Digital Igloo (Eric Klein, YGG)

Sascha Franck said:
Amen. So give us that set of cool new filters and modulators already!

Seriously, I must've said this a thousand times already, but I've never been into recreating whatever iconic sounds or whatsoever. Not even when playing sort of cover gigs (And guess what? Nobody ever complained, not even once.). I do absolutely get the "validity" of tried and trusted designs. They really just work for certain things. The new HX 2203 is a prime example for that. But I'm afraid I hardly ever create any kind of sound that you'd heard on a record, at least not deliberately. I like using it because of the "just works" aspect and go from there to kind of adapt it so it fits my personal needs/wants. And fwiw, it could as well be sort of any other more or less comparable amp. The new Voltage would do the job every bit as well (I may even prefer it here and there). Just give me any amp that's in the ballpark and I'm fine.
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I wonder how many other instruments have the same pursuit of creating a player's own sound or a new unique sound in a way that's comparable to electric guitarists.

As an ambient player, I'm as big a fan of soundscaping as anyone, and yet I still find that the best amp setup for me is a Marshall, in this case the 2203, and a 412 of Greenbacks. It's just got that sound that's definitive for the instrument. Where the soundscaping comes in for me is what happens before the amp. While my Marshall and Greenbacks might be pretty ubiquitous, the chorus, multiple delays, multiple ethereal reverb and tremolos that go before the stereo 2203s, that's where the magic of soundscaping really happens. The ambient swells I can get these days from the Helix are otherworldly, I love it.

I really admire players who experiment with new or unique amp sounds. I just think that the archetypes are the archetypes for good reason.
 
Digital Igloo said:
Not sure if we'd be able to add a Scale parameter to all existing delays. If they don't hit the DSP at all, yes, that's something we might be able to do. If they impact the DSP hit even a tiny bit, there's always a chance they could break presets right at the cusp.
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Sorry, I mightn't have been clear. Id like to see right-channel feedback correction for the delays that do have scale. Basically:

[Right Feedback] = [Left Feedback] * ( 1 / [Scale%] )

That way the left and right trails end at the same time. Some delays already do this, others, in particular the Transistor Tape, don't.
 
Digital Igloo said:
Yep.

From my perspective, there are only two customer problems that ML amps and IR cabs solve:
  1. "I don't know how perfectly recreate the sound of my personal tube amps and cabs so I don't have to lug them around."
  2. "I don't have enough variety of real-world tube amp and cab sounds."
It appears as though Kemper was originally focused on the first problem. The toaster granted artists and studio engineers the ability to recreate their own library of amps and take them on tour or to other studios. Later, it sorta morphed into #2: "Look at me! I have every amp ever made. It takes me an hour to find the perfect one, but it's here somewhere."

Making cool and original guitar sounds should be fun and fast; it shouldn't require file management. To me, ML and IRs almost... sorta... kinda feel like browsing a million LEGO sets (mostly based on film franchises from the 60s-80s) on Amazon, except all the sets are fully completed and superglued together. What if I'm more interested in building things no one's seen/heard before?
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Amen. While being able to capture your real world amp(s) and get a pretty darn close digital facsimile of its sound at my favorite settings is very cool, to me the capture stuff loses appeal quick when I don't have my own armada of amps to use.

Afaik the Kemper Rig Manager has something like 100K free profiles available and that's just an impossible amount of data for anyone to go through so it's no wonder it has devolved into "trusted" paid profile vendors, same as IRs have.

At the same time people tend to want shortcuts. They don't want to take the time to mix together the perfect cab using multiple single mic IRs, or figure out how to turn amp model A to sound like "not modeled here" amp B, even if that is possible. So they buy IR mixes, presets, captures, request every amp ever made to be modeled etc.

I can totally understand that. Sometimes you don't want to play sound designer yourself, or you don't know how. I recently bought some presets for my ASM Hydrasynth Explorer because I'm not yet good enough at dialing it when a lot of the synth stuff is still foreign to me. The presets were perhaps not quite worth the money, but I did find some keepers there.

