Kemper Profiling Amp

124 Guitarist May 2012
£1,299
GUITAR AMPS
Christoph Kemper
He’s a German keyboard player, but don’t hold it against
him. The inventor of the Kemper Profiling Amp speaks…
W hen was the idea behind the
KPA first conceived?
“I can’t really put a date to this.
I had been playing a lot as a
keyboard player with bands
and loads of guitar players over
the years, both live and in the
studio. I’ve always been a fan
of guitar sound and I saw the
guitarists often struggling to
get their rig and their tone
organised. At every venue it
sounded different:
stompboxes, broken cables,
nine-volt batteries, power
supplies, very often too loud.”
What did you perceive to be the
shortcomings of existing amp-
modelling technology and how
do you feel that the KPA
addresses these?
“Speaking to guitarists about
it, I realised that basically
modelling is great, but if you
want to create your own
unique sound, it becomes
a challenge. And using
modelling live very often
doesn’t give you ‘that’ live feel,
which is even noticeable for
the audience. There is an
endemic sense of mistrust for
modelling amps, and I wanted
to solve that with an amp that
can sound identical to the
original, and have proof via the
A/B comparison.”
When it comes to high-gain
sounds, the way the KPA
removes extraneous noise and
hum from the equation means
the resulting profile is in many
ways more practical for studio
use than the original amplifier.
How do you achieve this?
“[Grins] Well, with advances in
modern technology it is now
possible to determine what
part of the signal is desirable
and what is just noise. That is
a big part of the Profiling Amp
secret. The sound is recreated
in a different way than with
traditional guitar gear. It is
easy to take the noise out of the
profiling equation. We simply
did not teach the Profiler to
produce noise.”
What types of musicians do
you see as the target market
for the KPA?
“I had in mind the studio and
the stage. I saw guitarists
spending a lot of time creating
their personal sound with
amps and cabs and mics. Once
this is done, the recreation of
this sound is very difficult if
you then take the system apart
for travelling.
“So I thought why not leave
your set-up where it sounds the
best, take a profile, and then you
are able to recreate that sound
anytime, anywhere. And a lot of
guitarists and producers are
using it like this already on tour
and in the studio.”
Do you plan to offer the KPA in
any other configurations, such
as a rack unit or perhaps
a combo with a full-range
internal speaker?
“We are aware of a couple of
other possible configurations
that the amp could be used in,
yes. But we have to take things
one step at a time at the
moment. Being a small
company we cannot do
everything we would like to
immediately. There will be
more, however…”
What was the biggest sonic
challenge when it came to
accurately profiling amps?
“To be honest, the biggest
challenge was for me to
overcome the urban myths
people share about how a
guitar sound comes together.
The magic that happens in a
tube amp, and all that stuff.
I have learned that the tube
itself is not the main factor for
a good sound. Understanding
the dynamics of the
surrounding circuit is more
crucial. I found magic in tube
amps, but a different magic in
different locations than people
told me to expect it.”
“The biggest challenge was for me to
overcome the urban myths about
guitar sound” Christoph Kemper
“I found magic in tube amps, but different magic in different locations than people told me,” explains Kemper
as a rack unit or perhaps
Kemper at the 2012
Winter NAMM show
GIT354.rev_kemper.indd 124 3/21/12 10:54:38 AM