Modeller for Acoustic & Electric work

BrizzleRocker · September 2023

Is anyone using Helix/HX or Fractal for live performance with a mix of acoustic & electric guitar? I'd be interested to get some opinions of the pros/cons of each unit. Sounds I'm after are Pink Floyd rhythm parts but thinking of swapping my whole grunge rig out too which is currently two pedalboards and a 100W head)

mrleon83 · September 2023

Yup, I’m using a fractal FM3 for an average 3 hr set mixing electric and piezo sounds. I use on preset with 6 scenes for electric and 2 for acoustic and it is amazing. Super light , quick to setup and sounds great! Here’s a little mash up vid from a gig a couple of months back https://youtu.be/oyRRidcWIfA?si=D8Juh0jzioHoEQfR

Roland · September 2023

I use an Axe FX for a mix of electric and acoustic sounds. The acoustic sounds are all simulated using an IR and multi-band compressor, which together make my Telecaster neck pickup sound like an acoustic. Benefits are no fragile acoustic guitar on stage, no feedback from the acoustic body, and changeover time is a less than second.

grappagreen · September 2023

Acoustic sim built into Kemper is brill. One less guitar to take to gigs and setup…

Musicwolf · September 2023

Roland said:

I use an Axe FX for a mix of electric and acoustic sounds. The acoustic sounds are all simulated using an IR and multi-band compressor, which together make my Telecaster neck pickup sound like an acoustic. Benefits are no fragile acoustic guitar on stage, no feedback from the acoustic body, and changeover time is a less than second.

I do this with my Helix. It works well with a neck pickup but even better is when I use my PRS SE Hollowbody II which has a piezo bridge, Mag pickup output from the guitar goes into the regular Helix in and through an amp sim, piezo output goes to the aux in of the Helix and through an IR. I've measured changeover (Snapshot) at 20msec.

grappagreen said:

Acoustic sim built into Kemper is brill. One less guitar to take to gigs and setup…

Although I prefer the Kemper sounds to the Helix most of the time I find that the Helix beats the Kemper on acoustic sims. Also, because the Kemper is a single amp path, changeover is slower at around 150msec. That's ok most of the time but I have one song where I need to switch back and to right on the beat.

guitargeek62 · October 2023

@Musicwolf - interesting, that’s the route I’m toying with going since getting one of those HBIIs as well, I’m now a convert to the piezo/mag options on one guitar with variable signal path options

Musicwolf · October 2023

guitargeek62 said:

@Musicwolf - interesting, that’s the route I’m toying with going since getting one of those HBIIs as well, I’m now a convert to the piezo/mag options on one guitar with variable signal path options

It took a bit of setting up, but it was worth the effort.

For a typical Helix patch, which has both acoustic and electric paths, I have 'Guitar In' fed by the mag pickup with an amp / cab block. Piezo goes to the 'Aux In' on the second path with an acoustic IR. There's a gain block at the front of each path set to -120dB (so effectively muting the signal when it's active) - these two gain blocks are turned on and off via Snapshots to give me my acoustic or electric sounds. All straight forward.

Then I have to consider string breaks (or the more unlikely battery going flat or other failure). I only have one guitar with a piezo bridge so I have another Helix setlist, which is a copy of the first, except that the acoustic path is fed from the main 'Guitar In'. This way, if I have to swap guitars due to a break, I can quickly switch setlists and carry on using the neck pickup through an acoustic IR method (I can switch setlists quickly with a single button press on an Elgato Stream Deck).

Since I'm carrying two guitars to cover breakages I may as well use them both so, second set, it's over to the Rickenbacker ('cos it's just far too cool to not be used). This means I have 3 set lists. One optimised to play the full set using the HB II (humbuckers + piezo bridge), one for just the Rick (single coil mags only) and one that is a combination of the two, which is the one used barring a string break, where the first half is the HB II and the second the Rick.

The audience, of course, couldn't care less

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Modeller for Acoustic & Electric work

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