Meanwhile I saw some rather stupid arguments on The Other Place saying that Line6 should not make custom models when they don't have this and that real amp model in the Helix already. :facepalm

It's kinda weird that a digital modeler maker is not "allowed" to make their own amps, or that they can never be as good as real ones. At the same time say Dave Friedman making their Nth spin on a Plexi circuit is hailed as an amp design genius.
 
laxu said:
Meanwhile I saw some rather stupid arguments on The Other Place saying that Line6 should not make custom models when they don't have this and that real amp model in the Helix already.
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My-oh-my.
Seriously, for me, in case there were only Line 6 creations in their HX amp portfolio, I'd get along every bit as fine as with all those other things.
I might however wish they'd come up with kinda like a breadboard amp. Or at least allowing me to freely chose different tone and gain stacks plus separate pre- and poweramps. But then, in the end I don't exactly need more amp tones.
 
laxu said:
Meanwhile I saw some rather stupid arguments on The Other Place saying that Line6 should not make custom models when they don't have this and that real amp model in the Helix already. :facepalm
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Eeesh. Yeah, that sentiment slurps turds. I know there’s no proof but it *really* seems like TOP is infested with a few corporate shills. There’s no way to be that provocative on purpose, even if one’s goal is to troll.
 
Digital Igloo said:
I know there’s no proof but it *really* seems like TOP is infested with a few corporate shills.
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Likely, but not sure whether that applies as a sufficient reason for these statements.
I think it's rather that the vast (!) majority of your (and other modeler makers) customers is of the home noodling kind, pretty much never playing live and possibly also not being exactly active in doing original music. Playing along with their favourite YT backings of iconic players and nailing those tones as closely as possible is all they want.
Yes, I know that this is a pretty simplified view, but I'd bet it's not too far from reality.

And before anyone starts getting at me: There's absolutely nothing wrong with that at all! It's not my thing, but who knows, if I hadn't chosen to also make this my "career" (which I perhaps wouldn't even do again), I might just be doing the same kinda thing.
Whatever, I think this is why so many people are asking for yet another amp model, regardless whether they already have 7 very similar ones at their disposal. It's also why so little people are asking for, say, global blocks or other things not adding to your sound arsenal but rather adressing issues arising in live context. If I was never playing live, I'd possibly never ask for global blocks. And if all I wanted was to sound like Blackmore on "Deep Purple in Rock", I'd likely never ask for modulators and synth-alike filters, either.

I guess that might be the main reasons for comments such as these. And while it's also making me go "my-oh-my" myself, I guess it's still something you gotta deal with, especially in case you're a company interested in at least sort of maximizing profit.
 
Sascha Franck said:
Likely, but not sure whether that applies as a sufficient reason for these statements.
I think it's rather that the vast (!) majority of your (and other modeler makers) customers is of the home noodling kind, pretty much never playing live and possibly also not being exactly active in doing original music. Playing along with their favourite YT backings of iconic players and nailing those tones as closely as possible is all they want.
Yes, I know that this is a pretty simplified view, but I'd bet it's not too far from reality.

And before anyone starts getting at me: There's absolutely nothing wrong with that at all! It's not my thing, but who knows, if I hadn't chosen to also make this my "career" (which I perhaps wouldn't even do again), I might just be doing the same kinda thing.
Whatever, I think this is why so many people are asking for yet another amp model, regardless whether they already have 7 very similar ones at their disposal. It's also why so little people are asking for, say, global blocks or other things not adding to your sound arsenal but rather adressing issues arising in live context. If I was never playing live, I'd possibly never ask for global blocks. And if all I wanted was to sound like Blackmore on "Deep Purple in Rock", I'd likely never ask for modulators and synth-alike filters, either.

I guess that might be the main reasons for comments such as these. And while it's also making me go "my-oh-my" myself, I guess it's still something you gotta deal with, especially in case you're a company interested in at least sort of maximizing profit.
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As someone who is totally just a home noodler these days, I can agree with all that. I haven't been into trying to chase a particular player's sound in ages though, because I'll never play quite like my heroes so might as well have my own tone as well. And I'm not saying I have some unique tone either.

I think there's some people who just want to digitally collect every amp there is and even if they got all their requests, there's always something else that is "missing". I get it's fun to get new amp models every once in a while but at some point you aren't adding any new sounds.

Interestingly there's much less people asking for pedals, rack fx, specific cabs/speakers or mics to be added. Requests are almost exclusively amps.
 
laxu said:
Interestingly there's much less people asking for pedals,
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I actually think they're much more interesting as they allow you to move between somewhat lightly altering your core sound and totally destroying it - with the "tonal balance" still not falling apart as the amp used is holding it all together.
And if it was after me, I'd love to see the entire palette of Chase Bliss pedals modeled. Oh, and all Hologram Electronics pedals. And so on.
 
