Posts by ML Sound Lab

Quote from GodlessEndeavor

Finally had time to test it, it's a good pack, a little expensive for what offers. It's my opinion.

The amp part works cool with my favourite Kemper cabs, cab part I think it's just an IR, not that great and for sure Kemper Cabs wins in this field.

cheers!

Thank you for the feedback! I'm actually surprised that you didn't like the cab, that's been voted as the best IR from the MEGA OVERSIZE Cab Pack that's currently "the talk of the town". There are a lot of big dudes especially in the modern/progressive/instrumental/djent/metal genres using it on big stages right now.

When I get a chance I'll have to create video about Kemper Cab vs IR's. I haven't seen one yet especially that's apples to apples.

Just for the sake of all the "IR hate" on this forum, here's a very honest comparison I made a while back for a client/friend who was questioning the IR format. The clip has a real cabinet miked vs an IR that's done by me (at home and not even at my studio) and then phase reversed in the end. For those who don't know what phase reversal does, it cancels out "the similarities" so when you get pretty much absolute silence as a result of phase reversing like in this case, it means that my IR shoot method is fully capable of capturing everything that a real cabinet is doing to your guitar sound. And since IR technology doesn't capture non-linearities, this means that EQ and phase is all that's needed for authentic cab modeling = cabinets have pretty much no effect on dynamics is what I'm saying in layman's terms. Try messing around with phase reversal to see how a tiny detail completely messes things up. F.ex. a Kemper profile vs a real amp will not give you results like I get with my IR shoot method. So... the Kemper Cabs that are "better than IR's"... IR's done right get pretty damn close to perfect results so I'm not sure how much better they could be. I'll try and get the comparison video done soon. Here are the clips as promised:

Here's a link for the comparison in a mix:

https://soundcloud.com/mlsoundlab/mic-vs-ml-sound-lab

Here's the same clip outside a mix context:

https://soundcloud.com/mlsound…-vs-ir-phase-reverse-test

In the end you'll hear what the IR does not capture. First thing to note, notice how quiet it gets. And what you hear is me doing this comparison at home so you hear a click track, my acoustic strumming and monitoring echo and this is all because I'm literally 2 meters away from the loud cabinet.

Quote from jperttu

Hi all,

usually I don’t defend people on forums, but I guess I’ll make an exception this time. During the years, I’ve heard Mikko’s stuff (both recorded and live) and he’s a legit guy. I also happen to know that he has lots of experience with both digital modelling gear and tube amps, including cabinet miking. I don’t know him personally, but he has gained respect and earned his position in digital amp world by doing hard work for years.

IMO, it would be good tactic for him to provide free profiles for people to test before making purchase decision, but I’ll surely buy a profile packet from him if he comes up with any amp that intrigues me (I’m not a Mesa guy).

Personally, I’m more than happy to see a guy like Mikko in Kemper forum offering profiles (even for not free). The guy is the real guitar sound geek for sure. I guess his timing was not the best one (the profiling market is already oversaturated and Kemper forum merrymaker Monkey_Man is currently banned). Of course good questions and informative conversation are always valid. But please, chill out everybody.

-Jari

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Thank you the calmness Jari and yes, I've been in this geeky guitar tone game for almost a decade now and boy has it been life-changing in a good way. I would like to think that being on forums through all this time has taught me to have a thick skin and respect everyone even when they're on the opposite side of the argument. My mistake was thinking that everyone would know me and my previous work and there would be no problem in me starting a conversation about "making your modeler better" because I've been doing that for other modelers for so long. Now that I think of it... that can definitely sound pretty douchey. I definitely need to give the Kemper guys a taste of what I do. Thank you once again buddy! So... are you a Marshall guy or?

Quote from Ibot39

You are here to answer any questions... but still you don't answer the simple question I asked how many times now? Do we hear the converted / Kemper cab in the comparison video or the original IR? Because you don't answer this, I have to assume you just use the same original IR with an IR loader and not the converted cab. If this is true, it would be at least misleading - kindly said.

