Actually the host was acting impressed, and I was thinking, "Wait until you see what I can do with my "old" Kemper".
What I can do with my "old" Kemper is:
1) Carry my entire guitar rig in one trip from the car (and fit it in a car)
2) Plug-in and setup in 5 minutes
3) Sound great with a level of consistency I was never able to achieve with boutique tube amps and pedal boards
That is where I live when it comes to what I need for a gig-rig 
Agree.
For me, there isn't anything on the market that is a match for the existing KPA when it comes to a gig rig. Nothing!
No other device gives me the tone, ease of stage setup, size and weight, and right down usability on stage that the Kemper does.
I don't expect anything to exceed the tone of the KPA (since we are already at the point that any tonal differences are a matter of preference), and currently nothing is even close (IMO) to the gig usability.
I originally had a VHT 4x12 with a VHT 2X12 "Fat Bottom" cab. Playing the Kemper through an amp and to the speakers (PA amplifier used, not a tube amp so not to add/remove anything), what I found is that the VHT cabs create so much of a "tone" themselves that all the profiles have a common "sound" or "color" to them.
I get much better results using a FRFR speaker (DSR112) when I want to play with a group that doesn't have IEM's or enough PA to amplify the Kemper directly with the PA.
With my own PA, I use IEM's for monitoring, and go directly into the PA with the Kemper (no cab or amp on stage). This is by far my preferred setup..... but I don't play lead.
For lead playing, there really isn't a substitute for the air interaction between a local amp/monitor and your guitar strings. For lead players I would recommend the following:
1) Kemper L/R direct into PA
2) Kemper Monitor out to a powered FRFR on-stage pointed at the guitar player
3) IEM's to hear everything and your guitar.
So in my experience, (others may and will disagree) you don't need the power amp or the orange cab :).
Everyone wants kemper to be like a effects unit, I love how its more like a amp. Its more like a stand alone amp with loads of toneshaping. Stereo rigs an all that phff. Is there a Soldano forum now were people are saying they want a stereo Soldano. Want stereo? buy 2 powered cabs an run the stereo effects into that
Not everyone.
I think that those of us that play mostly live with the KPA love that it behaves and operates very "amp like".
Those that primarily use the KPA at home for recording tend to want the ultimate routing and efx unit with lots of interfacing capabilities. IMO, this is a use case that the KPA kinda grew into, but has never ben particularly well suited for (by design).
.... but even people that record want the authentic tones you can get from the KPA, they just want the recording interface and routing capabilities of the QC or AxeIIIFx as well.
I suppose there is nothing wrong with wanting it all :).
Take me and others who just want a Kemper Mini. Does nothing for the "at home" user, but for portability and throw-and-go gigging .... amazing!
The reason I keep advocating for a Mini is that it is a much easier lift from the current architecture than making a KPA2 that is a fundamental change from KPA1.
It works that way by design and is highly unlikely to change. The reason being that the Generic Gain covers the full range that the Kemper is capable of. Amp gain is almost always less than the full Kemper gain range. Linking the morph function to Amp Gain would restrict the morphable range unnecessarily. Within the amp’s gain range the two ate linked 1:1 so there is no reason to use the amp gain when the full range of the generic gain could be used.
Based on my playing with LP's, (btw, I still hear "Les Paul" when I see LP ), it seems like more is going on than just changing gain when you change a LP gain. Before LP, when taking a high gain profile and lowering the gain, you frequently lost clarity and the tone would become muddy and not pleasant. After LP, "changing the gain" seems to keep the profile sounding good and all gain levels (much more like a real amp would).
Of course, I could be incorrect (but it didn't sound like it), but it doesn't seem like the LP gain simply limits the gain range .... but maybe it does. Does anyone know for sure?
Seems like we go in circles in this discussion :).
When you break down the KPA product and its competition, seems like things can be broken into 2 markets, and a few categories:
The two markets are Recording and home production, and live gigs.
