Sound man says my Kemper sounds like a bag of crushing chips at times

    Hi All, perhaps you can help me straighten out my sound, our sound man say's that when I kick on my drive stomp, it sometimes sounds like a "A Bag of Potato Chips Crushing" not all the time and never on lead, only chunking certain places. I don't hear this when performing, in fact what I do hear it great punch and creamy drive. However, this morning to went down to my studio and plugged it in to my board and just started playing and holding power chords. I did not hear potato chips, But I do hear strange, added harmonic frequencies (not good ones) when I play certain bar and open chords with the drive on - not all - but like A major - bar at 5th fret 6th string A gets sounding a little weird. To me it almost sounds like it finds the A note, kind of, but is uncertain of its tonality and the computer is trying to search other note upper and lower intervals (not sure if you catch what I am describing). I am tuning my "distortion sense" input for my guitar down -2db and I think that is helping. My PRS, New Les Paul and Strats all have really high output pick-ups, which I think is creating more output at specific frequencies. I initially had the Kemper setup for my older LP, which has old P-90's and much less gain.


    Anyway, is this the right use of distorted sense? not sure really what lowering or raising distorted sense does to the input of the stomp? do I need to setup both senses every-time I change guitars? I think its really cool that Kemper understands different pickup output voltages and provides a path to correct.


    Previous sense settings: Clean 0.0 db Distorted 0.0 db
    Current adjustment: Clean 0.0db Distorted -2.0 db


    Kind Regards,
    Brad

    Is this an external stomp box you're kicking in? And is your sound guy complaining about a crunch at the point you kick it in or is he complaining about 'your drive sound'?


    I'm not sure I have an answer for you in either case but clarity of understanding what the issue is might help someone else to assist you. For the record, I've never played with clean or distortion sense. It's worth reading up on these as you may be barking up an inappropriate tree IMO :)

    [quote='blund69','http://www.kemper-amps.com/forum/index.php/Thread/27754-Sound-man-says-my-Kemper-sounds-like-a-bag-of-crushing-chips-at-times/?postID=292652#post292652']Anyway, is this the right use of distorted sense? not sure really what lowering or raising distorted sense does to the input of the stomp? do I need to setup both senses every-time I change guitars? I think its really cool that Kemper understands different pickup output voltages and provides a path to correct.[/quote:





    Had the same Problem and can produce the same issue when playing clean crispy sounds. (Typical SC)
    I think it is more a matter of volume settings in the profile and not so much the clean sense. (0 must be OK)
    I use an eq with high cut at approx. 8-9 KHz and lower the volume before the stack (or in the amplifier or cab).
    Reducing the Master volume or RIG volume don't help as far I considered.


    What is your output level? I have to set it lower than -20 dB otherwise this noise come easy.


    I can not explain why this help - but it helps. Don't have the Problem anymore :)

    Quote from blund69

    Anyway, is this the right use of distorted sense? not sure really what lowering or raising distorted sense does to the input of the stomp? do I need to setup both senses every-time I change guitars? I think its really cool that Kemper understands different pickup output voltages and provides a path to correct.


    Had the same Problem and can produce the same issue when playing clean crispy sounds. (Typical SC)
    I think it is more a matter of volume settings in the profile and not so much the clean sense. (0 must be OK)
    I use an eq with high cut at approx. 8-9 KHz and lower the volume before the stack (or in the amplifier or cab).
    Reducing the Master volume or RIG volume don't help as far I considered.
    What is your output level? I have to set it lower than -20 dB otherwise this noise come easy.
    I can not explain why this help - but it helps. Don't have the Problem anymore. ;)

    Quote from Sharry

    Had the same Problem and can produce the same issue when playing clean crispy sounds. (Typical SC)
    I think it is more a matter of volume settings in the profile and not so much the clean sense. (0 must be OK)
    I use an eq with high cut at approx. 8-9 KHz and lower the volume before the stack (or in the amplifier or cab).
    Reducing the Master volume or RIG volume don't help as far I considered.
    What is your output level? I have to set it lower than -20 dB otherwise this noise come easy.
    I can not explain why this help - but it helps. Don't have the Problem anymore. ;)