Almost all vendors have some "big names" they work with or well known musicians that used their rigs. Or they are themselves outstanding musicians. But their "marketing" is somehow... more likable.

Why? Please watch your own video and count how many times you say "100 % realistic". "Dude". What do you think?

And when you bring in cabs "by other profile makers" that don't fit your direct amp profile - what should that prove? That is so ridiculous... and you know that.

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I answered the two clear questions you had. I must've missed this third one. All the demos we put out are the presets loaded up in the units, I thought that would go without saying. Even the real amps in the comparison are actually the real cabinet miked up. No IR loaders anywhere. Like I said before, cab modeling is the ML IR converted. I measure just a little bit of low end missing in the conversion process so there's an EQ after the amp section correcting it. It's a very subtle difference though and actually if you could link me to the analysis of the Cab Maker conversion being bad I'd love to have a read because it's really not "that bad". Once again I would make the statement that the reason IR's in general may sound bad is because the separation between an amp and cab has not been completely successful.

The other profile maker's cab comparison is proving exactly what I'm trying to explain here. There were "merged profiles" involved. If they were truly authentically separating the amp and cabinet they should sound authentic. They just don't and I know those profiles sound really good with the correct amp profile. IMO things can be done in a much better way so that people don't need separate profiles for different use cases because things can be done in such a way where the same profile will work with a powered Kemper and a real cabinet, SS power amp + real cabinet, SS power amp + FRFR cabinet or a powered FRFR speaker and obviously in the studio as well.

I'll start by saying that I'm not used to having to explain myself this much. Usually after people experience my work they don't ask these kinds of questions. I know I'm new here but if you Google my previous work you'll only hear positive things through over 5 years of creating guitar tones for professional gigging/studio musicians. And if you feel like "all he does is djent" based on my Periphery 3 and 4 collaborations, I'll remind you that I'm more of a blues/alternative guitar player myself.

Quote from Ibot39

You are explaining NOTHING in the video. 100 % realistic, 100 % realisti, 100 % realistic... yeah, we get that now But again, you are explaining really nothing... very weird?!

But please answer the simple questions (I have already asked above):

1. In your first comparison video, did you use the Kemper direct profile and converted IR or is it direct profile into an IR loader with the original IR?

2. How can you guarantee 100 % realistic sound, when using CONVERTED IR (using cab maker)? The converted profiles will NOT sound 100 % the same to the original IR you are praising - I think you know that?! That makes your whole concept questionable.

So you are basically make "special" direct amp amp profiles and then just copy your already existing IR in - after you converted them with cab maker, which makes the cab part sound and feel different compared to the original IR (in my experience).

And your secret method is only a benefit, if I want to change cabs in the same profile ("amp / cab separation") or maybe use direct profiles, right? Compared to common studio profiles (where no "separation" is needed) there is no advantage. Because other vendors simply profile the full signal chain for EVERY cab / mic combination and therefore I don't need to change cabs.

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I was trying to avoid the "annoying marketing speech" which was the feedback I was getting from you guys and just show you because I thought it was very obvious in the video. I mean there is actual audio there which was the whole point of the video. Especially around 7:20 where I try out three merged cabinet captures by other profile makers I thought I made it very clear. One sounds far away, one sounds like treble on full and one sounds like all the honky mids on full. This was the message I've been trying to get across. You guys wanted proof so I did my best trying to do just that without offending Kemper or other profile makers.

I'll admit that it is hard for me to get the message across because 1) if I explain my full process I would have to talk about "my secrets" and 2) the preconceptions people may have. The biggest false truth I hear is that "converted IR's don't work". First of all it makes a huge difference what IR's your using. Depending on your IR shoot method and knowledge on how to create clean captures, you will be left with power amp color in your IR which means that the IR has an EQ curve baked in it. So if you've tried IR's with the Kemper and they sounded bad, chances are they just weren't compatible with the profiles you were using because the power amp color is already a part of the profile and also the IR so it's got the same thing "modeled twice".

