I’ve been using amp sims for over 6 yrs. They were crap in the beginning, but have improved tremendously. When the Fractal system came out, it truly was a game changer. One pedal with all the amps and fx pedals built in. Of course, the pedal has a computer chip in it, so it is the same as using a laptop in today’s world. Many are jumping on that wagon. All the amps and fx you want. The beauty is you can use it at home with headphones (thankful neighbors), in the studio (no mic setup), at gigs (no need to run it at “11” to get your tone (thankful venue owners and bandmates), no hauling heavy amps, or huge pedalboards taking stage space.
Where else can you play thru a Marshall Stack, or Vox, or Soldano, or a Fender Combo Amp? Not in most music stores, but on stage or in your home.
IMHO, all the regulars are now using Neural Networks AI, but the Neural DSP Gojira is more versatile than what they show. It has a few fx, which is all I really need. There are many other free fx pedals if you need more. A lot of people like Helix, but I find it hard to get a tone I want, but is crazy easy on CPU and has tons of amps and fx. I like Bias and TH-U. The Mercurialls, ML, Nembrini, and Softube plugs are nice, and some have free fx pedals. It’s really all about what you are trying to achieve.
Perhaps the Nembrini BG Extasy would be a good choice for a first and only amp sim plugin. I just bought it for $40. It models the Bogner Ecstasy 101B, the clean channel is based the Fender Super Reverb/Deluxe Reverb preamp, the other channels are more Marshall like.
The NI Guitar Rig 6 freebie is very nice and has a good selection of pedals if he’s into JCM style amps. I find it every bit as good as my Neural and Nembrini sims. And did I mention its free? College kids love free.
Also the Amplitube freebie is pretty nice if you use hi end third party IRs, which are all inexpensive these days. Heck even the Celestion IR’s are just a few $ these days. Also worth checking out York IRs. They have a introductory promo right now for their 2x12 Rect with V30s for $1. I bought it and it stacks up very well to Celestion and OwnHammer.
So he can have two great setups and a hi end IR with multiple mics for a total budget of $1.
I think Peavy sold it to AMR, don’t know if they are part of the same company. Version 4 was the last update, maybe 3-4 years ago, but according to AMR, there is still a free version, and requires a dongle.
For all those invested in the Mercuriall range (or considering it) - they have now created an integrated platform called AmpBox around their amp sims - no more need to have separate plugins. It’s all wrapped into one “master plugin”, containing stomps, preamp, power amp, EQ, delay & reverb.
Currently, it can host their version of the Bogner Ecstasy, the Boogie Reaxis, and the Engl E530 - the rest of their product portfolio (Spark, SS11-X) will probably be ported to work with AmpBox in the future.
If you own one of the three products above, you can activate them for free to work within AmpBox.
Definitely working very nicely - aside from my usual gripe of their chorus not being mono compatible - but that can be worked around by only using one stereo channel and running the plugin in mono…
Following @Corky’s lead, I’m also in the process of slimming down my guitar setup - but instead of the Gojira rig (which is also veeerrry nice…), I’m building my guitar sounds on the Mercuriall Ecstasy (aka Euphoria), with the Reaxis and Engl sprinkled in when needed… All in one plugin, all in one rack - enough for my needs.
Thanks for this Torsten! I’ve been so busy lately that I haven’t taken the time to read my emails in weeks, but I stop by here everyday. No doubt I missed the notification for this. Good choice on the Ecstasy!
I did a gig with the band on December 23rd and decided that I would not use my main Cantabile rig for guitars and keys but use my back up version of of 88 weighted MODX 8 and Line 6 Helix. The back up rig is a slightly shorter set up time and slightly less gear. I did the gig but caught COVID. The Cantabile gods were punishing me.
This looks like what I want to do, I downloaded the thu metal pack to try it and probably will purchase it, at this point I built one preset with two amps, and everything else I use, doing the switching with turning each component on or off individually with cc’s, and notes.
A quick heads-up to the TH-U users here: Bert Meulendijk has joined the TH-U rig library team and brought with him two of his (IMHO) best Kemper impulse packs: the Wisseloord amp collection and his Bogner Ecstacy Classic pack.
Both of these packs are captured with and without speakers, so also great to combine with your own speaker IR or with Supercabinet libraries. I pair them with my Celestion IRs - I have their Greenbacks, Creambacks, V30 and V-Type libraries, plus their Vox pack, so almost all bases covered (a Fender Blackface also plays pretty nice with Creambacks or V30s…).
Between the two packs, you can cover a pretty broad gamut of styles and sounds, so a definite recommendation while they’re on sale…
Igor Nembrini has just released his version of the Fender Bassman - judging from the audio demos, that one is up to his usual standards and probably a must-have if you like the traditional Fenderish Blues sound…
I’m going to check out Faceman later today. I wonder how it relates to bx_bassdude which I understand was developed by Igor. I picked it up years ago for about $20. It was my first “paid” guitar sim (was running with Poulan and some others before) so it became my goto along with their Mesa sim.
No doubt I missed the notification for this. Good choice on the Ecstasy!
(a Fender Blackface also plays pretty nice with Creambacks or V30s…).