squeezenor wrote:it does get a bit difficult to parse. some folks want super leads and super basses and bluesbreakers and 45/100s and the pa things and some people are fine with just the 20 watt pink taco model. i just wish the "generic" models were a little clearer about what they were based on so you know what to use them for, but they are good and i'm not really complaining otherwise. the red pig is red, so there is that. but i'm not sure there's another marshall major model out there. i'm also not sure how different the major is than a plexi, real or imagined.
Well, the PDF manuals and the Custom Shop are usually pretty explicit about what a given model is based on (when it is based on something specific). The
Red Pig, for example, is described as "Based on Marshall® Major™ head", while the
JH Gold is "Based on Marshall® JTM45™". OK, sure, the British Lead S100 is actually described as "Based on Marshall® 1959 JTM100™ Super Lead", though it's
really an update of a model from the original Hendrix collection -- from 2007? -- and it's perhaps not quite as cool a model of a Superlead as the
JH Gold is of an actual Hendix-modded JTM45/100. Also, I'm just nerdy about Marshall variants.
squeezenor wrote:you bring up something else i try to keep in mind regarding who is "most accurate" or the "best"; everyone is basing their model off of something different. after 50 years of wear and tear, none of them sound as they did when they left the factory. and the standard for what those amps are supposed to sound like was set decades ago with a bunch of studio gear involved.
You are absolutely right, and this is absolutely true. Even a modern artist in a modern studio with relatively new or recent gear .... well, you only have to watch a few YouTube videos of recording engineers trying to mic up a cab to realize that even in a relatively recent cab with 4 speakers of the same model, each of those speakers may actually sound different!
Even artists have difficulty replicating their recorded tones if they have to go to a different studio for overdubs or something, etc. I think this is part of what made high-amp hardware amp sims popular with touring musicians (not naming any brands of those, but we all know what the biggest names there are): you can consistently pump the same tones out to the PA (even if you are still at the mercy of the PA and the venue's acoustics -- but that's the live-sound guy's job).
squeezenor wrote:i doubt they could do an artist collection without that person's (estate) participating
To be sure. I was just trying to say that they
could model a given manufacturer's signature gear for a specific artist as long as they didn't reference the manufacturer (no logos) or the artist (no names). Obviously, though, there's not much commercial reason to do that, since the manufacturer's and are artist's name are the things that would be expected to drive sales, no matter how lovely the model.
squeezenor wrote:i'm not sure how they go about it. every artist collection has at least a couple of amps. it might not be worth it otherwise. even brian may got two (which made sense). slash got two that are pretty similar, but that's also defensible. with guys like rhoads or gilmour or wylde, they might have to think for a bit to come up with second and third amps, unless they don't mind a second version of something that already exists, and we already know that they don't.
It's a good point that I hadn't thought about: all the artist collections have at least two amps, no? Neither Randy Rhoads nor Zakk Wylde have complicated rigs -- at best, Zakk has used different versions of fairly similar gear when he received or changed artist endorsements from manufacturers. (I think even his "own-brand" amps that were planned -- but seem to have evaporated -- were basically JCM800 clones.) On the other hand, Gilmour may have barely more than one amp, but the array of pedals and rack effects would be enough to swamp the AmpliTube 5 menu system UI!
That said, IKM could probably release a digital model of Gilmour's orange-juice squeezer and the fans would come out for it!
There are a
lot of guitar-playing (or at least guitar-owning!) Gilmour fans out there ....
squeezenor wrote:i've never been an artist tone chaser so i don't have many feelings on the matter; the only thing i care about in the artist collections is the gear. aside from a few oversights like laney/iommi, i can't really think of much that isn't already in there somewhere.
