re: Modeling amps vs. Profiler?

It all depends on what you want to do. If you’re a bedroom guitarist who just occasionally jams with friends, a mustang v3 will be plenty enough. However, with amps, there are certain tones that are absolutely gatekept by price.

The sounds of vintage marshalls from classic rock albums, that classic bluesbreaker sound, etc are often very difficult to replicate on cheap amps and pedals. For most guitarists, this doesn’t matter. However, for tone snobs, aggressive giggers, music producers, and recording artists, tone is EVERYTHING.

And if you’re performing a lot of different styles or recording different artists, the ability to replicate multiple amps and pedals via the amp modeler is super helpful. You can have a marshal tone, an EVH, a Vox, a Fender twin reverb, a mesa boogie, etc all in one package. A profiler takes it one step further because not only does it allow for using digital patches that replicate these different amps, but it has the ability to make NEW patches by profiling a tone you record into it and copying it digitally. This is huge for recording and touring artists because they can craft a tone in the studio using any combination of amps and cabs, digitally encode that sound via the profiler, and then get that EXACT tone live without even using any amps on stage. In addition, tube amps sound completely different loud vs soft, whereas a digital profile or model can get the tone of the loud tube amp at any volume. Plus, profilers are usually very light, and smaller than most people’s pedal boards (while also replacing the pedal board as well). They can be plugged directly into a daw or soundboard, giving the sound man or recording engineer MUCH more control over the sound. They take up WAY less space in a tour van, which is HUGE for fledgling bands trying to tour to make a name for themselves.

The vintage marshall amp you want that produces the sound with a tubescreamer probaby costs $2-4k. The EVH head and cab total another $1.2k. The fender reverb is $1.4k, a mesa boogie around $1k. You can find a decent modeler that can replicate these tones reasonably well with a cab for around $600, while the better ones go for around $1.2k. A kemper profiler setup that can replicate these tones as well as make new ones goes for around $1.8k. The costs of these modelers and profilers are going down as the technology improves, while the costs of vintage amps only increase.

There is absolutely a purist sect of musicians that HATE anything digital. They don’t agree with using profilers or modelers. Heck, they don’t even like solid state amps. They want nothing but tube amps and analogue pedals. Some don’t even like recording to a click track, or using time alignment, let alone meladine pitch correction. They believe there is a certain amount of warmth and control lost when using a modeler vs a real amp, which may sometimes be true, but 99% of the time, even serious guitarists cannot tell the difference. The technology has gotten THAT good.

It’s a battle of analogue vs digital, heavy amps vs light boxes, specializing in one tone vs having many tones at your fingertips, and the inevitable result of chasing tone vs value added.

Personally, I have used both. In the studio, I tend to record on a kemper. Live, I use a clean style tube combo amp with a pedal driving it. In one band, my rhythm guitarist uses a cheap modeler, and it sounds incredible just plugged into the soundboard. It makes me jealous watching him unplug and stuff that little setup into his guitar gig bag and be done loading out while I haul my heavy combo amp. I’ll probably eventually get a modeler to have fun with, but I am satisfied with the tone I’m currently making with my analogue rig.