Posts by Robrecht

With the looper location set to Input, as alextsi described, you should then connect all your external effects pedals in an effects loop (not to be confused with the looper ).

In short, this puts your external effects inside the Kempers internal signal chain (running a cable out of the Kemper's Send output, into your pedals and back to the Kemper's Return connection), and thus, after the Kemper's input. That way, the loop recorded at the input will be played back through that entire chain, including your pedals, so you can manipulate it while it loops.

Search for "Effects loop" in the manual for more details!

Over the years, this has been a recurring, albeit slightly niche feature request (I've collected a couple of threads below, but as they're all quite old, I decided to start a new one): the ability to assign an automatic modulator to any effect parameter. An LFO, optionally synced to tempo, would be great. An envelope or envelope follower would be useful as well (though the latter already exists in the form of the Ducking parameter to control the mix of many effects).

LFO Wah

LFO and/or enveloper to control other fx(-parameters)

Assignable LFOs and envelopes

Clock-synced LFO

Auto morphing

Originally, this idea would have required tremendously complicated interface elements -- every parameter would require at least two extra settings to select a modulation source and modulation depth, and then you'd still need to set the LFO's frequency or the envelope's ADSR values somewhere. Not worth the hassle.

But with morphing firmly established now, a centralized modulation source would be much simpler to implement (interface-wise, I mean). The brilliant morphing workflow already allows any parameter to be set up for morphing between any two values, simply by setting the endpoints (unmorphed and morphed). There's already a dedicated morphing page in the Rig menu, and it already has settings for rise and fall times (optionally to tempo)!

With all those things already in place, implementing an LFO would be as simple (again, interface-wise) as adding an "auto" checkmark to make the Kemper loop through the rise and fall phases continuously. An AR envelope could simply be a one-shot rise-and-fall sequence triggered by a note from the guitar... This would make for a quite flexible modulation source, with many LFO and envelope shapes attainable by combining different rise and fall times.

I was playing with the Formant and Ionosphere reverbs just now and thinking again how cool it would be to make the Formant parameter slowly evolve over time...

The difference between the low volume while you're recording and the normal volume when playing back a recorded track makes me think of some kind of phase cancellation issue.

Are you using a direct monitoring feature on your audio interface? In that case, make sure you're not also monitoring the track to which you're recording through your DAW (in Ableton Live, set the track's monitoring option to "Off" instead of "On" or "Auto"). It's possible that those two monitoring streams, due to the latency of software monitoring, may largely cancel each other out.

I sometimes activate it via pre-programmed MIDI. That way, I can record a loop exactly in time with the song (we play to a click track). I'm also the singer in my band, and there are one or two songs where I play an intro, then loop it so I can sing over it. It frees up my mind so I can concentrate on the vocals, and it frees up my hands for more expressive stage presence.

You could call it cheating, but in my view everything you hear is still "live". The loop is not pre-recorded, it's played right then and there before it starts to loop. If I mess it up, it's even worse than without the looper because every error comes around a couple more times, so I really have to get it right the first time. If you think about it that way, it's actually more live than live! Right? And of course, if the MIDI automation should fail, I'm still perfectly capable of playing and singing the part at the same time.

I do the same thing with my vocals sometimes (using a TC Helicon Voice Live), but only so I can sing a harmony part on the second pass.

Quote from V8guitar

I had a play with it but to be honest I found it too limiting e.g sound is directly linked to your profile, can't use t as a sample ( one shot, only continuously loops ) etc.

If you set Looper Location to Output, you can change profiles while the recorded loop stays the same.

Putting the Acoustic sim in one of the pre-amp slots is fun if you want to use Parallel path to crossfade, but don't forget Acoustic sim is actually a stereo effect as well! I like it very much in one of the post-amp slots.

I've recorded a very quick and sloppy test with two guitar parts, both my basic Mexican Fender Strat, both with Acoustic sim in X and a compressor in Mod, amp stack disabled. The chords part additionally has the new Delay Widener in the Delay slot.

Poor Thomas. Hope he doesn't feel too bad about his little mistake. I just think it's cool that they have a guitar player and Kemper user running the Facebook page, not just some impersonal social media expert. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Quote from phantomatlantic

Just found this and it's absolutely brilliant man! You should set up a little "pay what you want/ can" if you're just going to have this for free. Great work.

Thanks! Hm, I'll think about that, I wonder if it would be against Kemper's forum policy... In any case, comments like yours make it worthwile! And I always get a kick out of hearing that a band on the other side of the world is performing live with my little device.

Quote from AndersK

Did anybody figure out how to access the performances above #26?

Thanks for making and sharing this awesome patch Robrecht! This really makes the Kemper automations a lot easier!

Would be sweet to be able to program the performances above #26 though.

I've been using Ableton professionally for the last 12 years, but have absolutely no clue what I'm doing when it comes to M4L, otherwise I would do it myself.

Okay, I've finally had some time to work on this.

• I've replaced the limited 1-26 Performance select grid with a simple dial that goes from 1-125. Just like the old grid, it always activates the first slot in the selected performance. You can then select another slot with the five slot select buttons.
• I've also included full controls for the looper: Rec/Play/Overdub, Stop, Erase, Undo, Reverse, Half and Trigger. They work just like those on the Remote. The function of the Rec/Play/Overdub button depends on the state the looper is in: if it is currently recording, then pressing the button again switches it to play; if it is already playing, the button switches it to overdub. Unfortunately, I can't read/show the current state of the looper, you'll have to keep track of it yourself.

