I think I'm done with modeling

[BroSlinger]

Yeah I'm thinking it could go towards something I'd use or at least enjoy more.

Like that new Metropoulis

Hah! I’d love that! Honestly been looking at a Dr Z or Suhr Hombre head. I’d love to drop $3K on a new Metro though. George would love for me to do it too

If you get a Dr. Z, I guarantee it will sound good. He makes a lot of different amps that do a lot of different things. You may not find the one you need, but it will always sound great.

Pedals into a clean Dr. Z is my favorite sound for 90% of what I play.

[GuitarBilly]

Metallica is actually a great example. I remember seeing them in 99 and was completely blown away. This was way before I knew shit about gear, and had only been playing a couple of years. Then again in 2009, and it sounded amazing. My wife and I saw them in 2017, and of course the show was great, but the guitars just aren't there. Thin is a good way to put it, but they also seemed to get buried. The drums, despite Lars' mediocre playing, were like fucking AHNOLD biceps, while the guitars were Where's Waldo weak little wimpy arms. Pathetic by comparison.

I don't really get why bands at this level bother with this crap. Is convenience really a concern here? Just use your fucking amps...someone else is moving them and setting them up anyway.

There was certainly a period of time that I was looking for convenience, but never could get into the modeler stuff. At some point I just decided nah, fuck this bullshit. If I am getting on stage, I want the half stack sticking it's dick in the audience's ears from behind me on stage because it's that fucking big. Fuck modelers.

Yeah I don't get it at all why do it at that level. The smaller bands that are doing fly gigs and on a tight budget I can kind of see it (but not really as there are many ways to have a compact rig without going digital, the BluGuitar mentioned above being a good example of it). But Metallica, Rammstein etc? They travel with their whole fucking stage. These guys could be using 10 4x12s each and it would barely add to their load. Not to mention the modeling racks are just as big as their old racks.

How is this saving any space/weight at all? You can easily rack 3 Mark VIIs in the case with plenty of space for effects...wtf...

[TurboPablo]

Wow. I had no idea you were a model. Did you ever meet Kathy Ireland?

[greatmutah]

Wow. I had no idea you were a model. Did you ever meet Kathy Ireland?

Meet her? No. Fapped to her back in middle school/high school? Yes.

[EndTime]

Metallica is perhaps the biggest example. Their current live sound is pathetic. And basically everyone knows it. It isn’t cause they are old and lack aggression, which is also there too. Lol. It’s cause they “simplified” and decided that a much weaker sound is in some stupid way better than carrying amps and more gear. It makes NO sense. Even tho I heard their reasons. It’s more reliable and sound doesn’t change as much as tube amps bla bla bla. Nevermind they were able to pull off countless years and tours anyway. Whatver is simpler surely doesn’t outweigh sounding like they do these days . If anything, the only things they needn’t do is the wall of amps and all that. Which most were fake anyway. But ok, don’t bring all that excess. Have 2 half stacks on stage for all I care. That would shrink doen their old real amp rig immensely as well.

But whatver it offers in consistency and simplicity is simply taking the skill of the sound guys and the amp techs and whoever else made it work for decades and made them somewhat obsolete.. Yay???

[GuitarBilly]

Metallica is perhaps the biggest example. Their current live sound is pathetic. And basically everyone knows it. It isn’t cause they are old and lack aggression, which is also there too. Lol. It’s cause they “simplified” and decided that a much weaker sound is in some stupid way better than carrying amps and more gear. It makes NO sense. Even tho I heard their reasons. It’s more reliable and sound doesn’t change as much as tube amps bla bla bla. Nevermind they were able to pull off countless years and tours anyway. Whatver is simpler surely doesn’t outweigh sounding like they do these days . If anything, the only things they needn’t do is the wall of amps and all that. Which most were fake anyway. But ok, don’t bring all that excess. Have 2 half stacks on stage for all I care. That would shrink doen their old real amp rig immensely as well.

But whatver it offers in consistency and simplicity is simply taking the skill of the sound guys and the amp techs and whoever else made it work for decades and made them somewhat obsolete.. Yay???

yeah and it's not even less gear. It's just shittier gear. Their Fractal racks are enormous.

And let's be honest, Metallica doesn't need a lot. They're not U2 or Pink Floyd with a bunch of different sounds.
Plug straight into a Mark series amp. There's 95% of the catalog. Then they need a chorus for the ballads, a bit of delay on solos, noise gate maybe... that's all. Oh and Kirk needs his wah. lol. But yeah, in terms of effects a goddamn Pedaltrain Nano should pack everything they need. And it would sound better.