About the IR conversion: Kemper states that it takes 1.5secs of information in the CabMaker, which seems a bit overkill since 500ms is definitely the maximum length needed for anything else than a reverb. According to my measurements I lose some of the low end resonance with the conversion process and the low end resonance is what requires a longer IR format which is still in the 200ms-500ms area. What you'll notice on all my profiles is that there's an EQ block right after the cab that's fixing this and luckily it's low end because that can be fixable with EQ. If it was the high end I would agree with some people about IR conversion not working. Even that being said the difference is almost completely inaudible but since it's measurable I have the EQ correction active.

Like I said about a dozen times already these profiles need to sound 100% like the real amp. After all these profiles are done they still go through multiple bench tests before they're accepted. Here's a video sample of one of the high gain profiles being tested against a real amplifier and an Axe-Fx II: https://www.dropbox.com/s/i3hz…video-1548686445.mp4?dl=0 Measuring the difference while the same DI signal is being fed to all sources ensures that not only the EQ response is the same but the dynamic response acts in the same way. So in this example you'll see the the low end is a little bit off which is inaudible but it was fixed with the EQ in the ML rigs. This is just one of the tests these rigs go through.

I'm here to answer any questions. Although there's a weird vibe here right now (which I assume is normal on every forum these days) I'm happy that the feedback from people who have actually tried these profiles has been completely positive.

Here's a video of me showing and explaining the "ML Merged Profiles":

I will be working on a new pack next week and while doing that I will try and create a "one off" ML Merged Profile for you to try out.

ANNOUNCEMENT: Everything is 25% off at our store for the rest of the week in celebration of another year with multiple Grammy nominees being ML Sound Lab artists. Use the code GRAMMYS at checkout to get the discount or simply follow this link: https://ml-sound-lab.com/discount/GRAMMYS

Quote from Webb

So has your opinion changed regarding the Kemper? You were always one of the most vocal naysayers in the past. Curious what changed?

I'm the person who got temporarily banned for defending Kemper when it was announced... My opinion has always stayed the same. I wish there was no war between modeler camps but there's a good aspect in competition because it pushes the modeling technology forward. Last year was the first time that I spent a lot of time with the Kemper, Axe-Fx III and Line 6 Helix in the studio at the same time and I think they're all really good and I feel the competition has pushed all of these units to where they can completely replace tube amps.

Quote from SevenHillz707

We need a sample profile to test it!!

When I'll create the video explaining this I will create a profile that I can share with you guys to try out. I'm a man of my word.

Quote from JuLai

Does this "clean separation" achievement mean that you are able to produce 100% same sounding Merged and Studio profiles?

This would be really groundbreaking as I haven't heard anyone succeeding in this so far. And this would be pretty easy to test also I guess.

This is exactly what I was talking about. I definitely have no disrespect towards anyone and if it came across that way I've done a poor job explaining myself. It's like JuLai said. In a perfect world you would not need to have separate profiles for 1) when you're using a powered Kemper running a real cabinet 2) an FRFR speaker 3) Kemper in the studio or 4) yes ultimately if you want to have the ability to use impulse responses.

If you do need separate profiles for different use cases that literally means that the separation was not done correctly. It means there's some of the cab sound still left in the amp profile or what I witnessed, there's a lot of amp sound left in the cabinet profile. It's not really a problem as it will still sound convincing but if I know I have "a better way" of course I will do it that way. After all I need things to be as realistic as possible as I would never sell anything that's not good enough for my own use and I am quite a geek when it comes to this stuff. That being said this is a very common "weird" area when modeling tube amps and cabs. The impedance interaction changes how an amp sounds based on what cab it's plugged into. Once again this is not an attack towards anyone, this is just a simple fact that I can prove if needed. This is the exact reason why Boss Waza Tube Amp Expander was introduced to the market. It's a loadbox that simulates a bunch of different cabinet impedance resistances.

So what I'm trying to say is: I believe this cabinet impedance resistance should be 100% a part of the amp profile and completely removed from the cab profile. The reason I say this is because a profile like that will work perfectly in all 4 circumstances that I mentioned before. I'd love to create a video explaining this further but it will take some time. Let me know if you're interested.

