Sick Of Heavy Amps? Try Modeling Again!
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- Опубліковано 24 січ 2023
- Sure we all love a good half stack, but we all get a bit tired of lifting all that weight. Guitar modelers have come a long way since the harsh thin tones of old. Fractal Audio, Line6, and Neural are really reshaping how we think about guitar and amp modeling.
The FM9, Quad Cortex, and the Helix are great units that can save you time and actually save you money. Have your great tones and almost any pedal you want/need at your fingertips!
What happens if you get to a gig and someone spills a drink? Or falls on it? Do you take a spare?
That is possible although hasn't happened to me in the 4 years of using them. Two other people in my band currently use a Helix and Quad Cortex, so it happened,we have a preset/patch set up on theirs to run a second guitar.
@Dustin Radtke Yeah makes sense way more convenient than taking massive amps and boards everywhere.
Definitely a concern though. I haven't gigged with my modelers yet, but I would perhaps use a MIDI foot controller and hide the main unit somewhere near the cab or something.
My favorite fractal thread on the forum are the threads of people freaking out not knowing how to adjust volume, since there are 45 places to adjust (mess up) the volume. fune times! oh yeah also when the owner yells at his customerds!
a 1x12 combo like a deluxe reverb is great for most gigs and isn't that heavy. but then again there are drawbacks:
1. you can't screw up the tone in 714 places
2.you don't have to spend 300 hours going through the menu just to get started
I've been pretty happy with HD 500(x) Especially with the JTV89F Nothing stopping me but me.
Interesting thoughts on the fm9 and helix sounding more organic. I found the opposite. I play lower gain and clean stuff and that’s where I personally found the QC to shine for me. Felt more amp like and didn’t have the digital fiz that I was constantly dialling out on the other 2.
That’s being said I found the helix and fm9 better for the high gain stuff and seemed more organic to me.
I was able to get them all to sound and feel almost the same with tweaking. End of the day and after lots of hair pulling I came back to QC for the ease of use and just felt and sounded more like my amps I was used to live.
Great video
Everyone's ears are different, I'm glad you found the right fit for you. High cut usually helps tame the fizz.
I love using the Quad Cortex. It's just so user friendly, small, and it is a great looking pedal.
@@DustinRadtke for sure. When I had the 9 I loved the cab section of it with the eq cuts etc.
A bit surprised you are hearing digital fizz on a FM9. I have one- sounds pretty clean to me. I'm not trying to doubt you but I have also never heard anyone else ever say that. I wonder if it could be your power supply or cables, or speakers. In addition to my own persona experience, I have watched many clean patches from many artists that sound amazing.
@@MOAB-UT the digi fizz was more in the gain models I found. I was able to tame it down with eq cuts and cabs etc but always had that helix feel/sound to my ears. I’m not saying it’s bad. Just not my thing.
All my cables are high end, monitors, headphones and amps are the same set up I’ve used with my quad which im not having the issues with.
Of course the fm can sound great. I’ve heard it many times from other players.
I just couldn’t get there with it. I spent 3 weeks of non stop trial and error. Non stop tweaking at home and live. Live was a nightmare. I just got so frustrated with it that I sold and went back to QC.
I Played a friday gig with the fm9 before NYE and that was my breaking point. Called up my buddy to borrow his QC for nye Saturday. Loaded my last back up, went to venue 10 mins earlier just to plug everything in. Played first set and after we finished the sound tech and band both thanked me for switching back.Lol.
Using at home I really enjoyed the FM9 and was getting some of the best John Mayer type tones I’ve waver had. But live was another story.
I’d love to give the FM9 another try sometime when I can afford to keep both so I can spend what ever time it takes to get it right for live. But for now I’m sticking with QC as I just don’t have the time to deal with fractal and I’m not bringing a laptop to my shows to help deal with it.
The QC does everything I need and way more than I’ll probably ever use. sounds and feels amazing and only took me about half an hour to get it gig ready on the first day I owned one.
@@sugarprobe Maybe watch some Cooper videos. He is able to dial in really clean tones...even when he adds gain. ua-cam.com/video/SL5rthCGA4c/v-deo.html&ab_channel=G66 Like I said, your situation is not usual. Have you tried any other units with different cables, etc.? No way Cliff would allow fizz to live in his products- especially in the FM line or AxeFX III.
Buy some patches and first hear them in YTbe. If you get fizz, it's your specific and personal hardware which I do suspect. Very unusual. Have you tried with headphones? I get the fizz on the Line6 stuff- which is why I am all about Fractal.
Just a shout out for the FM9. Never tried the QC, likely never will. I've used Helix Native but not the hardware unit, it's just ok for me. On the FM9, I get your comment about less than intuitive on the fly. As a new owner, I need to spend more time editing things on the hardware instead of software editor. Practice makes perfect. One thing I will throw out there is that I haven't yet employed Performance Controls. If I'm not mistaken, the user can edit Global or Per-Preset performance controls and bring them onscreen so that what parameters you have setup can be handily adjusted. I believe the PC screen will stay active on hardware display until you close it manually (pinned). Any thoughts on this?
Oh, absolutely. There are several ways you can set it up to be easier to use and make quicker to get to. I wanted to show the out of setup that most users would see when they are just starting. I got so frustrated with the FM9 when I was new to Fractal, simple things like switch setup changes, amp changes, etc are all hidden a few menus deep.
All that said, I use my FM9 live over all of them though. I just connect to the tone more!
+1
you want to save time? get a tube amp with the lowest amount of controls possible. less room for errors.
yup ditched my fractal fx3 rack and went back to tubes, its awesome. no digital bs.