Are modellers as good as amps?

soma1975

Maybe the band needed you to be a bit more lost in the mix and Helix helped?

John_A

sweepy said:

professorben said:

John_A said:

Couldnt agree more.  My band certainly sound better since I switched to Helix, but they'd probably sound better still with a great player with half my gear (dont tell them that )

Of course the main issue of having a Helix is the elimination of needing new pedals or amps. 

O......K, good luck with that

He's dead right - havent bought a pedal or amp (other than a HX stomp) in 4 years

sweepy

I still don’t see what people like in the Line 6 Delays and Reverbs, I recently picked up an HXFX and was very disappointed tbh, the drives were ok and chorus acceptable but on the whole it was poor. As far as I can see the effects models are common to all units, I can see where we all have different tastes etc but I’d rather keep my Strymon’s

John_A

sweepy said:

I still don’t see what people like in the Line 6 Delays and Reverbs, I recently picked up an HXFX and was very disappointed tbh, the drives were ok and chorus acceptable but on the whole it was poor. As far as I can see the effects models are common to all units, I can see where we all have different tastes etc but I’d rather keep my Strymon’s

Yes, different tastes I guess.  Personally think the delays and verbs are great on the Helix.  What version did you try?  The HX reverbs added in 2.5 are up there with Strymon IMO, and the space echo is the best emulation of any analogue/tape delay I've heard.

Roland

John_A said:

sweepy said:

professorben said:

Of course the main issue of having a Helix is the elimination of needing new pedals or amps. 

O......K, good luck with that

He's dead right - havent bought a pedal or amp (other than a HX stomp) in 4 years

In my case it’s over 12 years

professorben

John_A said:

sweepy said:

I still don’t see what people like in the Line 6 Delays and Reverbs, I recently picked up an HXFX and was very disappointed tbh, the drives were ok and chorus acceptable but on the whole it was poor. As far as I can see the effects models are common to all units, I can see where we all have different tastes etc but I’d rather keep my Strymon’s

Yes, different tastes I guess.  Personally think the delays and verbs are great on the Helix.  What version did you try?  The HX reverbs added in 2.5 are up there with Strymon IMO, and the space echo is the best emulation of any analogue/tape delay I've heard.

I’m prob criminally underusing the Helix as I’m only using the simple delay and the Glitz Reverb. 

But they do the job for me, however I am using snapshots to vary those 2 in various ways so I suppose it makes up for it that way. 

John_A

professorben said:

John_A said:

sweepy said:

I still don’t see what people like in the Line 6 Delays and Reverbs, I recently picked up an HXFX and was very disappointed tbh, the drives were ok and chorus acceptable but on the whole it was poor. As far as I can see the effects models are common to all units, I can see where we all have different tastes etc but I’d rather keep my Strymon’s

Yes, different tastes I guess.  Personally think the delays and verbs are great on the Helix.  What version did you try?  The HX reverbs added in 2.5 are up there with Strymon IMO, and the space echo is the best emulation of any analogue/tape delay I've heard.

I’m prob criminally underusing the Helix as I’m only using the simple delay and the Glitz Reverb. 

But they do the job for me, however I am using snapshots to vary those 2 in various ways so I suppose it makes up for it that way. 

I’m certainly not using anything like the full capabilities of the Helix, I use one amp model, JCM800 for 90% of our set, like you I just use what I need to get the sounds I want

TTBZ

I’m pretty much just using the Placater model and a bit of the P75 Bright for lower gain stuff with a boost and delay assigned to FS1&2, definitely not using to its full potential!

The reverbs and delays are fine for me, they sound as good as anything else I’ve heard but I’m far from
a connoisseur of that stuff.

WiresDreamDisasters

I got very bored of the Helix delays and reverbs. I'm back to my Strymon pedals for now.

PolarityMan

i find the delays a bit fiddly to get right with respect to the feedback and mix compared to other untis and the tap tempo also seems a bit whack.

Clarky

WiresDreamDisasters said:

digitalscream said:

DLM said:

I tend to believe this guy:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p9rKZJ2m2TA

For anyone curious, skip to 1:39:00 for modeller talk.

I'm inclined not to listen to that guy, because not once did he mention working on the unit to mitigate the problems. The vast majority of the time, the problem is that the patch has been set up poorly, and that's borne out by the fact that he says it sounded great in isolation; patches are inevitably set up by the guitarist, on their own.

Lest we forget, the problems he ascribes to all modellers are exactly the problems that loads of people had with Victory amps (for example) - disappearing in the mix, and needing lots more volume to be heard. Did everyone blame all valve amps for that? Nope. And there were still more people who didn't have a problem with it at all...so is the problem the hardware, or the user, or the context? And why do anti-modeller folk not ask that question about modellers?

