I am mainly a metal player and I am always chasing crushing tones with great attack and those perfect mids.
Ive played guitar for almost 10 years growing up, but I didnt know a lot about gear, and for most of that time I was playing a line 6 spider valve combo... I had been wanting a better amp for along time so I got the kemper head. No experience with modeling or multifx or digital amps. I do love audio tech though and this has been a great learning experience so far.
When I go thru the preset rigs, like the EVH rigs, the Mesa Riga, and the ENGL rigs (all which "should" sound amazing) they all sound very far away, foggy/fuzzy/muffled, no clarity, no bite, and if I try a distortion or boost its either super thin and super fizzy or flubby and as stated above .
Pure cabinet is off, direct is off, ive played with definition and clarity a lot, to no avail. The only thing I've really had luck with in terms of high gain tones is the Peavey XXX (one of my favorite real amps) with a graphic EQ pre-amp stack boosting the shit out of the mids, and then scooping them on the AMP EQ, as well as turning the bass treble and presence way up. Sounds pretty good but still not exactly amp in the room. But damn close.
I don't know about turning monitor cab on/off and the output volume settings. I am wondering id having the master volume up and the FRFR on low volume, vs having master volume down and having the FRFR on high volume makes a difference. I almost always play with rig volume close to full or at full volume.
My setup is an unpowered toaster into a headrush FRFR 108 running an XLR cable out of the left out to the headrush(I dont know whether that matters, I was told to run it that way). I KNOW this amp is capable sounding great, ive heard someone play it live and it sounded as good or better than a tube amp.
I know the FRFR I have isnt top of the line but it should be ok for bedroom jamming.
I really really want to love the kemper and as of right now I really like it but in some ways my line 6 actually sounded better (I know how blasphemous that is. But I just have not found the right settings on this yet and I cant seem to find help. Ive tried to figure this out myself for a while and not ask but I want good sound)