Sean Ashe
Power User
Hey everyone, I haven't posted in a bit and figured since I just got home from NAMM, I should post a thread for some of those who weren't able to make it out or are interested to hear about my experiences 
So first, I should mention that this was my first NAMM. The good people at Sterling By Musicman invited me to come so I knew I couldn't pass it up this year. I stayed with my good friend and fellow Fractal user Cody Davis (Killer guitarist, look him up!!!) and hung with him the majority of the NAMM show.
Guitar companies that stood out to me, were Tom Anderson Guitars and Strandberg. I've never played a more resonant guitar, that felt like home, until I played a TAG. Because I live in the musically desolate Northwest Indiana, I don't get to play on guitars of that caliber as often as I'd like because they are just not available. Playing on the Strandbergs was very awesome as well, and I fell in love with their 'Varberg' model which felt just effortless. Also funny because I guess I had played on Holdsworth's guitar while I was there and the Varberg I tried was Paul Masvidals.
Matt had told me to meet up with him at the Matrix booth on Thursday, so I went over there and started jamming on some of the gear. I played through both the GT800FX and the GT1000FX and was blown away. I really loved those poweramps and they felt great as well. Matt showed up a few minutes after two with a laptop and then plugged into one of the many Fractal units as I was playing... I knew what was happening. Firmware 10.0 \m/
He updated it and then reset the unit, and immediately I felt and heard a change (for the better). Dynamics felt vastly improved, and the decay of notes was MUCH more natural. It sounded to me like all the natural harmonics and frequencies of the notes got to blossom out instead of just being projected. Every time there has been a firmware update, I tell myself "if they never update this again...it's okay, ill still love it" but.. This update is just killer. The guitar I was playing at the time had some really strange volume pots, they rolled off MUCH too quickly (on any setup), so i wasn't able to test roll off as I normally can.
I had the opportunity to jam with some great musicians at the Matrix booth as well such as Austin Woodward and Martin Miller, who absolutely is just...mind bogglingly good. I also got the opportunity to meet one of my favorite players and favorite tone chasers, Pete Thorn, and also got to witness Tom Quayle and Martin Miller jam (was incredible).
Now onto Kemper...
At NAMM, I had the opportunity to try out the Kemper Profiling Amp. I've heard many different things about it from various musicians and I really wanted to try it for myself. They had multiple Kemper's set up around the booth area with headphones plugged into them, but I knew that was no way to test the feel/response of it. So I asked the Kemper demo guy (I don't remember his name, sorry if he reads this!) if I could check it out through the FRFR setup they were running. He was a nice guy (and great guitarist!) and he said sure. So i went up there and started checking it out, and it didn't take me long to realize that some things were... off. I went to a patch on there that was a Vox AC30, and the gain was CRANKED. More gain than that amp has at any volume. I asked the Kemper guys "So if this is an accurate profile of an amp, how can you have more drive than the original. Not boost or anything, just the drive knob." And the only answer they would give me was "well It's just a bit of the kemper magic" -_-
Anyways, it seemed nice. The feel/response was really good on the clean amp models, but on anything that had a bit of distortion, it didn't feel right at all. I know that this could be considered a biased review of the unit, as I'm obviously a Fractal fan, but I truly plugged into it with an open mind. I think that it's a great tool if you're in the studio and you want your EXACT sound you had, but beyond that I didn't hear anything in the unit that I couldn't dial in in a few minutes by hand on the Axe..
As far as real amps go, I actually didn't even set out to try many of them. I did play through some very interesting amps though such as a Rhodes Colossus (really dug it, super versatile), the new Randall Thasher (Great amp, and Mike Fortin is a really nice guy too), and a Mini Dual Rectifier (killer amp in a small package).
I felt really really good when several people approached me, and told me that they loved the work I had done with my Axe FX and that they used my patches on a day to day basis. It has definitely inspired me to do a lot more using the Axe FX as far as creating patches for people to use, so please stay tuned for that. I was blown away at the musicianship I witnessed at NAMM and really can't wait to get back into an intense practice schedule. I won't lie, I feel like I've slacked as of late, but no more!!! It also surprised me that almost all the musicians I talked to, brought up the Fractal in some way when we were talking about gear. It seemed like something that connected most if not all the killer guitarists I talked to.
