Guitar recording: Real amps, modellers or profilers?

Let's look a little deeper into the differences between the traditional way to record/play an electric guitar (an amp being recorded with mics), the strange world of amp modellers, and the new exciting age of the amp profiler. I will be comparing these different ways of obtaining and recording guitar tones, and looking at their positives and negatives in comparison to each other.

I will start off by analysing the (not completely successful) shift from the traditional guitar recording methods to the use of amp modellers. The Line 6 POD (widely considered to be the first guitar recording pre-amp to gain serious momentum) had several benefits over traditional amplifiers. Not only did it promise a huge amount of tone variety through control of various emulated guitar amps, speakers, mics and effects, but as Paul White (2018) says (when talking about the “attraction of the modelling approach”), “You can play at relatively low levels and get big-sounding results in the knowledge that the sound you hear over the studio monitors while playing will be the same sound you’ll hear in the final mix”. This was a huge downfall of recording with a valve amp; the only way to get those thick overdriven tones onto a record was to turn the amp way up, and place mics in front of it to capture that sound. This not only meant that recording was more difficult as it couldn’t be done quietly, but also that when listening back, you would always incur some sort of room sound as well as phasing issues (because of sound reflections being picked up by the mic). This made recording guitars in this way much more difficult, and therefore inaccessible to many people.

Needing a fair amount of knowledge about mic’ing an amp effectively (see fig.1 below for “The textbook method of recording the guitar amp” -P. White) while also being able to afford those mics was asking a lot of guitarists who didn’t have the money to record in large, well equipped studios. Having access to the sounds of thousands of different amps and microphone combinations all in one box was massively more cost effective (although finding the exact price of the POD during it’s release is strangely difficult), than spending possibly tens of thousands of pounds on various different amp models and microphones, on top of having a well acoustically-treated environment. This is also without mentioning the massive amount of space saved, as 4×12 cabinets take up a vast amount more floor-space than the hand-held size of the POD.

(Taken from The Producer's Manual 4th Edition - Paul White, 2018)

While this may seem like a ‘slam-dunk’ for the POD, the one thing it (along with all other amp modellers to this date) didn’t seem to convince guitarists and producers of, was the most important part of the whole product; the sound. As Per Normann (2013) states; “The idea that the electron tube is irreplaceable has a huge affect on the amplifier market. Designers and vendors of amplifiers have to comply with this supply and demand situation. With a market craving for electron tube amplifiers, new inventions is not likely to be profitable in years to come.” This suggests that even as late as 2013, the market was still heavily reliant on traditional tube amplifiers, and had not significantly shifted since the creation of the POD 17 years previously, and the main reason for this was people simply didn’t think the sound was as good as the amplifiers the modellers were supposed to be imitating.

This is, however, only 2 years after the first mention of the infamous Kemper, which was first unveiled at National Association of Music Merchants (NAMM) in 2011. I believe that this is where everything changed for amp modelling, just as Michael Wagener, (producer for Metallica, Ozzy Osbourne and others, selling over 90 million albums worldwide) (2012) commented “The Kemper is a game changer and is hands down THE best piece of gear that walked though my studio door in the last 20 years”.

The Kemper is an amp profiler instead of modeller, which is a hugely different piece of apparatus. Christopher D. Schiebel (2021) put it best; “This profiling amp is designed to capture the exact tones, dynamics, and responses of any amp it’s plugged into, by playing various samples through it so that it can scan and understand the sounds and responses of your amp, analysing the result to create a detailed snapshot”. This huge innovation in terms of tone capturing seems to have solved the only glaring issue which was present with the amp modellers. The Kemper retains all of the same advantages over traditional guitar recording/playing, while seemingly delivering the exact same sounds achieved by the conventional methods.

This is, however a slightly contested point, as it is easily possible to find those that still disagree with the idea that the tones are the same, for example; Jan-Peter Herbst (2019) writes “The findings indicate that although most producers experiment with modern technologies, they regard these as special effects or backup solutions. Traditional guitar sounds and engineering practices are still preferred”. However, although this is offered as an opinion, there are no listed producers or quotes to back this up. Whereas a study by Nina Düvell, Reinhard Kopiez, Anna Wolf and Peter Wehie into “Discerning between Hardware Guitar Amplifier Sounds and Simulations with the Kemper Profiling Amp” in 2020 yielded “no support for a commonly accepted pessimistic attitude toward digital simulations of hardware sounds”. This is also supported by Michael Wagener (2012) who, after doing multiple tests with routing guitar signals through various amps and recording them with multiple microphones, concluded; “I could not hear a difference, I could not tell where the amp track ended and the Kemper track started and vice versa”. He also added in the next paragraph “The secret is in getting a great profile(…) refining the profile the correct way etc. If done right, I can not tell the profile from the original, if NOT done right, there will be a noticeable difference”.

Adding to all of this, the Kemper has another distinct and unique advantage over all other methods of creating guitar tones; the ability to share all of these ‘snapshots’ online with other music makers. This really does (for the first time ever) provide anyone access to the greatest guitar tones from the best amps all over the world, given direct to you in your bedroom through your headphones.

In conclusion, this seems more than sufficient evidence to support the argument that when used correctly, the Kemper amp profiler is possibly the next link in the chain of the evolution of guitar recording and performance. Just as portable, convenient, versatile and easy to use as an amp modeller, while retaining all the classic tones and sounds everyone loves from the old-school amplifiers and microphones. After reflecting on this research which I have gathered, I truly believe that for guitar recording and performance needs, it would be a complete waste of money to invest in expensive amps, or any top-of-the-line amp modellers, as neither of them can match the versatility of the Kemper... which is why we have one.

References

WHITE, P. (2018). The Producer’s Manual – All you need to know to get pro recordings and mixes in the project studio – 4th Edition. Ambleside: Jake Island Ltd.

Kemper amps (2021). News flash The Kemper Profiler is back. [Online]Available at: https://www.kemper-amps.com/news/29/The_KEMPER_PROFILER_Rack [Accessed 21 Oct. 2021]

NORMANN, P. (2013). Design of amplifiers in LTspice Aspects on the usage of spice-ware in the work of designing an electron tube amplifier Per Normann. (2013). [online] Available at: https://www.diva-portal.org/smash/get/diva2:628880/FULLTEXT01.pdf [Accessed 21 Oct. 2021].

WOODS, M. (2014). Line 6 POD. [Online]. Available at: https://www.audiotechnology.com/features/line-6-pod [Accessed 21 Oct. 2021].

(WAGENER, M). Kemper? – Page 2 – Gearspace.com. [online] Available at: https://gearspace.com/board/so-many-guitars-so-little-time/795465-kemper-2.html#post8569668 [Accessed 21 Oct. 2021].

SCHIEBEL, C. D. (2021) Amplifier Modeling vs Profiling – What’s the Difference?. [Online] Available at – https://www.guitarlobby.com/amplifier-modeling-vs-profiling/ [Accessed: 21 Oct. 2021].

HERBST, J.-P. (2019). Old sounds with new technologies? Examining the creative potential of guitar “profiling” technology and the future of metal music from producers’ perspectives. Metal Music Studies, 5(1), pp.53–69.

DÜVEL, N., Et al. (2020). Confusingly Similar: Discerning between Hardware Guitar Amplifier Sounds and Simulations with the Kemper Profiling Amp. Music & Science, 3.