Posts by JimmyK

Quote from V8guitar

Just to be clear:

1) Wasn't bashing Slash because of the KPA...I was bashing the fact that many people think he's amazing, when (in my opinion) hes good but not amazing. Paradise City solo? Really? Generic pentatonic solo? Although the end motif is quite nice, not exactly Hotel California. Anyway, the point is, its my opinion.

2) My point was he is a great songwriter. I was making the distinction that although songwriting is an element ( albeit an important one) but its not the only aspect.

2) Slash didn;t mention it himself, it was Richard, so we don;t really know. Regardless, his opinion means very little as Im not a big fan.

3) The sounds on his amplitube video were dreadful.

Its not that I don;t respect him, as said hes a really good guitarist. In fact I'm not really bashing him, just making the point that there are many better guitarists that are not as famous, many in the same. Yes he was responsible for Gibson revival, even though he didn;t play one.

Ironically I really like "Appetite". That is one of the great albums of all time, does that by definition make him one of the greatest guitarists of all time? He was a key part of the them as a guitar band, but Izzy wrote much of the music, Axl was one of the most iconic vocalists blah blah.

So nothing for me to get over. Just because I'm not famous ( or even as good) mean I can't have an opinion. You don;t have to agree with it but its as valid as yours.

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Sorry mate, it's perfectly ok not to like his songs or his playing.

But "considering him good and not great" as you stated, takes us back to basics.

So, a songriter who wrote (or co-wrote no problem) massive timeless hits and some of the greatest solos of all time according to every list, is "just good".

Maybe you should reconsider what makes a great guitarist, and not a "just good" one. Nuno for example (since he is your favourite), is of course a phenomenal guitar player and one of my favourites too. But he is subjectively nowhere near Slash in terms of massive diachronic hits, or great all-time compositional solos.

You also said he is not "diverse". He is an artist, not a session player. Gilmour, Hendrix, The Edge, BB king, SRV, Malmsteen, EVH and a million others were not diverse either, I guess that makes them "just good" right?

And finally, since Slash is just good, I would be really inerested to know how you consider yourself as a guitar player. Don't take this personal, it's not, just for the sake of conversation.

Quote from Dynochrome

(because we all know it wasn't because they don't sound good but for other reasons he had)

The only thing we all know that this is an arbitrary conclusion. Mesas don't sound good? Strats? He just doesn't like it for his reasons. The whole conversation seems like some people here need to convince themselves, because someone with such great achievements didn't like their gear.

Slash is one of the greatest of all time. His solo on sweet child of mine is one of the greatest solos of all time. Timing, feel, note choice, flow, tone...everything. The same on Paradise City. He is a proven top-notch songwriter too. He is also one of the most unique and recognizable guitarists of all time. His tone, his touch and his way of blending pentatonic scales is one of a kind. The same with the attitude in his playing. Many have tried, very few can sound like him. He is also one of the main reasons gibson was reborn during the 80's. And of course, he is a rock icon.

Having respect for other musicians is a characteristic of great musicians. Respect all musicians first, but especially the ones who have accomplished great achievements (and much much greater than you'll ever do)

So many pages of nothing, just bashing Slash and GNR and 5-year old excuses like "he doesnt know how to tweak it", "he used bad profiles", "it took me 20 years to get a great tone from the Kemper, he didn't spend the time required with it" etc

It's pretty ironic bashing him because he didn't like Kemper. C'mon guys, take a look first at what you 've achieved on your own in the music business, and then speak for someone else. He doesn't like the Kemper, probably as much as he doesn't like Mesas, Strats or Teles.

It's that simple, get over it.

Quote from Alfahdj

Because you said so, of course. Really, I know over 20 musicians that still believe tubes are magical artifacts or something around those lines. You can emulate ANYTHING with a transfer function/ differential equation/ mathematical model/ neural network. Its just a matter of time and processing power, and the method of course.

After an A/B blind test with the kemper in a real room, with a real cab, I bet you wont know which are the tube amps, and which are kemper.

Ok, create a human brain. No rush, I can wait ?

For the other things you mentioned, just read my post. No time to write the same stuff again and and again. The "blind" test argument is misleading. Use both in a band side by side and you'll get it

Quote from Ingolf

Wrong on all accounts.

Powertubes are contained in the profile (if it's a tube amp that has been profiled).

Lol no they don't. You'd wish though ?