The categories are:
1) Sound Quality
2) Ease of Use
3) Functionality
4) Marketability
Things like multiple amps, graphical routing (multiple series parallel paths, etc), more effects, etc all go into "Functionality".
Where KPA has shined has always been sound quality and ease of use. For gigging, it has flat out been the best thing on the market (IMO) for quite some time and continues to be to this day. For ease of use, among its completion, it is by far the easiest to use for live work (IMO).
It isn't as marketable as QC or AxeIIIFX. All those shiny color routed screens are tough to compete with for the poor KPA's monochrome non-touch-screen interface.
It isn't as functional as the QC or Axe III FX either. The routing and output capabilities of these products far exceed the KPA.
In the past, I have advocated for a KPA Mini (ie, just scale down into a lower cost market). If anything, I feel like a simple upgrade to a color LCD could greatly improve the marketability of the KPA.
I have always felt that the KPA is a gigging musicians tool. It doesn't need to be pretty, it just needs to sound good and be easy to use live .... and be ROCK SOLID reliable/durable.
It is also great for people who want to record with classic amp sounds but don't want to carry around a truck full of amps.
For those with functionality desires for multiple amps, and advanced series/parallel routing capabilities, I have never felt the KPA is the right tool for that job..... and for me, I don't want it to be.
The KPA workflow (for me) is easy and very "amp like" (for those of us who are classic tube amp setup guys). It has just enough "Digital" work-flow capabilities to be "simple" compared to an entire pedal board of pre and post effects, yet not get crazy confusing in doing so.
I guess what I am saying is that I am not sure I want the KPA2 to deviate too much from the formula it is currently using for success.
I agree that a KPA2 is necessary due to manufacturing constraints. Chips become obsolete and companies just quit making them. Nothing you can do but redesign the product around new parts. If I were the product manager of the KPA I would be thinking about things like:
1) Color LCD - Touch Screen - Soft menu buttons (marketability)
2) Move from a 4 pre / 4 post to "n pre / n post" (functionality)
3) Integrate WiFi and BT into the unit (functionality)
4) Dedicated phone app (ease of use)
5) Advanced tablet app (designed work-flow from ground up for unit operation, not rig management) (ease of use)
6) PC rig manager (ease of use)
The very act of using newer, more powerful, DSP chips would likely give the new KPA2 a sound quality edge over the existing KPA, but I doubt that this would be the reason people would pick the KPA2 over the KPA1.
Keep in mind that at this point, we aren't just talking about a new product. We are talking about a new generation product line. It is likely that the "Cadillac" version would go first .... the Toaster and Foot Controller. After this, the rack, stage, and mini would need to be filled out to complete a full market product line. The existing Kabinet should be interchangeable. It would be a nice touch of the old foot controller was also compatible for those who have existing product and want to upgrade to the KPA2.
Anyway .... those are just my 2 cents
What I'd like to see:
- Quantization on the looper
All good ones for me too, but ESPECIALLY this one. Maybe you looper pro's can make a perfect loop on the first try, but for the rest of us, a little quantization would make it actually useable live.
I can use it at home, in a situation where if I botch a loop, I can just start over; however, for a live application getting it right even 2 out of 3 isn't anywhere near close enough for a live performance (I might be able to live with 95 out of 100 for a live performance, but even then, not good).
There is always the case for just shelling out the $$$ for the Boss RC600 (really only a little more expensive than the Kemper Remote), but I only want it for a 2 or 3 songs for solo performances, so I don't really want to deal with another large foot controller with a more complex live setup (love my KPA rack and FC for ease of live setup).
Lots of time what sounds GREAT by yourself doesn't CUT with the band. This is especially true for metal.
The fact is, your guitar rig low end is NOT going to compete with the kick and bass that occupy that frequency range in a HUGE way. And really, your guitar shouldn't.
Getting a good mix in a live situation is an exercise in frequency separation. The guitar occupies the mid range of the frequency spectrum in a band (as others have suggested, hi mids are your friend). It is a delicate balance. Keep in mind that the eq bands can CUT as well as BOOST :).