It's just retarded.

[NinjaRaf]

Skip to 41 min, and this guy is talking about this exact thing haha.

But also, watch the whole video because it's pretty fucking interesting.

[greatmutah]

Metallica is perhaps the biggest example. Their current live sound is pathetic. And basically everyone knows it. It isn’t cause they are old and lack aggression, which is also there too. Lol. It’s cause they “simplified” and decided that a much weaker sound is in some stupid way better than carrying amps and more gear. It makes NO sense. Even tho I heard their reasons. It’s more reliable and sound doesn’t change as much as tube amps bla bla bla. Nevermind they were able to pull off countless years and tours anyway. Whatver is simpler surely doesn’t outweigh sounding like they do these days . If anything, the only things they needn’t do is the wall of amps and all that. Which most were fake anyway. But ok, don’t bring all that excess. Have 2 half stacks on stage for all I care. That would shrink doen their old real amp rig immensely as well.

But whatver it offers in consistency and simplicity is simply taking the skill of the sound guys and the amp techs and whoever else made it work for decades and made them somewhat obsolete.. Yay???

yeah and it's not even less gear. It's just shittier gear. Their Fractal racks are enormous.

And let's be honest, Metallica doesn't need a lot. They're not U2 or Pink Floyd with a bunch of different sounds.
Plug straight into a Mark series amp. There's 95% of the catalog. Then they need a chorus for the ballads, a bit of delay on solos, noise gate maybe... that's all. Oh and Kirk needs his wah. lol. But yeah, in terms of effects a goddamn Pedaltrain Nano should pack everything they need. And it would sound better.

It's just retarded.

Metallica of all bands is the one that needs an AxeFX the absolute least. Wheel out some cabs, bring out their Marks/Diezels/Rectos/everything else and just fucking play.

Similar thing happened when I saw Maiden last fall. Within Temptation opened up and it was all Kemper units. And it wasn't bad, but when Maiden hit, they were using real amps, real Marshalls and you felt that shit. You could immediately tell the difference. The guitars weren't lost in the mix that's for sure.

[RaceU4her]

i know i sound like a broken record, but i still havent seen that sub $500 single space simple layout amp model loader i can run into the loop of one of my tube amps and scroll through amps id really like to "try" but not cough up the money for like maybe a Rivera, Orange, Deizel or whatever. just a modern day gsp1101.

[spawnofthesith]

i know i sound like a broken record, but i still havent seen that sub $500 single space simple layout amp model loader i can run into the loop of one of my tube amps and scroll through amps id really like to "try" but not cough up the money for like maybe a Rivera, Orange, Deizel or whatever. just a modern day gsp1101.

2 rack, $2k only

[GuitarBilly]

I wouldn't be surprised if what happened is someone with a stupid title like "global logistics coordinator" made a fucking PowerPoint presentation on how the AxeFx would save them this and that and they just went with it. At some point these bigger bands start to run like corporations and anyone who ever worked a corporate job knows how stupid that gets. People having meetings about how to reduce the number of meetings and shit like that. This type of decision has middle management six-sigma black belt written all over it. Makes me happy I left that kind of environment forever..

[GuitarBilly]

i know i sound like a broken record, but i still havent seen that sub $500 single space simple layout amp model loader i can run into the loop of one of my tube amps and scroll through amps id really like to "try" but not cough up the money for like maybe a Rivera, Orange, Deizel or whatever. just a modern day gsp1101.

You can do this with a POD Go. The modeling technology and sound quality is pretty much the same as the Helix, just a much simpler signal routing and less features.


However, IMHO trying amp "models" is nothing like trying out the amps. It's not even close.

Anyone who played an 800 "model" in a Kemper/Fractal/Helix and think they know what a raging 2203 sounds like is pretty much the guitar equivalent of a virgin nerd that thinks watching porn counts as sex experience.

Something like the Synergy Syn1 would be a much better option for that since they're actual preamps. Sort of like a 500 Series chassis for guitar. Obviously you'd need to buy the modules but at least they'd give you a better taste of the amps you want to try. And you can sell/return the ones you don't like to buy more.

[NinjaRaf]

People having meetings about how to reduce the number of meetings

Literally had a meeting about this last year at work.

[Ostinato Rubato]

You deserve better than Helices.