Quote from lindenhey

I turned my PowerRack up, and up again, then up again and then went into the Output settings and turned the poweramp up, and up again.

Kpa is good for studio and through FOH. But it will never sound like a tube amp through a real cab. Maybe only if you actually use a tube poweramp. You can't beat physics.

I've tried it and I know. Power tubes add harmonics, fatness, fullness and raw power to the tone (except coloration) that can't be reproduced otherwise when you play with a real cab. With tubes you'll be heard inside a live band with half the volume. The tone will cut and will have balls. With a solid state poweramp you'll have twice the volume and won't cut. And will be thinner, and as you go louder will be even more thin.

What would these guys know? They probably used the wrong profiles, or wrong guitars, or wrong p.a. etc...Billy Hillbilly who once played in front of 80 people and has all Top Jimi and Tone Junkie profiles knows better lol ?

Quote from CarloLf

I can not confirm you. And of course don't know how loud your band is playing in the room. When I am playing with my band in a rented room with equipment, the Kemper is connected to the Return of a Boss Katana with a 2x12 Marshall Box. My band mates often give me the advice to turn the volume down.

Is there another guitarist in your band playing with a tube amp?

My problem was that the tone wouldn't cut. With my tube amp I can be heard with relatively low volume and with another guitarist in the band who is also using tubes. With the Kemper I should be insanely loud.

When I was new to Kemper I took it to a rehearsal of my band which had two guitars at the moment. I connected to the return of an 100watt solid state randall amp which was connected to a 4x12 marshall cab with gt75s.

The other guitar player connected to the rehearsals studio cheap tube amp (don't remember the brand) with a 2x12 cab.

I couldn't get heard no matter what. No matter how much I turned up the volume, I couldn't cut and be heard over the other guitarist, and I tried a hundred different profiles. I added mids, treble, decreased gain, did everything without results.

In the room, no solid state powered section can compete with tubes. The overtones of tubes make the tone sit and cut and it's not a matter of eq or compression Kemper is nice for recording and gigging through FOH. With a real cab you'll need a tube poweramp to compete with a real tube amp.

Quote from OneEng1

Really? I would like to think that I know a thing or two about guitar tone and I have spent entire DAYS with both just playing around.

Lets go down your list:

Core tone: Kemper was better in many more instances than Axe III Fx

Feel: About the same IMO

routing possibilities: Axe III Fx by a lot

Ease of Use: Kemper by a lot

You really think that an Axe III Fx is easier to use than a KPA?

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No cocked wah, better noise gates, better stomps, no unwanted compression and gain means better tone. And I can tweak as much as I want without getting weird results. The tone coming from my speakers is double than with the kemper. Fatter, punchier, biteyer etc.

And the harmonics that aren't missing is better feel. Cuts a lot more like a real tube amp.

The fx? You skipped that one.

Ease of use: I can record separately dry and fx only tracks, and then get a dry/di track without having to change cables. Plus the great editor, which took kemper 10 years to make.

The proof that Kemper needs to come up to date is that their FB page started posting a ton of posts about how accurate profiling is since the first videos of QC arrived.

Apart from that, whoever knows a few things about guitar tone and owns both a fractal device and a kemper, knows that today fractal is far superior in every aspect. Core tone, feel, fx, routing possibilities, ease of use. But you have to own both to be able to tell.

Quote from Alienator

Even the 3.0 Helix is a huge improvement, they say. Modeling becomes more and more precise.

Yes that's one of my main points here.

Another thing I noticed today, is when I reduce gain on my favourite profiles (let's say to get from a hard rock tone to a more classic rock oriented sound), I always lose punch and the tone becomes thin and compressed. I have to look for a different profile with less gain, and that's where the Kemper was always problematic to me: All the low/medium gain marshall-y profiles lack power, sustain and punch.

With the fm3 I just went from a glorious hard rock tone to a classic rock tone with two or three tweaks, mostly reduced preamp gain and added poweramp gain. And literally I have played with it 3-4 hours in total, because I have been sick for almost a week now.

I am pretty sure that Kemper was the king ? maybe three years ago. I actually believed it was still the king 10 days ago! But seems that all the other players kept evolving and reached the next level and maybe it's time for Kemper to do the same.

Quote from tooltool

generally speaking, if you get a friedman hbe profile up on the fm3 and run a york audio ir, would it sound the same as a di profile of the same amp (settings) and use same cab ir on the kemper.

