Hi i have mine almost 4 months and still learning and discovering new features and it is a very powerful gear indeed i already profiled my tube amp, sounds very good, also recorded some stuff direct in line and with a phanton power condenser mic my ears still getting used to the nuances of the parameters
regarding the fire ant, i do hope that it disintegrate too, i have a 3 years old son and he touched the kemper with chocolate hands... that caused the issue : )
thank you guys
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Than you are way ahead of me. Sounds like you are on your way.
Chocolate hands? Ouch! Time to lock up the studio. My little one is in College now, but I remember those days.
Fire ant, huh? I had those horrible things when I lived in Florida. Back in New York now. Too cold for them! It should eventually rot and disintegrate.
I've had my rack for two weeks now. Already deep into it. Love it!
I was the Doc. Man, this seems like ages ago. But these were great times nonetheless. And the Vetta II was exciting.
Doc!, of course...Vetta section. Resident expert...if I remember right.
Glad to be back with you guys! Starting to feel like home again. I wonder what happened to Kevin up in Canada?...you know he coined the expression "fizz", remember? It became a huge headache for L6, and is still a descriptive word used today. Funny $#!+.
Sorry to take this thread on another tangent, but how do you like the Switchblade, Phil? I'm looking at picking up a Triamp, heard so much about H&K amps, but it seems they don't get as much love as other companies.
No problem, nightlight. The Triamp is a great amp, although there are so many choices today. That may be part of the reason they don't seem as popular. The Switchblade is a bit different sounding. The first two "Funeral for a Friend" CD's showcased the Switchblade sound pretty well. I also believe early Breaking Benjamin recordings used them. It was the first MIDI programmable tube amp where all the settings get saved, so I went for that feature. I like the Lead voice and Ultra voice. Crunch? Not enough "crunch", but somewhat low-gain Fenderish sounding. Clean voice? Not enough compression (could be externally added). But the Lead voice rolls back for nice cleans with as much (or little) breakup as you want. Tone controls DO make a difference, so once you find what you like you save it, and then try different variations and compare. I created several core tones that worked for just about everything clean to crushing I ever wanted to do. Someday I hope to profile mine for my 6 or 7 favorite settings. I need better mics and a decent preamp before I can do that.
I was on the L6 Forum, too. So was @Ingolf, but I’ll let him tell you he User name he had back then.
It was a fun time, no doubt. So much "passion". Even Peter Thorn was there. Armin too. I wish I could remember everyone I regularly interfaced with. You know..."the old gray matter ain't what she used to be...".
Maybe we could take this to my intro thread. Again...don't want to hijack this thread.
Yeah, when I last talked to Mike about Kemper (back when it came out), he went to Axe. Roger went back to tubes with a Marshall hand-wired 100W JH head and ISO Cab. Have not heard from anyone else.
Well my ears still hear the difference. Typical 500 Hz annoying midrange and unnatural top-end buzz. Though "fizz" seems to have been somewhat tamed. No doubt the "tone" can sound good. I've heard that. I just don't hear what sounds real out of modelers. Since I went back to tubes, I re-discovered the joys of low gain breakup...not just crushing "Recto" high-gain sounds anymore. With Kemper, sitting in front of my studio monitors sounds and feels the same as sitting in front of my tube amp and 4x12 cab. I honestly cant tell the difference. Exactly what I always wanted!
Don't want to hijack here, but glad you reached out. E-mail me if you remember my address. I might still have your address saved. Probably do.
I was "on the fence" for many years thinking the same thing...maybe a new and improved version was just around the corner. That didn't happen. But after hearing well done profiles of great amp tones against the real amps used to make those profiles...and not hearing a difference...I finally dove in. And I'm so glad I did and absolutely love this thing.
Agree on the resale point if it did actually happen, but why come out with a new version if the sound is already there? Nothing to gain IMO.
Hey, PHILBERT .... Are you THE Philbert from the Line6 forums so, so long ago?
Hey Karl!
Yes! How are you doing? Long time!