[GuitarBilly]

People having meetings about how to reduce the number of meetings

Literally had a meeting about this last year at work.

oh yeah 100%. I wasn't joking. This kind of stupidity happens in these bigger companies all the time. I'm sure Metallica has that type in of jackasses in several positions within their organization.

[nightflameauto]

Our workplace is so stupid we have meetings to plan other meetings, then follow-up meetings to discuss what we just discussed in the bigger meetings. Reduce meetings? MEETINGS MEAN PRODUCTIVITY!

*Watches the seventy-eighth powerpoint slide on the importance of meetings*

[andvari7]

Fine, you fuckers sold me on it. I’ll put my Helix up on the chopping block, and - in the interest of compromise - I’ll set up a pedalboard-based system. Tech 21 Liverpool Deluxe, pedals, and done. Will that get me away from the limp-dick modeling you are ranting about?

[RaceU4her]

i know i sound like a broken record, but i still havent seen that sub $500 single space simple layout amp model loader i can run into the loop of one of my tube amps and scroll through amps id really like to "try" but not cough up the money for like maybe a Rivera, Orange, Deizel or whatever. just a modern day gsp1101.

You can do this with a POD Go. The modeling technology and sound quality is pretty much the same as the Helix, just a much simpler signal routing and less features.


However, IMHO trying amp "models" is nothing like trying out the amps. It's not even close.

Anyone who played an 800 "model" in a Kemper/Fractal/Helix and think they know what a raging 2203 sounds like is pretty much the guitar equivalent of a virgin nerd that thinks watching porn counts as sex experience.


Something like the Synergy Syn1 would be a much better option for that since they're actual preamps. Sort of like a 500 Series chassis for guitar. Obviously you'd need to buy the modules but at least they'd give you a better taste of the amps you want to try. And you can sell/return the ones you don't like to buy more.

maybe i gotta try a pod go. for me its not even how accurate to the real amp it is, its more the thrill of downloading a new amp, trying it with all my guitars, speakers, boosts... its what keeps the guitar in my hand noodling which is where most all of my riffs come from, that then gets me recording which lets me practice mixing and all that fun stuff.

[greatmutah]

Anyone who played an 800 "model" in a Kemper/Fractal/Helix and think they know what a raging 2203 sounds like is pretty much the guitar equivalent of a virgin nerd that thinks watching porn counts as sex experience.

this is going jn my sig.

[linthat22]

Well, if anyone has a Quad Cortex they'd like to offload...... I'll throw you a couple bills for it

[Lance-a-not]

As someone who has used a Kemper for a decade... Yup, you guys are 100% right.


Here's where it gets "what to do?" for a guy like me. (and confirming this thread)

So I live in an apartment, record a ton of derpy things.
All with samples of drums, cellos, violins, guzhengs... any weird instrument
that hits my ears. No way can I afford to put a orchestra, or even a drummer, in a studio.
I realize my Kemper tone is a little outside the norm, but I can drop it in there
with all those instruments and it mixes easy peasy lippin greasy.

I drop my Synergy, even through IRs in the mix and... bam, it swallows up
the mix. Basically like Billy was saying. I have even matched the Kemper
profile eq, it gets closer to the mix, and sounds more like some tube... But then most
of my mix goes to crap. Even more of a difference with a microphone, though the guitars are .

So I am stuck with a Kemper for recording because I can't go to real studios ($) to mike
up the Syn and hire guys

And "stuck with" the Synergy for the inspiring playing

I will say I play my Kemper through a real cab and until you get it loud it is fine.
Not even bad by itself at drummer levels. But once you crank up the amp the Syn30 it destroys.

[Shask]

I love my Fractal stuff. However, it is definitely a different experience than my tube amps. My tube setup is crazy though because I have them going through a reactive loadbox into stereo rack effects, then back through a SS poweramp into cabs.

[primeholy]

Not to brag, but I Was a Teenage Hand Model.....

[valtyr]

I have my Helix connected to my computer for recording but that’s pretty much the only time I use it. I stick with mostly tube amps the rest of the time.

Digital sounds thinner, even with synthesizers. Just 3 voltage controlled oscillators in a Moog will destroy any virtual analog or software synth in a mix every time.

[Dave]

Metallica uses modelers live?

That’s… something




Anyway I got bored of the helix itself real fast. It was fun for a minute when I was in a throwaway band but as soon as that was over I didn’t have it much longer.

I picked up an hxfx a bit ago and love it with my mesa 50 cal rig in 4cm. The boosts, modulation, time stuff, etc are all pretty sick, and it controls the amp switching. I much prefer it to the full-size helix.