Buy Richard Hunter’s Huntersounds Patch Set for Digitech RPs
If you’re ready to order, click here right now! Otherwise keep reading…
The Digitech RP series multi-effects devices offer a lot for harmonica players.
We can start with a half dozen each of great reverbs and great delays—as good or better than dedicated reverb or delay units costing almost as much as an RP device! To that we can add amplifier and cabinet modeling based on dozens of well-known amplifiers, pitch and modulation effects, distortions, and more. It’s hard to find a more economical way to add a huge assortment of high-quality sounds to your stage or studio setup!
The problem for harmonica players is that, terrific as these devices are, out-of-the-box they’re set up for guitar players, not harmonica. As we all know, effects devices and amp modelers (let alone real amps) simply do not behave the same way with guitars as they do with a harmonica and microphone. (Did anyone say “runaway feedback”?)
The Huntersounds patch sets unleash the power of the Digitech RP for harp
Richard Hunter’s Huntersounds patch sets for the Digitech RP series devices solves this problem, and turns your Digitech RP 250, 255, 350, or 355 into an incredibly powerful harmonica setup. You get a set of hundreds of “patches” (pre-configured sound setups) for your Digitech RP 250, 255, 350, or 355, in both single patch and bulk load format. These are EXACTLY the same sounds used by Richard Hunter on his recordings and performances, and they cover everything from simple reverbs and delays only to massive amped blues and rock sounds. The emphasis throughout every set is on sounds that harmonica players can use immediately in a wide range of styles, and we’ve tweaked every patch over and over to yield the maximum volume and tone without feedback. The results are terrific; just read this review by Australian harp guru Tony Eyers, and these rave reviews by some of the musicians using our RP patch sets on stage and in studio!
What’s your gig? We’ve got you covered
Some players just use the reverb and delay only patches in front of their favorite blues harp amp; others take their RP device and a microphone to the gig and plug it straight into the PA for a terrific amped sound on blues, rock, and jazz, or sweet, subtle effects on country and acoustic styles. Hunter’s own stage setup for the last few years has consisted entirely of a Digtech RP device and a Fireball V microphone. That’s the setup he’s used on stage and in studio with some of the most demanding artists and producers in the world. (By the way, you will need SOME kind of external amplifier to go with your RP—it’s an effects device, not an amp, and it won’t make a sound until you plug it into an amplifier. We recommend the cleanest amp you can get your hands on if you’re planning to use the amp modeling features of your RP. A guitar amp set to the cleanest available setting will work fine for most situations, though we prefer a keyboard amp or PA system ourselves.)
Each patch set is optimized for use with the Audix Fireball V microphone, but we know from testing and customer feedback that most of the patches work very well also with “bullet” style mics and vocal mics. (Some of the effects, like chorus and flanging, that require a wide frequency range to be heard in their fullest glory won’t sound quite as beautiful with a bullet mic—bullets just don’t have the frequency response. But the pitch-based effects, like the low octave doublers, work GREAT with a bullet.)
Here’s a short clip of us playing a Bottle o’ Blues mic into our RP355 running a blackface deluxe amp model with slapback delay and reverb, recorded live with no editing, overdubs, or post-recording processing. Sure sounds like the real deal to us…
Bottle o’ Blues mic with RP355 Blackface Deluxe
We make it easy
Each patch set ships with a full set of documentation that describes every patch in the bulk load set, with single patches organized by sound category (such as FX, Blues, Clean, Pitch, and so on). All sets ship with a full set of instructions that tell you how to load the patches into your RP and set the RP up for performance. The entire collection of patch files weighs in at less than a megabyte, so it will download easily even on a dial-up Internet connection. All buyers also get a year of FREE updates to the patch set, meaning that every time we add a new patch to the set during your first year as a licensee, we send it to you. Finally, we provide email support for our users. Our goal is to get you up and running with your RP, making great music, as quickly and easily as possible.
Finally, we need to add a little bit of legal stuff related to the patchset. You will need to agree to the terms before your online purchase can be completed.
If you’re ready to order, click here right now!
FAQ
Q: What else do I need besides the patch set?
A: You’ll need:
Peavey KB 2 Keyboard Amp
If you can’t find a KB-2, there are plenty of other options. We’ve played through powered PA speakers from Mackie, Peavey, and others that sound great. Peavey offers a powered PA speaker with a 12″ woofer, 100 watts of power, and three inputs with individual volume controls for about $340. Mackie offers a very nice speaker with similar specs for about $300. Again, look for something with at least a 10″ speaker and 100 watts of power. A powered PA speaker (or two for a stereo setup) and an RP is a powerful, versatile, and lightweight setup for most gigs.
You do NOT need an external preamp for input to the RP. The RP will work fine with a mic at the input. You do NOT need a direct box (DI) to connect the RP to your amp or PA unless the cable run from the RP is longer than 50 feet (20 meters).
