Kemper Profiling Amplifier Head BK

This gear is fantastic...

very good. I love it...

But..

it took about seven weeks to get this product. (KOREA)

A difficult review

I'm going to find this a hard review to complete not because of a fault of the product but because owning one nearly turned me off completely from electric guitar.

First off, I was desperate to buy a Kemper for my studio as it represented the most satisfactory way of recording guitars without resorting to isolation cabs. When it first arrived, I profiled my amplifiers before selling all but one. The profiles were easy to do and very accurately represented my amps. The quality of the Kemper was beyond reproach but once setup in the studio I found I was playing less and less and when I was playing I was auditioning profiles and settings more than enjoying playing guitar. During this time I completely lost interest in the guitar and got more enjoyment out of keys.

A couple of months ago, whilst trying to scrape together the money for acoustic treatment, I decided to sell the Kemper. It has taken a couple of months to get back to enjoying playing again, now with an amp. What seems ironic is that the amp I play through was the same profile I used 9 times out of 10 on the Kemper and the profile accurately reflected the sound of the amp. The only conclusion I can draw is that, for me at least, whilst the Kemper sounds great and is very well made, it isn't as enjoyable and as inspirational as playing through a proper amplifier. For a composing studio musician that is a serious drawback.

Forget about amp sims, this is the winner!

For electric guitar and bass, nothing comes close to the sound quality of the Kemper profiler. I spent years messing around with Amplitube and other sims, with SGear being a top favourite in the end. But the more I read and heard about the Kemper, the more I wanted it so I took the plunge.

It's not needless to say, but I sold my amp and cabinet not long after as I only really use it in my home studio. Must say that the M Britt profiles complete the picture for me and I'm getting the absolute best guitar, harmonica, and bass tones in my recordings.

For those of you who have real world amps that you love, profiling them is as far as I can tell the only current way to capture their sounds without blasting your neighbours.

Very happy with my purchase. If you're considering taking the plunge in the profiling world, jump now, you won't regret it!

Excellent kit for studio and small gig use

I've been using the Kemper for a few months now, both in my (very simple) home studio and for small gigs. I'm actually running four instruments through it, a NS/Stick (fretless bass, effectively), electric guitars, a cello and sax with the acoustic instruments using a Mixing Link pre-amp. I've also put an Eventide H9 and Ditto X2 in the external stereo loop, and some other outboard processing in before the input (a sitar pedal and compressor).

In the studio, quality is excellent - running either line out or SPDIF into a Scarlett 18i6 interface produces beautifully clear noise-free recordings for all instruments. It's great to be able to plug in my bass, flick to an appropriate profile and record that, then switch to another instrument and with a single button press have everything set up to record that completely different sound perfectly. Fantastic when you don't want gear changes to interrupt your flow.

I've also used the profiler running directly in a variety of PA systems (conventional and a Bose line array on one occasion) for small gigs with a four piece 'prog folk' band. My main worry was that without a bass amp behind me I'd have trouble hearing myself (we're not playing in venues that would really justify conventional monitors) but it's not been a problem and I've had plenty of compliments on the bass tone. I'm also a big fan of the size and form factor in this case - gig bag for the bass on my back and one hand each for the kemper in its padded bag and my pedalboard and I can carry my entire rig in one go without breaking my back.

I've not actually tried to profile any amps, and I don't own the kemper remote (although I suspect I will soon), so I've really only used the 'off the shelf' functions of the device, including the pc/mac software for managing rigs (kemper's rigs are a combination of amp, effects, input configuration etc). I've used some free rigs from the rig exchange (something like 5000 of them on there last time I checked) and also purchased some from online sellers, one in particular which managed the 'edge of breakup' tone I was after for my telecaster.

All in all, not only is the kemper excellent quality and a pleasure to use, but it's actually replaced a load of gear that in total cost considerably more. It's saved me money, chiropracters's appointments, space, and made composing and gigging more productive and sound better. As you can probably tell I'm a fan, I'd recommend this to anyone but especially to multi-instrumentalists.

My only reservation is whether I'd have preferred the white one...

the only thing you will ever need for guitar sound

I have been playing through modeler ever since I started investing in guitar gear. I start from the Pod XT > HD and now here. I finally come to the Kemper Profiling Amp.