I really don't want to start a conversation about pricing especially when our metrics show that there's no issue. I don't think anyone chooses to use profiles because they were so inexpensive. Those kinds of profiles you forget about in a week. That's not what we stand for. We stand for the highest quality possible and we're priced accordingly. Even that being said we're not the most expensive profile maker out there. Not even in the top 5.

We're definitely aiming for quality over quantity. Bad sounding profiles simply don't make it to our packs because the last thing we want is to force people to start searching for a good sound and filling their Kempers with a bunch of profiles they'll never use. The profiles in our packs are balanced and measured to be perfect (we have years of experience working on pro guitar tones for live and studio) while going through all available gain stages. Here's the info:

Profile 1: Channel 1 - Pristine clean

Profile 2: Channel 1 - Edge of breakup

Profile 3: Channel 1 - Pushed clean

Profile 4: Channel 2 - Medium crunch

Profile 5: Channel 2 - Rock rhythm

Profile 6: Channel 2 - Full gain crunch

Profile 7: Channel 3 - Tight high gain

Profile 8: Channel 3 - Metal rhythm

Profile 9: Channel 3 - Full gain lead

From a technical point of view I can not emphasize enough that these are not your average profiles. This is not marketing speech, our first scheduled Kemper pack was supposed to come out about 3 months ago (as many active members in here that did some beta testing can confirm). It got postponed until we got the results that are up to our standards and the Kemper performed up to it's fullest potential. After doing the necessary comparison tests we felt like these profiles that are known as "merged" are many times not doing a good job in separating the amps and cabs. The amp and cab impedance interaction is simply something that's not easy to realistically separate. In our profiles this impedance interaction is all left as part of the amp profiles which means that you can use our Kemper compatible Cab Packs to achieve 100% realistic results. I will definitely post a video explaining and showing how this works. What it means is that all the Cab Packs that we come up with will make these 9 profiles sound literally a thousand different ways if wanted. Among many benefits like being able to mix amps and cabs in a completely realistic way this also means that people using powered Kempers will get the most realistic end result by far. I'll be shooting a video explaining all this a little better.

There have been many questions about a preview of these profiles so I shot this video to show you guys what it sounds like!

Quote from schreckmusic

Great job Mikko! In a mix its really hard to hear the difference at all!

Cheers schreck! It's actually hard to tell the apart separate from the mix as well. Of course there are minor differences between the modelers but they are all fully capable of replacing real tube amps in the right hands.

As of today "ML Sound Lab" is officially offering Kemper Profiles. I'd like to thank this forum for the warm welcome as I've already made some friends here. Let's jump straight to what's special about these "ML Merged Rigs". Here's a link to our online store: https://ml-sound-lab.com/

Our Kemper Profiles are all "ML Merged Rigs" which requires a unique but accurately tested process (took us 4 months to get it right) that ensures a clean separation of the amplifier and cabinet. This makes sure that Kemper users will get extremely accurate profiles that are fully compatible with ML Sound Lab Cab Packs. I've personally been in the forefront of IR technology pushing it further to its fullest for about 8 years now and although I've heard IR's are not necessarily "a thing" here, these ML profiles make IR's work 100% with the Kemper. If you're unfamiliar with my previous work I'm best known for collaboration Cab Packs with artists from bands like Guns N' Roses all the way to Periphery. You can hear our Cab Packs in use on "Periphery III: Select Difficulty" and being used live by some of the biggest names in the industry which I sadly can't legally name-drop. ML Sound Lab became it's own company now in 2019 and the purpose it to provide the most authentic tones for the best modelers on the market.

Here's our first Kemper Amp Pack release: https://ml-sound-lab.com/products/boogey-v-kemper

"ML Boogey V" is based on a "Mesa Boogie Mark V going into a 90s Mesa Boogie Oversize 4x12 loaded with rare original spec Vintage 30 speakers.

