Posts by JedMckenna

In my views it's redundant to add more drives or pretty much any other conventional pedals in front instead of using the Kemper effects. If you can't make it sound decent, the problem isn't the machine. At the end of the day, I've yet to see an unsuccessful gig be saved by bringing more pedals.

Go in "output" and choose which outputs sends what. In your case you could set the Direct Out to "Git Analog" and set the Main output as your amp sound by setting this to "stack" (or depending what you want). I suggest reading the manual and looking at the official Kemper tutorial videos, it explains all this in great details.

Reminds me of a gig I did at 3600m altitude. The Kemper was perfectly fine - the only problem was some band members getting altitude sickness! Good times!

Quote from Burkhard

¨   Environmental Requirements

Maximum altitude: 3000 m (10,000 feet)

I think the first 2 pictures you posted are ES 339s (which are nice too!)

Funny you post this, this entire covid year it's been a honeymoon with my 335 (from the Memphis plant). I bought it sight unseen through a connection (the retail price was a ridiculous US$3700), it was reckless and I was a bit apprehensive knowing that Gibsons are hit or miss. I am not a collector or anything and hate guitars that sit unplayed, I only have 2 other electrics for different purposes and they are workhorses. I didn't love it at first, and just looked at it for an entire year. The nut was out of whack and the electronics were all screwed up, I wasn't sure about the finish. The neck however was perfection (my luthier confirmed this!) and it sounded amazing so after a few additional hundreds $ to fix the nut and change the wiring, I eventually got over my personal traumas with sunbursts (too much time in jazz schools), I started loving the finish and got used to the different feel. It's an acquired taste compared to say, a strat, but these days I'm using it for pretty much everything because it's so versatile and it just sings. However, I see that lots of people (musicians included) often listen with their eyes and they associate the burst 335 to jazz or old rock & roll, so it might not look the part for certain gigs but alas! In the studio it's also it's my go-to (I've tracked everything from metal to jazz on it.) I'm on a jazz gig these days (haven't used Kemper in a while!) and just plug straight in a fender combo and it's right there.

While I do prefer the feel of some other picks, I'm superstitious and get anxiety whenever I use something else than small red Jazz III. Even the black ones give me the feeling that something isn't quite right.

It's nothing but an indication from the person who made the profile that the tonal sweet spot of the amp had been found using that specific pickup setting. Also, some take into account the output difference between HB/SC and adjust the volume of the rig accordingly so that their pack is balanced volume-wise. By all means, you can feel free to disregard if you want (but might need to compensate with some tweaks - ie: a profile labelled for single coils could appear too loud if used with a humbucker guitar, etc.) I personally just follow the creator's recommendation just for the sake of saving time tweaking.

While I see the point of Monkey_Man with the silicon chip thing, this market wants you to think you need to change your gear with their latest bells and whistle every year and it's aggravating to me. I'm still rocking a refurbished imac 2014 I got for quite cheap, it's nice and I love it. I do all my Logic work on it as well as video editing (Adobe After Effects and Final Cut), it's has been going strong for the most part (I keep it clean and avoid plugins/software that take up too much resources.) I also still have a trusty Macbook from somewhere between 2010-12 that I use as a backup or to travel. I don't think I'll even upgrade my dinosaurs anytime soon.

Quote from lightbox

Have you listened to this italian guy's Youtube video where he says he compares KD presets to the real pedals? Holy crap, I really don't know when I ever heard worse guitar tones. So thin, narrow, bandpassed, weak, almost like through a phone. And Christoph (for unknown reasons) shared this when asked for a comparison blind test!?

Sounds like you're over-dramatizing a bit to prove your point.

Depends what you are doing. Most sessions I do are everything but consistent stylistically so I never change cab and I just try to get a rig that fits the song as much as possible. If I were to play with a band that does the same style all the time or if I'd be looking for more consistency, I'd probably use a performance based around a single amp that has been captured under various amount of gain. I'm more worried about volume balance between rigs or getting the charts on time!

