Kemper profiling is great. Much of the time, in a fair listening scenario, profiles are indiscernible from their source amp.
Some posts sorta make it seem like now there’s just one more website where people who haven’t tried a Kemper can criticize what’s wrong with it. But among non-metal pros who are touring digital, or really anyone who can’t manage heavy cartage, it’s pretty ubiquitous. Since it’s not the only or even most convenient way to go, its appeal is its sound and .. the resulting “feel” that goes along with that, and that it’s built to pro specs. For anyone who’s interested, actually interested in understanding what it’s like to work with it, versus what they may perceive as its limitations on paper vs component modeling, it’s worth trying it.
Anyway, mad respect for Digital Igloo’s perspective. It’s not as if he hasn’t been part of the revolution. I don’t own current L6 stuff, but it seems like they’re on the verge of a pretty big advance with their new cab framework. And they’re already putting insane value inside of tiny hardware boxes, which is amazing.
One reads about lots of folks loving the Hx sound, and admittedly a lot of others who love the system but find their tones more easily with Fractal and finally, when they eventually get it in their hands, Kemper.
Despite the vast and ongoing chatter of Internet naysayers since the Kemper’s release ten years ago, the second that other companies began offering iterations of what is essentially CK’s code—let’s be honest, in at least one case it’s (maybe respectfully) identical—this tech has received a ton of buzz across the boards among people who dismissed profiling since forever.
Once folks get over their surprise about how not limited and how musical the tones can be, people inevitably want this functionality at their disposal.
Conversely, as someone who’s been forced to adopt an all inside the box approach for some recent production circumstances where the Kemper hardware would be cumbersome and re-amping problematic versus making changes on the fly, I’m wishing for news from Kemper about a freestanding app and daw plug-in that reads .kpr files and lets me stay inside of their ecosystem, which has worked so well for me for so long.
But meanwhile no, not at all, it’s not the only way to get great tones. So if you’re getting the tones you want by all means don’t explore the Kemper approach, or its THU NDSP ToneX etc variants. But if you haven’t tried it and want to, while I take issue with the compromised or cheesy-looking new “competing” implementations, by most accounts they do achieve a similar startling result as the original (why wouldn’t they?).
Maybe at some point, similar to amp wiring or whatever, or even the emergence of modeling, this approach to creating guitar tones will be part of the public domain, and it’ll be less about lifting Christoph Kemper’s invention and more about truly adding to the conversation with different approaches parameters and user interfaces.
I appreciate Digital Igloo’s resistance or distaste for copping Kemper’s code. I always say it, but on guitar boards everyone seems to presume that these designers and manufacturers are all about the money, but it ain’t necessarily so. If line 6 eventually does implement a version of this tech I’m thing it would fall in to the add to the discussion category, versus others where essential parameters have been dispensed with for who knows why..
L6 will get pressure from the masses to do this.
It’s not exactly the same, but I’ve always used raster-based software, and I’ve always used vector-based software. But when more recent apps appeared that exploit both approaches and combine them, it’s hard not to be excited about that, from a creative and from a workflow perspective.
So it’s also easy to see why combining profiling with component modeling holds appeal for a lot of people.
ymmv
Does this site have a delete™ feature?!
But it's not something I pine for by any means
