritt or Tone Junkie profiles at no extra cost. That is a huge bonus. Both of those profile makers are very well known and liked. If you didn't know, MBritt is the guitar player for the band Lonestar and he uses his Kemper and profiles live all the time. He is also on this forum. Sweetwater used to knock some off of the price if you call them. That is where I bought mine. I bought the Kemper stage and the gig bag for it at the same time. They gave me a good deal on it.

    Quote from RosboneMako

    Does the Kemper have an auto-wah/envelope filter effect? I have not seen one but not have not really looked either. Would be super nice for solos etc. ( I dont like to learn everything about it instantly. Takes all the fun out of playing with it)

    As Nicky says, the short answer is yes. The longer answer is that as with a lot of Kemper things, they throw it all into one effect with lots of different parameters that need to be tweaked. You'll need to tweak eight different parameters to dial it in.