I am not a metal player per se, but I do love my chug when I play something heavy (Enter Sandman, Fuel, etc is about as heavy as I get). Even with metal, try to stay out of the LF below .... say 80-90 Hz. There is plenty of "punch" around these frequencies without getting into the meat of the kick and low notes and sub-harmonics of the bass.
Lots of metal has the bass, kick and guitar hitting the impact points at the same time. For you to be heard, you need to have your guitar eq'd to emphasize frequencies people can hear that don't conflict with the kick and bass.
It won't sound as good by itself when you do this, but just give it a try and see how great it sounds live.
If you want to really play around to see what frequency mix to setup, the morph pedal feature is your friend! Try setting up a parametric eq where you can morph the center frequency of one of the eq channels. Give the channel about 4-6 db of gain (this is ALOT) to about double the volume of that frequency (10db is considered audibly double). Play with the band and move that frequency around in the Mid to high frequency range with your pedal and see how different boosted frequencies sound with the whole band playing.
I think you will be very pleased with the results and you will learn with your own ears what sounds good in the mix!
Hmm, for me they have it covered with the powered Kabinet.
There seems little advantage of having the power amp in the stage/front of stage, better to be as close to the speaker cab as possible - hence built in to the powered Kabinet.
I have bought the Blackstar Amped 3 for rehearsals and its great but I will have to try to source a long speaker cable, otherwise Im on top of the speaker!
My thoughts exactly.
The powered Kabinet is specifically designed to sound good with the KPA. While you can easily get good sound from a power amp and a cab of choice (although the cab will likely color all your rigs to the point where specific rigs will be needed for each cab you use). Depending on the cab, you may get coloring that over-flavors your rigs. My VHT cabs (both the 2x12 fat bottom and 4x12 slant top) do this to such an extent that it makes all rigs have that specific "flavor" added.
I could have worked to rid the setup from that "flavoring", but I found it easier to just use a FRFR speaker that accurately reproduced the KPA output (made this call in the first week of having my KPA in 2013). If I had it to do today, I would have purchased the powered Kabinet for my stage monitor for those times when I am not using my own systems IEM's OR I am jamming with another band that uses stage monitors vs IEM's.
FWIW, I think you need a physical monitor on stage if you need resonant feedback. IEM's are find for your monitoring of what you are playing, but only air movement will get your strings resonating.
Crap. It's been quite some time since I sold my VHT UL (before Steve sold the company name ). I gotta have this.
Thanks for posting!
Sadly, the most I can come up with is a nice color screen ;).
Of course, I never knew I needed LP either!
Display MoreThe LP gain knob behaves as if there's a bright cap.
Manual:
The authenticity of the [LP] Amp Models is also true for the amp’s Gain control, which will mirror the exact range of the original gain potentiometer, as well as the tonal changes of the attached “Bright Cap”.
No. The non-LP tone controls still function as an amp's tone controls, just a generic one. LP tone controls are not generic, that's the difference.
Have you tried putting a volume boost pedal in front of an overdrive pedal? Depending on how much volume boost you give, the overdrive pedal gets more distorted. And if you give it a ton of volume boost, then the overdrive pedal gets distorted beyond just the distortion it can provide by itself, right? That's basically what's going on. When you turn up the gain into a nonlinear system, you get more distortion.
As an aside, outside the digital domain, over-driving input stages of different analog (or digital) gear can get you the kind of distortion that you definitely DON'T want. Even the KPA can suffer from this if you over-drive the output (and get the output light to go solid red).
... but yeky83 is right about putting a volume boost in front of either a gain pedal, or the amp. It is no different than EITHER raising the volume on your guitar volume knob OR increasing the gain on the preamp (or pedal). I use this as well as a pure boost in the X slot after the amp to produce a good lead tone from a rhythm tone ( ... well, I also add an eq to boost the mid and mid highs for the lead as well).