This is a video showcasing how accurate our Amp Packs really are for all modelers:

These are the exact profiles that come in the pack and there's absolutely no post processing on the guitars. All profiles are in perfect balance and range throughout the maximum range of gain stages available on the real life amps.

Stay tuned for more releases very soon.

Quote from az471590997

I bought your IR Converted format Practical on KPA

Just trying to make things as easy as possible. Thank you buddy! Finally got something proper released for the Kemper community: https://ml-sound-lab.com/

Goes to show that a profile can be used in a completely different way in a different genre that I originally planned. That's awesome!

Out of curiousity: Do many of you guys tweak profiles and fine tune them or simply just trust the rigs as they are?

Quote from Monkey_Man

You started out on a high 'though, right Mikko? It's all-downhill from there, buddy.

Anyway, it's about quality not quantity.

You're 100% right about this. Friends... I can barely remember the time when I had time for those kinds of things.

So I think I just made a pretty sweet Mesa Dual Recto patch with the new methods and all:

You can download if here for free: https://www.dropbox.com/s/ktq4…/ML%20Recto%203.kipr?dl=0

So, not sure who to talk to since my Kemper buddy list is quite short at the moment but I spent a lot of time today trying new innovative things when profiling. Different signal paths and measuring volume levels at every position and I think I found something. I keep running an iZotope match EQ with the signal from the real amp while trying to get a "straight line" as in there's no EQ difference between the real amp vs Kemper. I've heard of some people adding this match EQ to the IR included in the preset but I was able to tweak things so that I get a straight EQ line. This means that these profiles are 100% compatible with all of my cabinet simulations. Obviously there's a reason why I want this to work so badly... just letting you guys know that progress is being made. I think I'll post a rig for you guys to try out soon.

Quote from Mlaykay

Cool video, as others have already said, great, usable sound from every unit…

BUT for me, in order of preference: Real thing > Axe3 > Helix= Kemper. On some clips I did prefer Kemper to Helix or it was at least a tie to my ears.

I’m dissapointed by the result, as I feel Kemper should be closest (that’s what it was designed to do, right?) What I find interesting is that I came to the same conclusion watching Ola Englund’s video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IDF1oFyBI6U In his video the Kemper also has this muffled sound to it, almost like a “blanket over the amp” tone going on(compared to the original), while the Axe stays more faithful in the highs. At least to my ears, listening on AKG K701 cans and details between modelers/amps are clearly audible.

However, I was completely fooled by the Kemper in this video, just like Rob Chapman:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=INJ_H5PiuTE&t=17s

It seems the Kemper shines in certain situations and not so much in others…is it the profiling methods used or something else?

With all that said, I absolutely LOVE mine and don't plan on switching anytime soon.

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The thing with all these comparisons is that all these modelers are a little bit complicated to understand. What I mean with this is that it's very rare that I see a completely apples-to-apples comparison. On Ola's example I think the low end is where the difference was. All of them had a very different low end. This is something that IMHO can be done better if you take really good care of the signal chain and it's also something you can completely mess up by f.ex. doing a lot of palm muting in your refine process. On the Chappers video they used the same real cabinet which makes it more apples-to-apples but then again at the same time, modeling that cabinet is something they weren't testing at all in the comparison.

I would say the cab is at least just as important as the amp in these comparisons. Through all these years it has become more and more clear to me that most people don't know how to get clean captures from guitar cabinets. This is my area of expertise really and I feel very fortunate to have done cabinet modeling for quite many high end modelers out there. I've never seen any IR producer boldly post an A/B comparison with their IR versus a microphone like I did right here:

In my video I would say that the biggest difference between the Kemper and the real amp is in the ultra high frequencies above 10khz and maybe the Kemper has the most gain out of the bunch. I think I might get even closer by paying even closer attention to the signal levels that run in and out of the amp. These are the main issues I got with profiling during the first month or so. It's easy to get too much gain and a flubby low end if you're not paying attention to the small details.

So awesome to see that profile in use like that! That's pretty awesome. And that Crazy Nights riff is definitely similar! Hilarious actually!