At some point every electric guitarist these days stumbles across the amazing studio musicians that create content for YouTube. Just watch Tim Pierce, RJ Ronquillo or Pete Thorn and you’ll soon have amp fever, lusting after their quick multi-head amp switching systems. After my experiments with various cabs, leading to my decision to go with all head and cab amps instead of combos, I started looking at these switching systems.
At the same time I am a huge fan and constant watcher of That Pedal Show, where Dan and Mick have taught me about the joy that is a wet/dry rig. Having one amp run all the gain pedals and another running gain plus all the time and modulation effects gives a huge soundstage that doesn’t wash out you main tone. Trying different combinations of amps for each role has led to some very interesting and inspiring tones that would not have been otherwise possible.
The Problem with Most Switchers
But this has led to a bit of a problem. All of the top amp/cab switcher are pretty much mono, and even running 2 of them would mean having to split my amps into two groups ahead of time (I don’t have many amps, so that would make it pretty pointless). Just as I was about to bite the bullet and go full mono from now on, I came across a brand I’d never heard of before in a forum post.
De Lisle to the Rescue
De Lisle makes a number of switching solutions, some more basic than the often-proposed devices. In fact, the amp and cab switched I ended up with is a fully passive device that simply lets you switch any of the 8 cabs to any of the 8 amps. Its only safety measure is a passive load that protects an amp if it’s not connected to a speaker, but even then, only if you don’t send a signal to the amp.
So it’s not fancy, doesn’t have midi control and won’t let you swap between a bunch of amps while playing to try out various tones. What it does do is let me set any amp that is connect to any cabs that are connected. If the amp could handle it, I could run all 8 cabs to one amp. More importantly, I can run any amp to any cab at the same time, making any wet/dry combination possible without having to go behind and re-wire my cabs.
Not only has this wonderful device made experimenting more fun and easy, it’s also breathed new life into my Mesa Boogie Triple Crown as I play it way more often now that I don’t have to hook it up every time I want to play it.
Which only leaves one last question, which head should I buy next. Ok, maybe that one is already answered as well.
Guitar amplifiers fall into two categories, combo amps and head with cab amps. Both camps have their own pros and cons with space, portability and ease usually taking the top spots of each list, but should they? Once you have even one head and cabinet setup, and plugged another combo amp or other head into an existing cab you realize there is something even more important to consider. Tone. That magic word that all guitarists are on a never ending search for. Turns out the cabinet and speakers you plug into have way more to do with your amp’s tone and feel than you likely ever realized. So can your cab really free your tone? Yes, yes it can.
WHERE IT STARTED
My first realization came after I bought my first head and cab setup, a grail level amp, the Two-Rock Classic Reverb Signature V3. Huge cleans with tons of bottom end was the name of the game for me. like all things life changes and I decided I wanted something smaller and more versatile. Enter a Bloomfield Drive 40 watt combo amp and out goes the Classic Reverb. A second cascading stage to give more in amp gain, and a smaller footprint for if I ever moved (I was in a bit of a minimalism phase). The only problem? After some time I really missed the big deep cleans of the Classic Reverb.
Luckily (in hindsight) I sold the head separate from the cab as I got a change to plug the Bloomfield combo into the Two-Rock 2×12 cab. The difference was honestly staggering! Not only did the bass response of the 2×12 come back, but surprising some of the chime that I thought was inherently lost in the new amp too! This revelation lead me to run the combo into the cab pretty much all the time, and eventually I swapped the combo for the 100 watt head version of the Bloomfield Drive as it seemed silly to have a combo speaker that was never getting used and also gave back the 100 watt bass response that I adore.
ADDING SOME MORE
The next head and cabinet pair I purchased was another huge 100 watt beast, the Paul Reed Smith J-MOD 100. This time the cabinet was an even bigger closed back cab giving me something else to play with. When you need more bass out of an amp (rare, but happens as you will see soon), that is the cab to plug into. The cab matches to the John Mayer signature amp very well, giving it the signature bass response that John raves about in his demos. The closed back doesn’t fill the space with sound in the same way the Two-Rock cab does, but instead gives a quicker response to the speakers as the air behind helps bring them back to the ready position faster.
WHERE IT WENT WRONG, BUT THEN SAVED THE DAY
So far both amps sound great, but different into each cab, but what about an amp and cab that were meant for each other but just don’t do it for me? That’s just what happened when I picked up a Mesa Boogie Triple Crown 100 head and cab locally. The cab was compact by deep, giving a really percussive mid range that I could see working really well for high gain metal players, but make the amp sound quite nasal and honky in my opinion. As I got ready to sell the amp and cab I figured I’d give the amp one last try plugged into the PRS cab and I was blown away, almost literally. Gone was the honk and in it’s place was massive bass end with a more classic rock feel. That cab (and the Two-Rock one as well, which also sounds fantastic with the Boogie) saved that amp for me.