    So I was playing with these profiles (BTW I am using Bert Meulendijk Kemper Profile Pack, specifically his Bogners and Plexi's that I purchased - and I just want to say - they are worth every dollar I paid, best damn sounding profiles to date; the problems are NOT the profiles or Kemper per se' - just to be clear) - I found out a few things. (To answer some other questions - there are no external stomps these are all "virtual stomps" from Kemper. All outputs levels set to 0)
    1. Turning down distorted sense by 2db somewhat helped - but still had the weird artifact/sound, just not as loud.


    2. I have a compressor in stomp slot 1, which had it's output set to +2, the Distortion Plus is in stomp slot 3 (this is what I like to use for drive). When hitting a power 'A' chord or 'F' chord, the compressor, I guess, is driving the 'Distortion Plus' into some weird harmonic overdrive, not every chord but - really, really, really sounds like shit - totally unnatural - totally digital & computer sounding - turning it off and/or down seemed to resolve the problem but I loose the smoothness of the compressor. However, this is confusing because with the overdrive stomp turned off and compressor stomp engaged I do not hear this but when I turn the Kemper Gain Knob up to 50-75% I hear the exact same artifacts. Why?


    I really think this is strange behavior because when I use my Whampler Ego in front of my OCD Overdrive into my Physical Boogies or Marshall's I never hear artifacts like this only smooth tone - thoughts?


    3. Gain staging seems to be the problem here, I think, but not 100% sure - since there are no overload indicators on the stomps there is no real way to determine if I am overdriving another stomp, but question still stands what is this compressor doing that would cause weird/added harmonics even when the gain control is increased???


    4. You cannot treat your Kemper stomps like you would your analog gear - Kemper sounds amazing, no doubt about it, but at the end of the day - it is still a computer. You need to really tailor your sounds to your axe and playing.


    Cheers,
    Brad

    To me, the internal od/dist stomps just don't sound good. See of you can find some good driven/distorted profiles that fit your needs instead. (And notice i said "to me"). And this is coming from one who is madly in love with his Kemper.

    And in the end, the love you take is equal to the love you make.

    Like 1

    It's impossible to digitally clip fx modules, OTOH a distortion module will indeed distort more if driven harder.


    You can clip just the input and/or the output, and this is hint at by the I/O LEDs being consistently on the red.


    What is your Distorted sens set at?

    I've encountered odd artifacts similar to what you are describing on a handful of profiles, and I found that the clarity parameter had the largest impact on its noticeability--values > 0 made the artifacts much more obvious. If the profile you are using has a non-zero clarity level, you might try adjusting back to zero to see if that helps.


    how did you hook the kemper to the mixer? jack cables or xlrs?

    "...why being satisfied with an amp, as great as it can be, while you can have them all?" michael mellner


    "Rock in Ecclesia" - new album on iTunes or Google music

    I think you might be overdriving the preamp on the board. A lot of sound guys think if the connector fits, it's compatible. I can't tell you the number of times I've fed a line-level output to the sound guy only to have him idiotically run that into a cheesy mixer preamp and persist to tell me levels are way to hot for some reason. It's a LINE-LEVEL signal, I reiterate over and over to blank stares.


    Anyway, you can certainly get teh levels matched and run into a preamp if you want to. Leave the output gain at 0. A better solution would be to give the sound guy a TRS connector instead of XLR, so he uses the line input on the board instead of the mic pre.


    Not saying this is your problem, but it's a problem I've had a lot over the years.


    As for the kemper sounding brittle, and edgy. I've been dealing with that myself, and find that most profiles have the treble and presence WAY to high for most of the stuff we do. At first I was afraid to crank them because it just didn't seem like it could be right, but we are getting better sounds since doing it. If it sounds good, then there are no rules.