Reason i ask is i have some great di profiles with the amp settings i love. Aside from all the extra options the fractal stuff gives, is there a difference in feel/sound on the fm3.

do i need to buy one?

I can't really answer your questions directly, but I can say that the tones are superior on the Fm3. Both pure amp tones and wet tones.

The feel is identical, great in both devices.

The problem with Kemper is that the majority of the profiles (even from well known vendors) are bad. But even the best ones don't compare to the models on the Fm3 imo. Plus - as I mentioned at my first post- you can tweak them without problems, no cocked wah -which btw I spoke about it before Rubea lol ? - no awful noise gate to destroy the tone, actually great stomps etc.

Kemper is still great though. I could make a thousand records with it and noone would be able to tell the difference in a blind test in a mix. It's just that with the Fm3 the tones are more "real" outside the mix, more fun and without the problems I mentioned.

Overall I would say that the Fm3 is 10-15% better for the things I want to do.

Quote from Clanker

I think fractal team teased yesterday that they gonna update modeling soon for fx3 and fm3, sounds interesting. As for resale value, when they announced fm3 shipping dates ax8 dropped 400 bucks on the used market overnight, just saying.

You're probably right, but I would have sold the ax8 as soon as the 3 reached the market. These things are computers and as I can see now, with every new version the tone improves significantly. I don't expect to sell them at retail price when a new version comes out, but thee hold well for a few months as I have seen.

But the most important thing is that now I have better tone with less money

Quote from Clanker

I want to try fm3 myself, but they are not selling those officially yet in where i live, and i dont wanna pay 1.5x retail price from scalpers, i guess i will wait till it gonna hit second hand market and take a look then. My biggest gripe with fractal is that they update hardware too often, and even stop supporting repairs for previous versions.

Yes the upgrade thing is a bit of a pain but as Kemper guys usually say, if it sounds great and you get all the tones you want why upgrade to something different? Plus I did my research before buying the FM3, the older units hold their value pretty good so I believe selling it when a new unit comes out will not be a big of a problem. We'll see

Quote from Clanker

some people go from fm3 to kemper, some the other way or back to analog, you never know with these things until you try yourself.

Indeed! I was sceptical at first because many Kemper users are bashing Fractal (especially the ones that haven't tried both - some people take very personal their gear lol) but I am happy I finally pulled the trigger. Not planning to sell the Kemper for now though, I am emotionally attached to it. Just wanted to let people know of my personal experience

Quote from whippinpost91850

glad it works for ya, sorry to see you go

Not going anywhere, but glad you're glad.

Hello guys,

a couple of days ago the Fm3 was delivered to my door and...all the problems I've had with the Kemper suddenly dissapeared...

My initial intention was to get the Fm3 as something more portable (I have the toaster), and maybe get some extra tones I can hear at some demos which I couldn't quite get with the Kemper. But it turned out much better than I expected.

The noise gate is awesome, it doesn't kill your transient or sustain, the effects are much better (finally a great and musical reverb), the editor is super fast, light and works with win7 (which btw half the planet is still using).

And the tones? Omg the tones! It's like having the best of the best profiles of every amp, but you can also tweak them as much as you like without getting unnatural results. There is no cocked wah effect anymore which I couldn't get rid of in half the profiles, the sound is much more 3d, amp-like and open, and the feel/response is as good as in the kemper.

The stomps are doing what actual stomps are supposed to do and inside one preset I can basically dial in a whole lot of my favourite profiles but with better tone and more possibilities ☺️ I had been searching for years for the best Marshall, Fender, Boogie and Vox tones but there was always something missing.

And of course, the icing on the cake, it's more affordable and more portable.

Kemper has been a great and revolutionary machine, I've had great times with it (even though I spent it's price in profiles to find the best ones), I did lots of session work with it which I wouldn't be able to to with traditional amps and I'll always love it, but I think it's time to step up their game. New competition is constantly joining the business and the ones that don't evolve get left behind.

This one is the only one I've found with a fair price for what it does. I use it for wah and whammy with the Kemper and works great. 20 euros.

https://m.thomann.de/gb/maudio_expression_pedal.htm

Katzbach has some great profiles, Jcm800 KK is my go to for tight rock with clarity and definition. My latest discovery though is Deadlight AFD, my best marshall profiles so far. Whoever likes TopJimi profiles but finds them lacking somehow should try these from tonehammer/deadlight.