After I had gotten rid of my original Classic Reverb, I plugged a lot of amps into that 2×12; 5-watt marshal clones, 20-watt hand-wired Marshalls, Kempers, and more. Compared to a number of other cabs I have had (Marshall hand-wired 2×12 for the 20 watt as well as some unbranded ones) it’s always sounded more open and balanced than the rest. Even in the world of IR’s and digital amps, do yourself a favor and get a great cab or two, it’s worth it. Next up for me, I’m thinking it’s time to try and 4×12 or 4×10 and see what that does to my tone.
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I have had Kemper Profiling Amps on and off for the last couple years, normally selling them when I realize I don’t actually play them like an amp as much as I twiddle through the thousands of profiles I have on my computer. The concept of the Kemper was a ground breaking thing 10 years ago, but has been done by other companies with more powerful processors and updated UIs. The one thing none of the competitors have match thus far is the powered head/rack with their built in 400 watt solid state amplifiers which let you use the Kemper as a stand alone amp.
But there has always been a drawback to doing that, which is your still had to lug your favorite cab around with you (in my case a Two-Rock 2×12 open back) and it never quite sounded right for the different profiles, though I find I prefer the Two-Rock for most amps, digital or tube. Then Kemper came out with the Kab and Kone which are Full Range Flat Response (FRFR) speakers make by Celestion in a small cab (or sold alone). These plus a software update promised to let you change the sounds and response of the speaker to match a selection of popular speakers, giving you a truer amp in the room experience. But do they deliver?
Having picked one up for myself, I immediately loaded up some of my favorite profiles of a Hi-Octane kit amp I once had. It’s a 5 watt class-A Marshall clone, that sounded incredible when you pulled the second preamp tube out, giving more of a JTM vibe. I profiled this amp a while back using a direct box to record the speaker out signal, meaning the cab/mic was not in the “direct” profile giving it a true amp only feel. So how did it sound into the Kab? In a word: Terrible. You see, what I expected was that the Kemper Kone setting in the software would make the Kab work like a standard guitar cabinet. Instead what it does is use the existing cab information in the profile (in my case, nothing) and tweak the response and eq curves to mimic having that cab loaded with different speakers.
At this point I was pretty much ready to return the Kab and sell yet another Kemper, but then I decided to do a quick copy/paste of a Two-Rock cab off another profile, onto my Hi-Octane profiles to see how well it works compared to my actually cab. While I can say it’s not 100% accurate (partly because there is no impulse for the Two-Rock branded speakers in the cab) it does sound much better, and the little 1×12 Kab can really put out some volume and bass despite it’s diminutive size. Oh right, lets talk the Kab itself.
It’s small, about the size of a Fender Princeton, meaning it can fit pretty much anywhere. This plus it’s laughable weight (25 lbs) means it’s very portable, something that I was really excited for. You see, I have my guitar amps all setup in a nice place in the basement, good for playing and recording, but not near my computer. Especially having gotten rid of my Bloomfield Combo, I no longer have a good way to play guitar in my office area, so being able to chuck this speaker under my desk and far enough back that I won’t kick it is great.
Image Copyright of Kemper-Amps.com
The weight also means I can carry the Profiler in it’s case in one hand and the Kab in the other hand down halls, up stairs and anywhere else with ease. I’m still not sure how that speaker is so light, being used to a 1×12 Blackshadow in my old Mesa Boogie Mk III weighing almost 20 lbs by itself, I’m not sure how this beast of a speaker exists. What do I mean by “beast of a speaker”? The Kemper Kab is rated for 200-watts rms! Though they do say that you shouldn’t use it with any other signal generator as it won’t sound right unless running the Kone software, but it does pump out tons of volume. The bass response of this skinny, tiny speaker cab is also quite impressive thanks to that power handling and a bass boost option in the Kone settings page. I still need to play with it more, but it seems to get close to my very large 2×12 cabs in overall bass response, which is very impressive.
So what is my final verdict? At $500 with tax, it feels a bit too expensive, but if you want to go with a Kemper as your main rig without resorting to in-ears, it is a pretty good option for monitoring on stage. Ultimately for me, I am a bit disappointed by it’s failure to work without a cab in the profile, and I would have returned it the next day had the store I bought it from online not had a 5% restocking fee. But I am glad I didn’t as the more I use it, the more I find how I can tweak it to get some great tones and am spending less time zipping through profiles and more time playing guitar. Which is ultimately the goal of any gear.
Update (12/8/21) The Kabinet is gone. In the end I decided the convenience of the light 1×12 didn’t outweigh the cost when I already have a couple 2×12 cabs I like the sound of the Kemper through already. Money-no-object, I probably would have kept it around just to have under my desk for the occasional quick play, but at $500 it just wasn’t worth it when something like a Yamaha THC, Waza Air or other more practical options exist for less.
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