I picked up my Kemper yesterday afternoon...took it home and started playing. Next time I looked up 3 hours had passed. Went and made supper.came down....played thru it until I couldn't stay awake. Where did the time go? Went to bed with a grin on my face!
I am transitioning from the POD Line6 XTLive and HD500 floor boards...as well as recording experience with the POD Farm Platinum plugin and a half dozen other Guitar amp Sims / Plugins. In years past I've owned a number of All Tube rigs and have been gigging on and off in both a professional and hobbyist capacity for close to 30 years.
First impressions....very intuitive...easy to move around in. I consulted the manual, perhaps, twice and that was for some obscure deep editing function i was curious about. I was VERY surprised at some unexpected functionality under the hood. Some very cool things there.
Sound / Tone?....Incredibley responsive to touch. I've never played anything like it....even when I had my Marshall / Boogie / Randal all tube rigs back in the day. The string to string / note definition is a joy to hear and feel. You can have a crunchy / Chunky / Distorted tone and yet it doesn't turn to mush...you can strum a chord and it still sounds open. The Cleans are CLEAN...no digital distortion / hash / overtones. THE TONE CONTROLS WORK! What I mean is....often times with amps and modellers you turn down the bass control to remove some "Mud" from the tone but you end up losing your "meat" as well as the mud. The Kemper tonestacks...they way they explain them in the manual...is that they designed the tone stacks to give a player a much greater range of controll than what is actually modelled. So when i turn down the bass control to get rid of a little mud..it does EXACTLY that...it leaves the "meat" or "Body" of my tone intack and gets rid of the mud.
The pick attack/ definition is outstanding and....when I back off my volume knob the sound of the patch actually cleans up. When I do that on most Modellers or actual tube amps , (depending on the amp)...not only does the sound "Clean up" , but it also gets thin. The Kemper doesn't do that. It gets clean and stays full. I like that the Kemper also balances out volumes between patches. I realize you can change them and make them as loud or as quiet as you want but the basic starting patches are leveled out..no nasty volume jumps. All in all...I could have taken the unit and walked onstage last night...dialed in a dozen stock tones to cover the full range of material our cover band performs..and started playing. I found it to be that easy. I'm really looking forward to digging in deep to this thing. There are couple of things I noticed about the functionality of the HD500 that the Kemper doesn't have but it mostly relates to the freedom to patch in more effects post Amp and Cabinet. I realize there is the X and Mod positions. I like having several Parametric EQ's in the Post position. Small thing really. And the computer GUI for editing...If one is on the way...great!
So...the criticism has been asked...is it worth it paying the cost difference for the Kemper compared to the HD500? It's a valid point... does the Kemper sound THAT much better that the dollars invested are not wasted?The answer to that is as individual as each person reading this.The short answer from me is YES...absolutely..I love the Kemper!. Obviously..the 2 units are not in the same league. But....It's going to depend on what you value. Screaming metal band with 2 guitars pounding out at 115db? Maybe not. Playing guitar behind a 4 piece horn section, lead vocalist and 3 backup singers? Maybe not....But for what I do, playing in a Cover band and recording in the studio, both situations where quality and nuance of tone as well as the ability to dial in sounds fast are the main criteria? ...Let's just say....I am not regretting my choice.
Kemper forever!!!