This is truly a game changer, the tone you get from this thing is superb. And not only it sounded good, it response to your playing like a real tube amp. The technology has come a long way. I am truly impress, you may think its pricey at first. But when you have play thru it, I am sure you will be convinced instantly

Incredible!

I've had the Kemper for one month, and only one concert, and I've had more than a dozen people (including professionals) ask me about it, take photos of it, or research it on their own, because it sounds so great. The crystal clear highs and low-end "whomp" of a tube amp--but not just one, but any one of hundreds of amps are available (Marshall, Vox, Orange, Fender, Peavey, and lots of great unknowns -- like a Rasmus Snake). I sound like a Kemper marketing employee, but I am not -- this is just the most incredible piece of equipment I have seen in over 20 years of playing guitar!

No more real amps

I've bought the Kemper just on great reviews and it definitely hasn't let me down. The amount of options you have with this beast is just simply ridiculous. This does mean that it takes a little bit of time to get used to handling it and finding all the features.

As both a guitar and bass player this is perfect as it handles the bass just fine aswell. It's great for recording as you don't need to go through the process of setting up a mic properly and it's great in a live setting too.

Hands down the best investment of my life.

Quite possibly one of the last pieces of guitar gear you will ever buy

Like most people, I struggled with the idea of spending a "lot" of money on this mysterious little item about the size of a toaster.

The thing is, a "lot" of money means different things to different people; and it's all relative, as they say.

For example, relative to an Axe-FX II, the Kemper is much cheaper (and much better, but let's not get into that argument right now...). And certainly, relative to actually buying the many amps, cabs, and stomp effects built into the Kemper, plus those uploaded by users to the Rig Exchange for you to freely download, and those that will in the FUTURE be uploaded there whenever someone profiles a new amp that is released by a physical amp company, the Kemper is, much, much, much cheaper...

So, in addition to tens of thousands (if not more) of pounds / dollars / euros worth of amp profiles and effects, it comes with a great tuner (that looks like a spirit level), a noise gate, an effects loop for any physical pedals I may own, a variety of recording outputs so I can record silently to my computer, and I don't have to waste any more of my life buying various amp heads, cabs, microphones, and tear my hair out trying to get a good sound out of them......?

Well why didn't you say so..? Sign me up.

End of the road

Best purchase I ever made for guitar. I've owned many modeling devices over the years, PODs, BOSSs etc., and real tube amps too. I've always needed the ability to get good amp tone when I'm gigging, at rehearsal or in my bedroom. This thing totally captures the nuances of the profiled amp, so you can have the tone that someone spent tweaking for hours with the best mics, preamps, ect. forever, except now useable at any volume. Better yet, once captured you can do things to it with the innovative controls that are impossible with a real amp. For example, a good amp cleans up as you pick softer and back your guitar's volume off. But if you back your guitar's volume too much, you'll lose too much volume to make it practical. In the Kemper with the built in compressor within the amp section, you can make it so that as you back off your guitar's volume, the amp still cleans up, but the volume will be compensated.

The unit is not only have the "factory snapshot" profiles, but you can download thousands of free shared profiles on the Kemper web, and you can buy professionally modeled profiles from 3rd party companies. Pair this with a quality powered PA speaker like the Yamaha dxr10, you'll never miss playing through a real amp again. Best yet, capture your best sound and have the ability to use it at more reasonable volumes.

If that's not enough, you can actually turn off the Cabinet modeling and run this thing through a real guitar cab. All you need is something to power your guitar cab with, (best solutions is a solid state poweramp which is not colouring your tone, or you can buy the Kemper Powerhead which have a built-in mono poweramp).

The effect section is wonderful, you can adjust every important parameter, and the sound is awesome. With a 3rd party MIDI footcontroller (Behringer FCB 1010 with UNO mod for example) you can easily handle the most musical situations.

Fantastic KPA

Fantastic piece of kit, sounds incredible, have done some profiling and the similarity between the two is incredible. It's built like a tank, which is very reassuring. Very pleased would highly recommend. Of all modellers I've tried nothing else comes close, I cannot recommend this strongly enough, I would not be without my Kemper.