The point is, adding volume before the amp mostly just raises the gain.
Right, I never said what you said I said. Glad we cleared that up.
To be clear, I am still saying that for many amps, the volume you play at (not just the gain) makes a big difference in the tone. I do not intend to argue how much of that tone change is due to the power amp tubes vs the cab speakers nor is it really that relevant.
Since the volume you play at makes a difference for the distortion AND LQP does NOT take volume settings into account (only gain), one could argue that for amps where volume effects the tone, the LQP should be taken at a high volume with max gain, or potentially several LQP's should be taken at different volume levels in order to capture the behavior of the amp.
This does not, in any way, reduce the effectiveness of LQP's. I believe this is one of (if not THE) biggest enhancements the KPA has ever had.
What I said was:
"Your contention that the power amp distortion and speaker distortion are a minor part of the overall distortion when the gain on most amps is turned up is really only true for high gain amps IMO."
Oh and I never said this.
To be clear, what you said was:
My contention was not that cabs do not distort, rather that they do not distort audibly enough to contribute to an overall guitar amp tone.
Oh. OneEng1 did you mean the Volume parameter within the Amp module of the Kemper? Well then there you go, it's just a volume knob. I thought this was common knowledge, so I misunderstood you and thought you meant the master volume of the amp being profiled.
I understand the Kemper gain staging. My point was that there can be differences in a real amp that are volume dependent vs gain dependent with regard to the amount of distortion the amp creates.
LQP as documented says to profile the amp with all the eq flat and the amp gain at max. It doesn't specify the volume at which to perform the profile at.
Your contention that the power amp distortion and speaker distortion are a minor part of the overall distortion when the gain on most amps is turned up is really only true for high gain amps IMO.
As a result, even a LQP would need to be profiled at multiple VOLUME levels in order to account for the volume related distortion.
LQP has no other mechanism of handling this volume induced distortion that I can see. It must be profiled at the volume the amp displays the characteristic distortion you wish to recreate on the KPA.
Cabs do not distort significantly enough to be audible, especially above the amp distortion which is orders of magnitude greater. What's often thought of as "cab distortion" is simply the amp's power amp being pushed harder and distorting.
This is in fact proven with the Kemper. The fact that Merged Profiles work at all is because cabs do not distort audibly to cause issues with the Kemper's linear Cab block.
With that said, even with LQP it'll still be necessary to capture an amp with many cabs & mics cus different cabs, mics, and mic placements sound different.
Not sure this is relevant. Yes, at higher volumes, some amps produce "power amp" distortion vs "preamp distortion"; however, it isn't like the KPA knows that the distortion is from the amp or the speaker cone .... and my point was that this distortion is output volume dependent.
FWIW, I know that cabs (some of them anyway) distort because I have driven them with powerful PA amps that don't distort and still got distortion at high volume even with a clean guitar signal. Most speakers will distort if you push them hard enough. Of course, some speakers do this without hitting the coil xmax while with others, you are about to blow your drivers in your cab when you hear it.
Ok, so let me rephrase the question here:
Pre-LQP, it was necessary to capture an amp at many gain levels, with many cabs and many mics/mic positions.
Post LQP it is STILL necessary to capture an amp with many cabs and mics correct?
Now, the real question is, since the LQP is based on the max gain of the amplifier, and cabs distort at different volume levels, does that mean that to properly capture an amp/cab profile you should dime the volume as well as the gain to achieve the "most distorted" version of the combination?
It is well known that some artists (like AC/DC) relied heavily on cab distortion for a relatively "clean" sounding distortion.
So ... in that particular case, the REAL amp/cab combo will absolutely change tone based on the main volume
Yeah, I know ..... there's always one in the bunch
Well, this might be.
But for me, and I'm using and will still use "old" profiles in the future, the actual "hype" about Liquid Profiling is not appropriate.