Again, I am very much agreed. I have eventually ended up with all the various artist collections (so far), but I've never been trying to sound like any of those artists. But there are probably a least a models from almost every artist collection that I use for my own purposes. Also, it is interesting just to flip through the artist presets and see how things work, and I very much enjoy checking out the "bonus" artist presets that have recently come through the IK Product Manager. These often use gear models from outside of the given artist's own AmpliTube collection (if they have one). I mean, I'm not a huge Satriani or Slash fan, as such, but those guys certainly know their business, and I learn something by seeing what they've done presets they create with sometimes fairly random AmpliTube stuff.
squeezenor wrote:they're going to have to get creative to fluff up amplitube 6 max.
orange/vox/laney/hiwatt/matchless collections wouldn't hurt. if they can't swing that, maybe a second metal collection, based on more genre specific amps or uncommon cult favorites like sunn, matamp, marshall valvestate, randall, framus, peavey.
actually, a peavey collection might make sense, too. some of the vintage oddballs, the 80s/90s vtm/butcher/ultra models, a bandit, maybe a classic or two, a 6505 and an invective, or whatever current models are left. maybe toss in some of those handwired masterpiece or budda amps, too. peavey would have to throw in the towel on revalver, but haven't they already?
Well, one thing that guitarists everywhere have proven again and again is that they can never have too much gear
so
more and
newer models of
everything are
always going to be attractive.
That said, I think the main challenge for AmpliTube is that which perhaps exists for all makers of modeled analog plugins: certainly in the last decade or so, the quality of amp sims has got so good that we have long since passed the point where it matters to the average listener (AC/DC notably used AmpliTube 2 for some things on
Black Ice, released back in 2008!) and increasingly even to all but the pickiest players who've had the luxury to indulge in the subtleties of real amps for year (without losing their hearing!
). There are even free amp sims out there that you can pair with free IRs and, at least for certain tones, they are pretty good!
So: where does any amp sim maker go in the future?
Leaving aside the "more gear!" thing
I think another important issue is going to be about the usability of the software. One thing that AmpliTube has in its favor is that it has a fair number of gear options, and you can change them in and out fairly quickly if you know what you are doing. That's a huge advantage if you are messing around and looking for just the tone you need for this song or this mix or whatever. The danger is that it can obviously be overwhelming to newcomers -- just as being ushered into a studio full of pedals, amps, cabinets, mic, and rack gear while being told to set up what they need to get the tone they want would be.
I think better ways to help users search, try, and organize presets will be key here. And that's a usability and perhaps UI issue, and not so much a technical (or modelling) issue.
Possibly AmpliTube 6 should have at least interoperability of presets between the iOS and desktop versions. THe current lack of that interoperability seems to confuse and dismay customers. I do presume Apple will eventually merge iOS and macOS, regardless of what they claim, and I presume the M1 etc. chips are steps towards that, though I don't know how long it will take.
Obviously, it's more fun to think about gear collections than usability, though.
I wonder if a "Metal 2" collection might not be a double-edged sword? Firstly, there are now a fair number of high-gain amps available in AmpliTube: there are some Mesa models, the Powerball, the Satch and Dimebag stuff. Though I suppose it's always true that "too much is never enough"), what should actually be in Metal 2? (Other than, obviously, an updated Tube Screamer and HM-2!
) Secondly, there are also now some other well-known amp-sim makers whose high-end high-gain models seem to have found a certain degree of favor in the metal community. Should "Metal 2" intend to take those on in the project-studio world? Or should "Metal 2" aimed at us hobbyists who prefer to drop USD 30 on an amp model instead of USD 100 or whatever?
Should there be some artist collections with younger guitar heroes? Brian May (and Dave Gilmour) are in their mid-70s; so is Iommi, for all that I would welcome an artist collection or just some "based on Laney" models. Slash (and Zakk Wylde) are in their mid-50s (not that I won't soon be there myself!
). I am not even sure who the younger guitar heroes
are but there must be a few.
(Everyone I
think is younger actually turns out to be
older ....
)
Oh well. Certainly more gear models should continue to roll out, and it would certainly be nice if some of the older models that have not yet been refreshed were refreshed. I think improvements to the interface and enhancements of the routing etc. capabilities would be appreciated. I think more searchable and manageable presets would be a bonus, especially to new user (though increased integration of the AmpliTube interface and Custom Shop functionality is a welcome step in that direction).[/quote]