I think a lot of what he is saying echoes my experience too. I've had the exact same experience of having an Axe FX + poweramp + cab and comparing them to my Diezel D-Moll into the same cab.

Brand new patches made in the context of the rest of the band just looping around a heavy section of one of our songs.

I couldn't get the Fractal to cut through in the same way. The Fractal needed to be LOUDER than the valve amp for me to be able to hear what I was playing, which would then introduce feedback and extra noise and all sorts of problems.

And I spent many practices trying to get that working. It was back when I sat in on a session with @Clarky and I was blown away by his tones. But I just couldn't make it work for me. That's why I sold my Axe FX II.

This is going back a few years. I think these things work for certain types of bands with certain types of sounds. But it doesn't really work for my band.

And I've used Amplitube on some of our releases (for a few overdubs) and I'm considering a Kemper Stage, so I'm not anti-modelling by any stretch!

iirc a good part of my tone was my cabs too..
they're nothing special, but they're not exactly that same and they blend beautifully 
a lucky roll of the dice maybe with them..

interestingly, I played a mini festival Sunday.. 4 bands, all valve but for me and a guy with a Kemper..
later that night the sound guy came up to me and said he adored my tones..
he said my riffing tone sounded huge and my lead tone was smooth and clear..
this is a new band so all my presets are new..
Herbert ch2+ left, VH4ch3 right and Herbert ch4 to solo
my cleans are manufactured from the Herbert ch2+ and the VH4ch3..
these are far cleaner tones than I've ever riffed with before..
felt really nice..

DLM

@Clarky Where does one get a 4 channel Herbert?!

professorben

DLM said:

@Clarky Where does one get a 4 channel Herbert?!

Clarky is the Chuck Norris of guitar, if he says a Herbert has 4 channels it damn well has four channels. 

Roland

DLM said:

@Clarky Where does one get a 4 channel Herbert?!

In cyberspace. You can do interesting things with modellers.

Clarky

DLM said:

@Clarky Where does one get a 4 channel Herbert?!

imagine a Herbert ch3 and all the lovely goodness..
then imagine spelling 3 completely wrong..

Clarky

professorben said:

DLM said:

@Clarky Where does one get a 4 channel Herbert?!

Clarky is the Chuck Norris of guitar, if he says a Herbert has 4 channels it damn well has four channels. 

lmfao ! !

srato

tabano said:

to my ears and hands Modellers don”t feel like amps, 
they can sound similar but do not respond to dynamics, and projection like a valve amp, they are not so responsive,
they are practical for the bedroom, for certain recording scenarios and to plug straight to the PA but they are not the same fun as the real amp,
all imho,

100% agree.

professorben

srato said:

tabano said:

to my ears and hands Modellers don”t feel like amps, 
they can sound similar but do not respond to dynamics, and projection like a valve amp, they are not so responsive,
they are practical for the bedroom, for certain recording scenarios and to plug straight to the PA but they are not the same fun as the real amp,
all imho,

100% agree.

See, this is where it’s gets a bit tricky. 
Because I’ve played a lot of valve amps over the 26 years I’ve been playing live (27 years in total) and Ive played some really crap valve amps, Fenders, Mesa, Marshall’s, Camel, Miles Platting, Peaveys etc.
touch sensitivity and responsiveness and dynamics were not really noticeable when you are just trying to get it to sound at least half decent at a gig, and let’s be honest most of us can’t tell the difference anyway.

We have all seen the YouTube videos where they blind test valve vs digital and its luck of the draw these days, we all like to think we could tell, but the chances are we couldn’t, at least not to any degree of certainty that rules out pot luck. 

Blanket statements  like which is better or Valve is better than XYZ are really pointless, I played a mini festival this summer, the band after us had a fantastic guitar sound, a Mesa MkV mini stack, the guy after them was using the same set up as me, Helix into a power amp into a cab (our own @digitalscream actually) both sounded great, both knew how to get great sounds from the gear they use, most don’t, the whole touchy/feely/valvey hippy shit is just your own subconscious projecting into an inanimate object, the technology of that object is irrelevant. 

Music is just soundwaves and frequencies, the emotional content and connection is purely in our own heads, which is why we all like different gear, tones and styles, to say one type of technology has a reciprocal connection and another does not is frankly ridiculous.

Guthrie Govan plays a solo on a Steven Wilson track called Regret #9 it gives me goosebumps every time, no matter if I listen to it on vinyl, CD, MP3 or YouTube compressed video.

Thats what we we are doing when we say valve is better than digital.  

John_A

@professorben great post!

sweepy

Having owned all 3 of the major modellers I’m left with the feeling that although they are all great bits of kit and have their uses, you can feel the difference under your fingers as they don’t react the same way as a “good” valve amp does