I agree. I have many "old" profiles that sound fantastic as is. What I am finding with LQP is that I can shape tone much easier to sounds that I like better.
First, this makes it possible for me to take an existing profile and make it even better than I could with the tools I had before. That isn't saying that the profile was incapable of getting those settings before LQP was introduced, it is saying that I was unable to get to those settings.
Second, I have found (for the same reasons) I am now able to take many existing "old" profiles that I couldn't previously tweak to a sufficiently good tone and make them sound really great.
The tones were always there, I was just unable to get the KPA there with the previous tools in many cases.
Note: I have only profiled 1 amp in my 10 years with my KPA (my old VHT UL). While I was able to sufficiently capture that sound, I no longer use it as I have found better sounding rigs for what I was using that tone for that I didn't make.
I can't speak for all KPA users since many of you use your KPA very differently than I do; however, for me, the KPA was never about profiling my own amps (or friends amps), it was about getting a suite of good tones to play live. To be clear, I am a live performance guitar player, not a professional KPA profiler. Sure, there are many that are both, but for ME, I will leave the profiling up to people that do that well and either graciously provide them for free, or sell them at a reasonable cost. Sure, I still have a suite of microphones (SM57, e609, MD421) that would make great profiles, but that just isn't my thing (I also no longer own any tube amps .... but still know quite a few people who do).
For others like myself, LQP provides a clear advantage over the standard KPA controls in taking an existing profile and making it into something gig-worthy with my guitars, PA chain and playing style.
The tone was always there in the old firmware, it was simply out of my reach in several situations, so for ME, LQP is actually under-hyped. I could care less if it makes the KPA controls "behave" like this or that amp. I could really care less if the KPA "captures" the exact sound of this or that amp. What I DO care about is how it sounds live and how hard or easy it is for me to get it to sound like that.
Honestly, I have been kind of confused since day-one on why people so often insist on comparing a profile to the original amp and so infrequently focus on how the KPA sounds in a live mix.
Of course, as I first stated, I know that others use their KPA differently than I do and their needs could be quite different to mine.
Ok, so the weekend is finally here (yea!). Got some time and got liquid.
Took quite a bit of time since I was on 8.7 (did a backup), loaded 9, rebooted and made sure everything was still alright. Then loaded 10 beta.
First thing that happened was I found the same bug others have reported in that my output didn't work anymore. Also as others reported, removing my USB from the computer and rebooting the KPA fixed it (it is a beta after all).
I wasn't sure when all the discussion started how excited I really was about this update, but figured in theory it should make it easier to get good tones faster.
BOY WAS I RIGHT. I am stunned at how quickly I can take an old profile and tweak it now to a number of great tones without much effort at all!
I have always felt that the KPA was the easiest of the digital amps in the high end market to get a good tone out of, but LQP has made it WAY easier than it was before.
Further, it just seems like every rig that I work on just comes out better than I was ever able to get it before and with very little effort.
So here is my take:
What I thought was going to be an "eh" moment is actually the best firmware update (for me) since I bought the KPA in 2013. From an overall standpoint, my guitar tone is going to be more improved by this update than from any other update ever. Not because the KPA got better tone, but because it let me (someone who is not Michael Britt) get so much more out of a profile by tweaking it than I could before. To be clear, I don't think this will do anything for Mr. Britt since he is one of the most accomplished masters of getting good profiles out of the KPA on the planet. For the rest of us mere mortals, LQP is the biggest improvement in the KPA since its inception IMO. Of course, YMMV.
Now, I have to get back to my KPA and continue to create tweaks of my current list of favorite profiles. Fortunately, my wife and daughter are off in Chicago this weekend so I can make all the noise I want! :).
Thank you ckemper . Great update!
You may have been thinking - correctly - that we can't create our own new tone stacks - we can only choose one of the supplied ones. Otherwise we are free to create profiles and use the new tonestacks to render our own "liquid" profiles - liquid in that they can be operated with the authentic tone and gain controls.
This was my understanding as well.
