ShatteredVitreous
Well-Known Member
- Joined
- May 7, 2018
- Messages
- 267
- Reaction score
- 569
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Well after 4 years of loving the Kemper and simultaneously being frustrated with the quality of the profiles on offer I finally sold it. I know we have some Kemper lovers on this board and I am certainly not mocking the product, its a fantastic digital device, but there were in the end too many things that annoyed me about it.
My frustrations:
Variation in profilers was drastic so if you wanted continuity between recorded tracks you needed to stay within a very small offerings from various profilers who all profiled the same (mixing Deadlight with Choptones was fine, MBritt with Top Jimi was fine but mix any of them up and its night and day in terms of application)
Having to surgically eq every profile to remove the over hyped bass, fizz or with some profiles a flat and apparent lack of body, to only thin the sound out too much was frustrating.
Stacking profiles just turned the results to mush.
Rig Manager since the introduction of an editor became so unstable from one minute to the next you could not use it. Performance mode, which is what I used to organise my patches by song, just did not work since version 6.
i took stock and decided to really question if I liked it enough to slow down my workflow. After realising I only used the JCM800 and AFD100 profiles I decided to try the real thing.
Off I went and purchased a JCM800 2203x (£700), Two Notes Reload (£500), a Slash wah (£150) and a GTOD (£80) plus a Twin City (£80) so I could split my signal to the JCM800 and my SJ.
A few things I noticed which was immediately apparent:
The lack of options had a huge impact on workload. No longer was I scrolling through thousands of profiles to find what would fit.
What sounded good out of the speaker sounded good in the mix. The overhyped profiles sounded amazing in isolation, to much fighting when recorded.
No longer, beyond a simple low pass, did I need to surgically eq the guitars.
Stacking guitars just made the sound huge and using the eq to make space for certain frequencies was quick and easy.
Sound experimentation was zero. Want a different delay? well buy it and really think about if you want to spend the cash rather than scrolling for hours and never getting anything done because it is all freely avaliable.
Its not all amazing.
I now have a clutter of cables, the fizzy sound from the reload is annoying at times but its a much better work flow and.......well thats it. Tucked the cables under the rug, put my headphones on when writing and I am in tone heaven.
I can honestly say at this point in time, and don't take my word for it, I am done with the digital world. With only the Axe left for me to try I really don't see the attraction in having so much choice whilst having very little time.
Now I just need a modern voiced Marshall to compliment my JCM800 and SJ that is not a JVM.
Boring story I know but I thought I would be nervous or reluctant on the day to sell, definitely not the case.
You know whats better than convenience, the sound of a tube amp....don't compromise
Mike
Well after 4 years of loving the Kemper and simultaneously being frustrated with the quality of the profiles on offer I finally sold it. I know we have some Kemper lovers on this board and I am certainly not mocking the product, its a fantastic digital device, but there were in the end too many things that annoyed me about it.
My frustrations:
Variation in profilers was drastic so if you wanted continuity between recorded tracks you needed to stay within a very small offerings from various profilers who all profiled the same (mixing Deadlight with Choptones was fine, MBritt with Top Jimi was fine but mix any of them up and its night and day in terms of application)
Having to surgically eq every profile to remove the over hyped bass, fizz or with some profiles a flat and apparent lack of body, to only thin the sound out too much was frustrating.
Stacking profiles just turned the results to mush.
Rig Manager since the introduction of an editor became so unstable from one minute to the next you could not use it. Performance mode, which is what I used to organise my patches by song, just did not work since version 6.
i took stock and decided to really question if I liked it enough to slow down my workflow. After realising I only used the JCM800 and AFD100 profiles I decided to try the real thing.
Off I went and purchased a JCM800 2203x (£700), Two Notes Reload (£500), a Slash wah (£150) and a GTOD (£80) plus a Twin City (£80) so I could split my signal to the JCM800 and my SJ.
A few things I noticed which was immediately apparent:
The lack of options had a huge impact on workload. No longer was I scrolling through thousands of profiles to find what would fit.
What sounded good out of the speaker sounded good in the mix. The overhyped profiles sounded amazing in isolation, to much fighting when recorded.
No longer, beyond a simple low pass, did I need to surgically eq the guitars.
Stacking guitars just made the sound huge and using the eq to make space for certain frequencies was quick and easy.
Sound experimentation was zero. Want a different delay? well buy it and really think about if you want to spend the cash rather than scrolling for hours and never getting anything done because it is all freely avaliable.
Its not all amazing.
I now have a clutter of cables, the fizzy sound from the reload is annoying at times but its a much better work flow and.......well thats it. Tucked the cables under the rug, put my headphones on when writing and I am in tone heaven.
I can honestly say at this point in time, and don't take my word for it, I am done with the digital world. With only the Axe left for me to try I really don't see the attraction in having so much choice whilst having very little time.
Now I just need a modern voiced Marshall to compliment my JCM800 and SJ that is not a JVM.
Boring story I know but I thought I would be nervous or reluctant on the day to sell, definitely not the case.
You know whats better than convenience, the sound of a tube amp....don't compromise
Mike