Since 3.71 it seems like the intermittent signal dropout on S/PDIF is back. It's my most used output at home and I've only noticed it happening again in the last few weeks.
 
Also, in the spirit of the thread:

Do you play any ukulele / banjo / mandolin?

How's your hearing? Have you been responsible over the years?

Do you ever listen to ambient or Post-Rock or Ambient bands like Hammock, The American Dollar, God Is An Astronaut?
 
CakeEater said:
Since 3.71 it seems like the intermittent signal dropout on S/PDIF is back. It's my most used output at home and I've only noticed it happening again in the last few weeks.
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Huh; works fine here, but I didn't sit and listen for more than a few minutes. Will ask James about it.
CakeEater said:
Do you play any ukulele / banjo / mandolin?
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Uke a tiny bit, because my wife's from Hawaii. For banjo or mandolin I'll hire session musicians.
CakeEater said:
How's your hearing? Have you been responsible over the years?
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It's not terrible, but there are definitely frequencies that are deficient. Probably stemmed from that Swervedriver show at The Mason Jar in Phoenix back in the 90s, but Mogwai at the Fonda a while back certainly didn't help. I wear 15-20dB plugs at shows religiously now.
CakeEater said:
Do you ever listen to ambient or Post-Rock or Ambient bands like Hammock, The American Dollar, God Is An Astronaut?
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TONS. Definitely a fan of all three. If you like Hammock, check out Frames (the one from Hamburg) or Pedestrian.

Favorite pure post rock bands are probably early This Will Destroy You, Caspian, and Sigur Rós but lately I've been immersed in the heavier end of the post rock/shoegaze/metal spectrum—Spotlights, Holy Fawn, SOM, Grivo, Nothing, Outlander, BLACKSHAPE ("ITIIITIATIIHYLIHYL" is an amazing track), and lots of others.
 
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Digital Igloo said:
Definitely a fan of all three. If you like Hammock, check out Frames (the one from Hamburg) or Pedestrian.

Favorite pure post rock bands are probably early This Will Destroy You, Caspian, and Sigur Rós but lately I've been immersed in the heavier end of the post rock/shoegaze/metal spectrum—Spotlights, Holy Fawn, SOM, Grivo, Nothing, Outlander, BLACKSHAPE ("ITIIITIATIIHYLIHYL" is an amazing track), and lots of others.
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Incredible! Thanks! It's late here in this part of the world but I'll definitely check these out in the morning.

GIAA were my gateway band, but Young Mountain was one of the first albums I bought when branching out, Sæglópur is one of the all time greatest songs of the genre. I can't wait to try out the rest of these!
 
Hi Digital Igloo and gear forumers.
Some on tgp forum are speculating about Helix "Big 4.0"update. I know it's the game since Helix release.
Source : https://www.thegearpage.net/board/index.php?threads/line6-helix.1586637/page-3704
I just wonder, even if I know you are not the genie in the lamp (and "Three thousand years of longing" was a great movie to me), if • a talkbox and a vocoder (for Helix floor board) is about to be released, and if • a sequencer controller with pattern editor (à la Adrenalinn) is on the way ? (First point will justify the mic input and seduce a lot of singers and fans of talkboxes (for Roger Troutman and Peter Frampton tones), and second point an Adrenalinn like sequencer would be great). Thank you (sorry for loooong sentences, many french frogs like me just can't keep it simple).
 
zib said:
Hi Digital Igloo and gear forumers.
Some on tgp forum are speculating about Helix "Big 4.0"update. I know it's the game since Helix release.
Source : https://www.thegearpage.net/board/index.php?threads/line6-helix.1586637/page-3704
I just wonder, even if I know you are not the genie in the lamp (and "Three thousand years of longing" was a great movie to me), if • a talkbox and a vocoder (for Helix floor board) is about to be released, and if • a sequencer controller with pattern editor (à la Adrenalinn) is on the way ? (First point will justify the mic input and seduce a lot of singers and fans of talkboxes (for Roger Troutman and Peter Frampton tones), and second point an Adrenalinn like sequencer would be great). Thank you (sorry for loooong sentences, many french frogs like me just can't keep it simple).
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At one point I would wax poetic on all things future plans but we learned select competitors pay attention to my pointless ramblings so now all I'm allowed to say is "we can't talk about future plans." :confused:

Have mentioned this before, but our engineering team is bigger than it's been in over a decade, so we're certainly not sitting on our hands. That said, 3.80 is going to be a relatively small update, but it'll make a few vocal people very happy.
 
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