If I forgot anything, which is entirely possible, I'll update this post later. NAMM went by so quickly and was just a blur, sooo much stuff happening in such a short amount of time. I hope you enjoy the story of my NAMM experience, and thanks for reading it! Well I'm off to change my strings/setup my guitar and get it ready for some intense practice sessions. \m/ - Sean Ashe
So first, I should mention that this was my first NAMM. The good people at Sterling By Musicman invited me to come so I knew I couldn't pass it up this year. I stayed with my good friend and fellow Fractal user Cody Davis (Killer guitarist, look him up!!!) and hung with him the majority of the NAMM show.
Guitar companies that stood out to me, were Tom Anderson Guitars and Strandberg. I've never played a more resonant guitar, that felt like home, until I played a TAG. Because I live in the musically desolate Northwest Indiana, I don't get to play on guitars of that caliber as often as I'd like because they are just not available. Playing on the Strandbergs was very awesome as well, and I fell in love with their 'Varberg' model which felt just effortless. Also funny because I guess I had played on Holdsworth's guitar while I was there and the Varberg I tried was Paul Masvidals.
Matt had told me to meet up with him at the Matrix booth on Thursday, so I went over there and started jamming on some of the gear. I played through both the GT800FX and the GT1000FX and was blown away. I really loved those poweramps and they felt great as well. Matt showed up a few minutes after two with a laptop and then plugged into one of the many Fractal units as I was playing... I knew what was happening. Firmware 10.0 \m/
He updated it and then reset the unit, and immediately I felt and heard a change (for the better). Dynamics felt vastly improved, and the decay of notes was MUCH more natural. It sounded to me like all the natural harmonics and frequencies of the notes got to blossom out instead of just being projected. Every time there has been a firmware update, I tell myself "if they never update this again...it's okay, ill still love it" but.. This update is just killer. The guitar I was playing at the time had some really strange volume pots, they rolled off MUCH too quickly (on any setup), so i wasn't able to test roll off as I normally can.
I had the opportunity to jam with some great musicians at the Matrix booth as well such as Austin Woodward and Martin Miller, who absolutely is just...mind bogglingly good. I also got the opportunity to meet one of my favorite players and favorite tone chasers, Pete Thorn, and also got to witness Tom Quayle and Martin Miller jam (was incredible).
Now onto Kemper...
At NAMM, I had the opportunity to try out the Kemper Profiling Amp. I've heard many different things about it from various musicians and I really wanted to try it for myself. They had multiple Kemper's set up around the booth area with headphones plugged into them, but I knew that was no way to test the feel/response of it. So I asked the Kemper demo guy (I don't remember his name, sorry if he reads this!) if I could check it out through the FRFR setup they were running. He was a nice guy (and great guitarist!) and he said sure. So i went up there and started checking it out, and it didn't take me long to realize that some things were... off. I went to a patch on there that was a Vox AC30, and the gain was CRANKED. More gain than that amp has at any volume. I asked the Kemper guys "So if this is an accurate profile of an amp, how can you have more drive than the original. Not boost or anything, just the drive knob." And the only answer they would give me was "well It's just a bit of the kemper magic" -_-
Anyways, it seemed nice. The feel/response was really good on the clean amp models, but on anything that had a bit of distortion, it didn't feel right at all. I know that this could be considered a biased review of the unit, as I'm obviously a Fractal fan, but I truly plugged into it with an open mind. I think that it's a great tool if you're in the studio and you want your EXACT sound you had, but beyond that I didn't hear anything in the unit that I couldn't dial in in a few minutes by hand on the Axe..
As far as real amps go, I actually didn't even set out to try many of them. I did play through some very interesting amps though such as a Rhodes Colossus (really dug it, super versatile), the new Randall Thasher (Great amp, and Mike Fortin is a really nice guy too), and a Mini Dual Rectifier (killer amp in a small package).
I felt really really good when several people approached me, and told me that they loved the work I had done with my Axe FX and that they used my patches on a day to day basis. It has definitely inspired me to do a lot more using the Axe FX as far as creating patches for people to use, so please stay tuned for that. I was blown away at the musicianship I witnessed at NAMM and really can't wait to get back into an intense practice schedule. I won't lie, I feel like I've slacked as of late, but no more!!! It also surprised me that almost all the musicians I talked to, brought up the Fractal in some way when we were talking about gear. It seemed like something that connected most if not all the killer guitarists I talked to.
If I forgot anything, which is entirely possible, I'll update this post later. NAMM went by so quickly and was just a blur, sooo much stuff happening in such a short amount of time. I hope you enjoy the story of my NAMM experience, and thanks for reading it! Well I'm off to change my strings/setup my guitar and get it ready for some intense practice sessions. \m/ - Sean Ashe
