Greetings all! Just thought I'd share these audio file links with you. Recently, my band played a corporate gig in Orlando, Florida where we backed up Eddie Money, Gary "The Dreamweaver" Wright, former Journey singer Steve Augeri, Jeff Carlisi from 38 Special and former Chicago singer Bill Champlin. I also wanted to give you a bit of my background and some observations on using the KPA for the last couple of years. This might get kind of "ME ME ME!" for a bit, so in case you want to bypass all that rubbish and go right to the audio files (so you can skip right to the solos and hear how bad I might clam them up!), click on this link www.markdannells.com and scroll down to the audio players embedded in my latest News entry on the Home page. I have entire song files of "Don't Stop Believin' " and "Separate Ways" by Journey, "Shakin' " by Eddie Money and "Love is Alive" by Gary Wright. These are basically board mixes with an audience mic, but they sound pretty decent.
So, a little about myself...Again, I will try not to ramble on too much, but I think my professional experience can be helpful to both current KPA users and those debating taking the plunge.
I have been a professional guitarist since the age of 14. Some of the notable bands I have played in include Grammy nominated artist/producer Butch Walker, Grammy nominated singer/songwriter Angie Aparo, Elektra/Music Company artist Brand New Immortals and I toured briefly with Skid Row in 2006 to fill in for Snake Sabo as he recovered from a hand injury. I have also composed/produced music for various TV and Movie projects. My current band, the Yacht Rock Revue, is mainly a cover band that recreates the "Soft Rock" sounds of the 70s/80s. What makes our situation a bit unique in the world of cover bands, is that we often get a chance to do shows performing with the very artists we cover. In addition to the aforementioned artists, we have also backed up: Robbie Dupree ("Steal Away"), Walter Egan ("Magnet and Steel"), Peter Beckett and Ronn Moss of Player ("Baby Come Back"), Elliot Lurie of Looking Glass ("Brandy"), Al Stewart ("Year of the Cat"), John Oates (Hall and Oates), Bobby Kimball (Toto) and even Rick Derringer! We also do themed shows where we recreate entire records like Sgt Pepper, Dark Side of the Moon (I have some clips of this show using the Amp Factory Gilmour Hiwatt that I will post soon), Purple Rain, Thriller, Led Zeppelin IV, etc...Given the diversity of the material we play, it's no wonder that I sought out the Kemper profiler! I was previously using the Egnater Mod 50 ( a great sounding, versatile amp), but it wasn't practical to transport on an airplane for fly dates, and...I'm just getting tired of heavy gear!
I got my first KPA toaster from Sweetwater in April of 2012. It was a demo unit that they were selling at a slightly lower price. I am pretty sure I had to be among the first US Kemper owners at that time. I was extremely impressed with the unit, but because of the shape of the toaster and the fact there was no internal amp made it a bit difficult for me to use it live in a practical manner. I sold it after about a year and replaced it with a Power Rack as soon as they became available in the US. Now, we're talkin'!
Another bit of pertinent info about me is that I had worked in a local boutique guitar shop here in Atlanta for years called appropriately enough "Boutique Guitar Exchange". I have since become a part owner of the store in addition to my touring schedule, so I have quite a bit of experience with high end gear. (Shameless plug...check us out here..Boutique Guitar Exchange ) I have checked out just about every high end amp out there...Two Rock , Divided by 13, Red Plate, Carol Ann, Morgan, etc. so I have a pretty good perspective on great amplifiers.
I did fight a bit with the Kemper live at first. I am currently using a Port City 2x12 with Jensen Neos, which sounds great with my other rig, but I wasn't getting the "Chime" and dimension I wanted. I also tried a Matrix 2x12 FRFR, and it sounded great, but it wasn't quite what I was looking for. At a recent gig, a guitarist in another band we were playing with had a 65 Amps Empire head with the 2x12 cabinet loaded with a Celestion Blue and a G12H. I plugged my Power Rack into just the 2x12 cabinet and... MAN! It came to life. I'm thinking the Celestion Blue gave it some sparkle, and the open back design of the 65 amps cabinet helped give it more dimension as well. I have also used a Forte 1x12 with a Scumback speaker that sounded pretty cool, too. This is not to dissuade anyone from an FRFR. Logically this is the way to get the most out of any profiler/modeler. I just personally like having a standard guitar cabinet at this point.
The recordings I linked to above used another set up entirely. Since it was a fly date, I back lined a Fender Hot Rod Deville, and just used the power section of the amp through the effects loop. This is a miced cabinet. I didn't run direct outs to the sound board. I want to try the DIs, but I want to make sure I have time to work it out with our sound guy before I just jump into it. Old habits die hard! My tone sounds pretty good, but a little boxy on a couple songs...Especially the rhythm tone in "Separate Ways". The recordings do show, however, that the amp does indeed cut though a 7 piece band extremely well. The first thing Steve Augeri said to me was "Man, that amp sounds great!" Pretty cool coming from a guy that worked with Neal Schon for 8 years! Conversely, the first thing Eddie Money said to us was "Hey, anybody got any Tums?" True story.
Since this recording a few weeks ago, I have changed my main profile from the Amp Factory Trainwreck to the Amp Factory Matchless Chieftain. We had an actual Sampson era Chieftain at the store recently that I just loved, but we sold it before I could profile it. The Amp Factory profile recreates that Matchless chime extremely well, even with my current cab/speaker combo.
OK...If you've read this far, go grab yourself a beer to mask the pain from too much information! Anyway, I hope this post gives all you KPAers out there some useful info...
Mark Dannells