I've been playing for a little over 50 years. Back in the 80's I toured a few years with some digital processors with tube amps (Roland GP16-Roland D-50-GK2synth driver) After that its pretty much been tube amps and pedal boards with the odd dabble in digital boards like the Boss GT100. A couple years back I tried a Tonemaster twin for a few months but ultimately disappointed.
A couple months back I bought a Helix floor Long and McQuade but after a few days returned it in the return window, again disappointed.
A week or 2 I made a leap of faith and bought the FM9T. I'm super excited and have put a lot of work in to it in the last couple weeks. To be fair to the Helix there were 2 problems on my side and my evaluation of the Helix is not fair. #1 I was impatient. The factory presets sounded terrible to me. However I was plugging in to my Adams TV8. Where as for the FM9T I purchased an FR12 FRFR. The FM9 doesn't sound much better through my Adams than the Helix but the factory presets do sound much better. I'm a fairly impatient guy, liking quick results and the FM9 gave that to me. One thing that I was a bit anxious was all the reviews talking about how difficult the learning curve is. With my limited exposure to high end guitar modeling units the FM9 was super easy with FM9 edit. I haven't yet done much programming directly on the unit but of the few things I've done, it wasn't hard. Most likely when I gig this weekend I'll be lost on the unit. So hopefully the presets I've been working on the last couple weeks are accurate, volume levels, etc. Luckily the Fender FR12 is flexible enough to easily compensate with eq and volumes.
I set up 3 separate presets with 2 scenes "Clean-Cranked". And the other 6 switches I configured as pedals to turn off and on. I will likely change this soon to 4 scenes and 4 pedals to turn on and off.
The 3 different amps I've set up are JTM45\JVM, Fender blackface and Vox AC30. I know the least about Marshall amps but I know what I want to hear. I had a very hard time getting what I wanted from the Marshall side. As I'm not familiar I don't know what cabs generally go with what amps. So there was a lot of experimenting. I built these from scratch and what I really should have done was listen to factory presets to find what I like and tweak.
I have to say the FM9 (with the FR12) has been the first digital modeling unit that has given me hope that I can ditch my tube amps for live performance. I constantly go back and forth from my tube amps to the FM9 to compare the subtleties. My tube amps are blackface, tweed, plexi and JCM influenced amps. The presets I created to copy that, although not exact (in some ways I like the tones from the FM9 a bit better) the tube like characteristics of the FM9 would probably be very hard for me to detect in a blind test. This is ultimately what I've been looking for, for years.
Instead of big, heavy heads and cabinets that I can hardly ever turn up to get the tubes working anyway, I'll be hauling the FM9, FR12 and a guitar or 2. Although at 64 I'm still healthy enough to lug that stuff, I'd rather not. I'd like to gig in to my 70's so I figure light weight is the way to go.
A couple months back I bought a Helix floor Long and McQuade but after a few days returned it in the return window, again disappointed.
A week or 2 I made a leap of faith and bought the FM9T. I'm super excited and have put a lot of work in to it in the last couple weeks. To be fair to the Helix there were 2 problems on my side and my evaluation of the Helix is not fair. #1 I was impatient. The factory presets sounded terrible to me. However I was plugging in to my Adams TV8. Where as for the FM9T I purchased an FR12 FRFR. The FM9 doesn't sound much better through my Adams than the Helix but the factory presets do sound much better. I'm a fairly impatient guy, liking quick results and the FM9 gave that to me. One thing that I was a bit anxious was all the reviews talking about how difficult the learning curve is. With my limited exposure to high end guitar modeling units the FM9 was super easy with FM9 edit. I haven't yet done much programming directly on the unit but of the few things I've done, it wasn't hard. Most likely when I gig this weekend I'll be lost on the unit. So hopefully the presets I've been working on the last couple weeks are accurate, volume levels, etc. Luckily the Fender FR12 is flexible enough to easily compensate with eq and volumes.
I set up 3 separate presets with 2 scenes "Clean-Cranked". And the other 6 switches I configured as pedals to turn off and on. I will likely change this soon to 4 scenes and 4 pedals to turn on and off.
The 3 different amps I've set up are JTM45\JVM, Fender blackface and Vox AC30. I know the least about Marshall amps but I know what I want to hear. I had a very hard time getting what I wanted from the Marshall side. As I'm not familiar I don't know what cabs generally go with what amps. So there was a lot of experimenting. I built these from scratch and what I really should have done was listen to factory presets to find what I like and tweak.
I have to say the FM9 (with the FR12) has been the first digital modeling unit that has given me hope that I can ditch my tube amps for live performance. I constantly go back and forth from my tube amps to the FM9 to compare the subtleties. My tube amps are blackface, tweed, plexi and JCM influenced amps. The presets I created to copy that, although not exact (in some ways I like the tones from the FM9 a bit better) the tube like characteristics of the FM9 would probably be very hard for me to detect in a blind test. This is ultimately what I've been looking for, for years.
Instead of big, heavy heads and cabinets that I can hardly ever turn up to get the tubes working anyway, I'll be hauling the FM9, FR12 and a guitar or 2. Although at 64 I'm still healthy enough to lug that stuff, I'd rather not. I'd like to gig in to my 70's so I figure light weight is the way to go.