In my intro post, I mentioned the old Line 6 Forum days and had hoped my old friends were here. How could they not be here? We were all trying so hard to make "real-sounding" guitar tones with that stuff. Obviously you discovered the "real deal" of the Kemper. Took me a long time to come back off of real tube amps after that struggling "simulation" era with Line 6. Skipped all the "modelers" after that experience. Some well done profile demos with the full tone I like to hear finally sold me on Kemper. I'm totally blown away. Dream (finally) come true! And no more need to EQ anything with the ol' DEQ2496.
So, do you know if any of the old gang is here? Mike? Derick? Hans? Roger?
I gotta learn how to program/setup this damn footswitch... this is the most AMAZINg gear EVER!!!
holy crap i love this thing.
Welcome!
Glad you finally got a working unit. I'm new too, and in very short order learned to edit, store, program and move stuff around with ease (copy and paste is such a great utility and time saver). One of the most intuitive pieces of kit I've ever worked on.
Even assigning stomps or effects to the Remote is super simple. Just push on the desired footswitch and press the stomp/effect you want to assign on the Profiler. Done! You can even add a second additional effect to one footswitch position by doing the same proceedure. And the Looper button can be used as a fifth on/off footswitch control for Effect "X" if you change the global option. Bonus!
And after you get a Performance patch saved with all the stomps and effects, and want to maybe make a lead boost version of the same but slightly modified, copy the original and paste it to another footswitch position on the remote, then make the necessary adjustments and save the Performance again. Done! Couldn't be any easier. After setting all five Performance footswitches, then go back and edit the names. I wish Kemper had USB keyboard support for naming stuff instead of twisting knobs, but it's not too bad with the auto-advance cursor feature.
EDIT: OMG! I just plugged in a USB keyboard and it works! Couldn't find that in the reference manual when I searched "keyboard". I'm super glad that works! Bonus! (another one)
One of the profiles I purchased sounded nothing like the demo that sold me on it, even though I used the same guitar and tried everything I had to get mine to sound at least similar in tone. Once I turned off the global Pure Cab, the tone got very close to the demo tone. So now we have to wonder if the profiler intended it's use or not. Did the demo have Pure Cab on or off? Was the profile created before the feature existed? How would you know?
And yet some profiles I worked on do sound better with it on, so either I tweaked those compensating for the loss of high end, or it just works better on those high gain tones. Easy enough to dial in 3.0 (or whatever value sounds best) on the individual rig / performance cab and save it again. But I will probably try a re-EQ without Pure Cab and see which sounds better in an A/B test.
As someone who generally likes far miced cab tone over close miced tone, the feature is good to have available. I might be choosing to purchase tones because I liked the "far" sound I hear on the demo. But I'm concerned with getting accurate representation out of the profiles purchased. From now on the first thing I will do on new profiles, before any tone adjusting, will be a quick on / off test.
Yep...Sounds better off. But I could swear turning up both Cab and Output sections to maximum doubled the amount of effect.
Tried the "Space" effect too for the first time. Reminded me of a BBE Sonic Maximizer. Boy were those things abused back in the late 80's to early 90's.
Interesting on the Les Paul vs CE24. I have 11 guitars now, including my coveted "Swiss army knife" Les Paul, and I'm finding a vast difference in usable tone with some profiles. It doesn't always work. My real amp, an H&K Switchblade, has different amp voices that work on all of my guitars. I probably aimed for that when I dialed the individual tones in, but is that the only reason? And the H&K has a very "organic" quality that allows each guitar to show it's character...like you would expect. It's not mono-tone tuning, at all, where everything sounds the same.
Maybe it's what the profiler used in the signal chain to "color" the guitar tone to achieve the intended results. Perhaps a stomp or something??? Also, I have my pickups low to where they sound bold enough, but phase coherent without clashing harmonics on the mids and highs. I can believe that profiles made with different pickup height might be tuned (dialed in) differently than what I would dial in if I did the profile.
The good news for me is that I can often make very small adjustments and hear the harmonics "line up" better. Striking how well that can be heard. After aligning the overall tone balance and breakup gain, those little adjustments create a perfect tonal focus and balance that is very obvious in A/B tests. That's a good quality that indicates the true amp-like nature of the Kemper. My real amps do the same...modelers didn't.