The alt + click to return value to 0 is what I find is missing the most.

I try to time a string change before a recording or a gig/string of gigs. Nowadays I use 10-46, usually Ernie Ball (ever since the move they pulled at Microsoft!) on all electrics except a Gretch where I put 11-52 I think. I use Elixirs 12-53 on acoustic. I never really cared about wiping down strings.

I had very few complaints about the Green Scream and was using it all the time but I can see how those new variables now make the overdrives much more refined and flexible. That's a pretty neat upgrade. Go Kemper!

Honestly, pack 3 is the one I regret buying. The reason being that it just feels more of the same after pack 1 & 2. In that era of his profiling, he was using the same cab for pretty much everything, and while it might work for him, the tones often end up feeling almost identical to one another (in varying amounts of gain). I used stuff from his pack 1 and 2 quite a bit for a while, and also his AC30 pack still (because it's profiled with the stock speaker) but I think I've never ended up using anything from pack 3. YMMV

Very cool MuddySludge !

Sound wise the differences once recorded would be negligible so it's probably ok to stick with what you have. However, if you keep using it you will eventually realize some of the quirks often found on cheap interfaces: slightly lower sound quality on headphone (or speaker) playback, weak or low quality preamps, limited functionality, occasional disconnection or error messages due to bad drivers, latency, etc. If you eventually get into production/recording deep enough and get tired of these shortcomings, you can start thinking about upgrading.

Headphone out of Kemper or of interface? Some cheaper interfaces have questionable headphone monitoring.

Kemper has some applications and amps have others, most of them overlap but not all of them. I suggest keeping at least a combo or a head/cab.

Played a small open air gig last week and decided to use the backline (after 6 months locked in my room with a Kemper and studio monitors). I had forgotten the awesome growl of my 335 through a Twin Reverb.

Quote from Monkey_Man

After playing through the factory Rigs, I wish I'd limited myself to the free Rig Packs and Rig Exchange.

Would've saved a whole lotta money and probably found many Rigs good enough to see me through. Once you take a bite out of the commercial-Profile cherry, it's hard to stop there...

Definitely. I bought commercial profiles like a kid in a candy store before I realized what I actually needed. Going through the factory rigs would have helped me figured this out way faster but back then, there wasn't as many awesome rigs coming stock with the Kemper.

Also... buying a great interface right off the bat instead of wasting time with the cheap ones.

After doing this for a while, here are some I realizations:

- Quad tracking can be a bit overkill depending of the part so I'm not systematically doing this anymore. Double tracking is often enough and feels tighter. Many modern guys (Gojira comes to mind) seems to be going in this direction.

- A lot of the modern stuff is edited, for which the DI is pretty essential: it allows you to see clearly where the attack transient is. In other words, get the DI not only for possible reamping but also for editing.

- I monitor wet but always record a track dry and mono (KPA output set to "Mod mono" to exclude the reverb/delays). If I am really attached to my effects choice (modulations/reverbs/delays), I record a wet track as well for them as well as a reference (but still always a dry/mono one). Depending of the style, if I can avoid that responsibility of getting the perfect effect sounds, I do it and leave all this to the guy who enjoys tweaking plugins.

- Keep track of what profile/guitar/pickup selection you used on certain parts if you can - I sometimes had to punch in afterwards because the arrangement changed or something.

- Work on your parts before the recording as sometimes the thickness you might be looking for comes from adding a track playing different voicing etc. Also obviously if you have the music ahead of time, practice your parts to perfection before your session, maybe compose your solos if necessary.

- Once you are done, give up any expectations on "sounding great" because once the mix guy takes over, it's all out of your control!

- Be ready to face some producers with aversion to digital stuff who tell you to play in that random amp sitting in the corner because "the real thing is sooo much better". If they don't like your tone, they'll 100% blame Kemper to reinforce their belief. Just go with it and wait till you're outta there to roll your eyes.