Note that when automating these looper buttons in Ableton, just like the other rounded buttons (Performance up/down and the small Morph button), you'll have to draw in each button press as a momentary press-and-release, like this:

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The button action takes place when the curve goes high, but it has to go low again before you can use it a second time (e.g. Rec, then Play).

(This is different from the four Stomp and Effect buttons, where you draw the automation curve high for as long as you want the Stomp/Effect to be on. The five Slot select buttons show up as a 1-5 value in automation.)

• Speaking of that small Morph button ("M", next to the Morph expression slider): this is also a fairly recent addition. It activates/deactivates morph using the rise and fall times by simulating a second press on the current slot's footswitch.

Anyway, without further ado, this is what the device looks like now:

Download it here!

Yes, first make sure your Clean Sens is set correctly (in the input settings). Strum your guitar while turning the Gain knob between fully clean and high overdrive within the same profile, and adjust Clean Sens so that there's no difference in volume.

Clean Sens is a global setting, you should only adjust it when you switch to a different guitar (tip: you can save input setting presets for each guitar you own).

Once Clean Sens is set, use Rig Volume to balance out any remaining volume differences between different rigs. Don't forget to store the performance afterwards.

Wow, evanmowry, that's great to hear!

Quote from AndersK

Did anybody figure out how to access the performances above #26?

Thanks for making and sharing this awesome patch Robrecht! This really makes the Kemper automations a lot easier!

Would be sweet to be able to program the performances above #26 though.

I've been using Ableton professionally for the last 12 years, but have absolutely no clue what I'm doing when it comes to M4L, otherwise I would do it myself.

Yeah, I've been planning to give that a shot. Should be possible using the bank select method. I'm not sure when I'll get a chance to try it, hopefully soon!

Hi! In Ableton, you need a Midi track, and the output of that track ("MIDI To") should point to your Kemper.

That means you should set the first drop-down menu under "MIDI To" to the Midi output device where your Kemper is physically connected (for instance, a Midi-enabled audio interface), and the second drop-down menu to the channel where your Kemper is receiving Midi (probably channel 1, you can change or check this in your Kemper's System settings).

I'm not in front of my computer now, but here's a screenshot from the internet (click to see the full picture). The first drop-down menu, where it says "Peak", is where you select your Midi output device.

Then just drop my Max4Live device into that track and it should work.

Good luck!

Quote from Monkey_Man

It's kinda-magical to me that this can happen.

I feel exactly the same from my side, the way a few comments can immediately clear up a seemingly inscrutable mix problem -- it sounds off, but why? And of course the magic is all in the quality of said comments!

Thanks again everyone, I knew I'd get some useful feedback here! I've updated the track in the first post again with some more tweaks. I feel it's really improved a lot thanks to you folks.

Oh, I totally argee about the sibilance. It's not even a taste thing, it's not like I prefer it that way or something, just the way you can lose sight of things when working too closely on them.

I already had a de-esser in there (the built-in Ableton Live device) but I've tweaked it more precisely now, and moved its position in the effects chain. There was also a reverb that I think picked up and amplified those highs too much. Finally, I've eased up on the compression a little.

Thanks for the feedback, guys. I've replaced the track in the first post with an updated version. Next up: cleaning up and partially re-recording the vocals.

Thanks man, very useful feedback, that's exactly the kind of thing you can lose sight of during production. Too much compression, I suppose you're right.

The production of the original is a bit of, well, a mystery to me. Very few elements -- one guitar, bass, piano, a very simple strings line on a cheesy sounding synth -- yet it sounds very full and wide. Turns out that's very hard to reproduce...

Thanks for the heads-up, Monkey_Man, you're the best! I've fixed it now.

Hi! It's me. You may remember me from these cover videos I did.

Anyway I haven't had a lot of time lately but I wanted to share something I'm working on. One of my all-time favourite records turned 30 this year, I think I've known and loved it for about as long, and I've wanted to record this song -- written and co-recorded by Bono and The Edge -- forever.

It's still a little rough around the edges (hah, no pun intended), I may redo some of the parts, but I thought I'd let it rest for a while. That guitar sound was quite a challenge to emulate. For the drums, I've cut up the the original intro and rearranged those samples for the rest of the song. And of course, it's never going to be in my vocal range, but I wanted to give it a shot anyway. If Mr. ckemper made a profiler for voices, I'd be all over it.

I've filmed some studio footage of the process as well so I'll try to make a video too, if I ever find the time.

I finally upgraded to the latest beta yesterday (from 6.something) after a period of gigging and just generally having little time. I love the new effect browsing system, no-one is going to confuse the Type and Browse knobs anymore now that they work together so logically.

Then I spent a couple of hours just playing and finally exploring the delay and reverb presets, which is so much nicer to do now (and also because I've recently started connecting the Main outputs again at home, after using only S/PDIF for a long time, which had the drawback that I had to start up my studio computer and Ableton to be able to hear myself, which usually meant I'd be purposely recording something, while having the analog outputs plugged in as well allows for direct monitoring, and thus encourages aimless noodling with just a guitar and the Kemper from time to time, and I'd almost forgotten how nice that is! Seriously, make sure your setup allows it).

Quote from pippopluto

Those are handy, but of course this is not what we are discussing here: the OP (and many of us of course) is after the stack to respond like the original amps, not after an EQ setting

There was some talk a long time ago about implementing that, I have no idea what came from it!

(From the first post in this thread, I did get the impression Greg was asking about simple presets for the existing EQ, just as shortcuts to quickly get in the ballpark of a certain sound image. Maybe it's a semantics thing: I think of "presets" as nothing deeper than pre-saved combinations of certain settings...)