Q: Which Digitech device should I buy?
A: We recommend the RP355 first, for a number of reasons:
DigiTech RP355 Guitar Multi Effects Pedal
Our second choice would be a used RP350, which has almost all the features of the RP355. RP350s have been discontinued by Digitech, but can still be serviced by Digitech dealers. Sound-wise, they’re identical to the RP355, except for the few additional amp and cabinet models in the 355.
If money (or space onstage) is really tight, an RP255 or 250 will work fine. The main issue here is that these devices don’t give you as much control over high frequency EQ, and they don’t have all the cool amp models from the RP350/355. You can compensate for the reduced EQ control by turning down the treble EQ at your amp or PA.
DigiTech RP255 Guitar Multi Effects Pedal
We do NOT recommend an RP150 or 155, because those devices don’t have a footpedal, and we think the footpedal is really important.
Finally, if you’ve got an RP200 lying around and you want to make use of it, go for it. It’s an older device, and you have to enter the patch data by hand (which takes an hour or so), but it certainly sounds good. Just keep in mind that if the thing breaks (which happens sometimes with a chip-based device that went out of production eight years or so ago), you’re going to have to re-enter your patch data by hand into another RP200 if you want to keep using those sounds. Trust us when we say that the USB connection with the newer RPs pays for itself fast if you’re in that kind of situation.
Q: Can the patches be converted to work with other Digitech devices, like the RP80, RP200, RP500, RP1000, or Vocal 300?
A: Unfortunately, no. Digitech’s devices are pretty feature-specific, and there’s no way to convert from the RP250/255/350/355 to other devices they offer. It is possible to convert patches from one of these four devices to another, by hand or by using Digitech’s utility program, but there are three good reasons not to:
1) It’s a violation of your license to use the patches, which is specific to the device you ordered the patches for.
2) You won’t get your year of free updates for the other device, so you’ll have to do conversions every time we send out a patch update.
3) There is no way to do an automated bulk load conversion from one device to another, so you’ve got to do the conversion patch by patch, which takes lots of time. If you’d like to do a crossgrade from one device to another, contact us.
Q: What amp should I use with the RP?
A: The RP is a pretty comprehensive sound source, and what you want most is an amp that will take the sound coming from the RP and make it louder, with a minimum of added coloration. A keyboard amp or a PA is ideal. A guitar amp set to its cleanest setting will work fine in most cases too. We strongly recommend an amp with at least a 10″ speaker in order to get the most from the RP’s effects, especially the pitch shifters. Of course, if you only plan to use the FX-only patches with your favorite harp amp, just use that.
Our current favorite amp for use with the RP is the Peavey KB 2. You can read our review of it here.
Q: What styles of music will this patch set work for?
A: You name it. We supply patches in this set for just about every purpose, and we have played rock, folk, acoustic, blues, jazz, and wedding gigs with these patches. For most gigs, all you’ll need to do is bring the RP, your mic, and a couple of cables, and plug straight into the PA. It’s great for musicians who travel on planes–you can throw your entire rig into a shoulder bag and know EXACTLY what you’re going to sound like when you get to the gig.
Q: What do I do if I need help?
A: Contact us via email, and we’ll give you whatever help we can.
Q: How do I record into my computer or recording device using the RP?
A: You’ve got plenty of options here.
1) If you like the sound of the RP through whatever amplifier you’re using with it, then you can just stick a mic in front of the amp speaker and hit RECORD on your recordng device–exactly as if you were recording an electric guitar from an amp. A Shure SM57 mic or equivalent , placed an inch or so from the speaker grille and facing straight into the center of the speaker cone, is a good place to start.
2) If you already have a decent audio interface for your computer, or good inputs on your recording device, you can run cables from the XLR outputs or 1/4 inch outputs on the RP directly into your audio interface or device inputs. Use LINE or INSTRUMENT level inputs for this purpose, NOT mic level inputs. Recording from the stereo outputs gives you the full flavor of effects like the rotary speaker, flangers, reverbs, and delays, which is very cool, but if recording inputs are in short supply, the RP sounds fine recorded in mono too.
3) Since the RP is itself a digital audio interface, you can connect the RP to your computer via USB for recording directly from the RP. In this case, you MUST have previously downloaded the correct audio drivers for your specific RP device from Digitech.com and installed the drivers on your computer. Once that’s done, you will probably need to go into your recording software and tell the software to use the RP as your audio input and output device. See the instructions for your recording software to find out exactly how to do this; in most cases, your software will have a menu that shows you all the available input and output audio devices on your computer, and you just check off the ones related to the RP.
Any of these techniques can produce good results. Watch out for digital clipping (which displays visually as squared–off waveform tops in your audio recording software), and lower the level of the RP’s outputs or the recording device’s inputs if necessary to get a signal with a level that’s neither zero nor clipped.
Readt to buy? Choose the patch set that’s right for your RP below!