I haven't had too much time with my new Kemper, but have found several tones I've been wanting for so many years. I love this device!
These are some tones I'd love to have, but have not found yet:
The Black Crows (Rich Robinson) - Shake You're Money Maker - Jealous Again - Sister Luck (love that opening "barking" tweed sound) - Thick N' Thin (jangle tweed) - Stare it Cold (Yes! Love that opening tone!)
Many types of great Tweed-sounding tones on this fantastic album. Made the record IMO...although I have no direct information Tweeds made those tones. They may have used Silver Jubilees live, but who knows what was behind those stacks? Never heard a SJ sound like that!
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Lincon Park (best "Recto" tone of them all IMO) - One Step Closer - Crawling -
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...plus Tool (clasic stuff..anything)
There are many others...too many to mention. I like a diverse range of amp tone. That's a good start.
Mine was defaulted to ON with a setting of 3.0. Not sure if that adversely effected my tone shaping or not...yet. I'll be checking that later.
Also, there is the Pure Cabinet setting on the speaker cabs themselves. Most of mine were set to 0.0. Having it in two places is a bit confusing. Would turning the Cab section up add to the value in the Output section?
I would guess, especially if you voice your concern (like you did here) in combination with your question, your wish will be respected. So far I have yet to see a vendor intentionally annoying potential buyers. And even if it comes to that, I am of the impression that the mods have quite a good grip on their forum so you can always turn to them for help.
Good luck for your profile search!
Thank you, Karajan. And thank you, Don.
Perhaps my confusion as to where to ask comes from the two separate sections...Commercial and Free. The tone I'm searching for could come from either. I'm just wanting to discuss possibilities from any source. I guess I'll start in the Free sub-section.
As far as commercial offerings, most purchased were quite good, and a couple of others did not match the sound samples at all, even though I used the same guitar and tried everything else in my arsenal (11 weapons of choice at the moment ). One in particular (JCM800) had this annoying midrange horn type sounding frequency peak that I couldn't dial out or around no matter what I did. I also tried my SM headphones and it actually got worse. The originator's sound samples were completely different, and I would love to have gotten that tone. I'll probably direct my concerns to the authors of those tones via e-mail before asking for advice from the forum.
I've been looking for a place to ask for unbiased advice on specific artist record (or song) "type" tones, as I have a list of favorites that I'm trying to fill...now that I can. The KPA is definitely capable, and I have already found some that were on that list...and are quite perfect to me ears. Quite frankly, I was afraid of being overwhelmed by commercial vendors, so I avoided asking. I'm seeing a lot of that, so maybe I'm in the wrong sub-section???
I wouldn't even mind if a commercial vendor replied with a brief answer like, "is this what you are looking for?", and maybe a YouTube link to a sound sample (but only a quick sample...not a 10 minute dissertation and add campaign). I'll know if that's the sound I'm looking for (or not) when I hear it.
I have been using Copy and Paste to load effects, stomps, even entire rigs from one place to another. That is a huge time saver. Kind of a "I wonder if this will work" thing. It did! Nice!
The more I play with this thing, the more I discover how thoughtful it was designed.
I'm not that familiar with the POG, but it is probably not a flip-flop octaver (like a Blue Box or OC-2, or the Analog Octaver stomp emulates). For a 'cleaner' sound then the Analog Octaver stomp creates on purpose, use the Chromatic Pitch pitch shifter. Try the 'Smooth Chords' and 'Formant Shift' settings.
It's too easy to dismiss the pitch shifters in the Profiler which broad statements like this - some of the best ears in the industry are finding the pitch shifters rather spectacular.
Use the right tools for the job.
I actually think the Transpose, and especially Whammy, effects are great! Much better than my Digitech DSP 1101, which is funny as they make Whammy. But that POG is very smooth...smoother than what I heard out of the Kemper. That's all I was saying. And yes, I did try the Chord Smooth and Format Shift settings. It added latency.
Ouch! Time to lock up the studio. My little one is in College now, but I remember those days.
), I never tried a Restore from my USB stick Backup.
I just plugged in a USB keyboard and it works! Couldn't find that in the reference manual when I searched "keyboard". I'm super glad that works! Bonus! (another one)
