We always talk about the amp modeller transforming what a viable live rig looks like. How there is really no need for an "real amp" and cab. No need for a well-stocked pedalboard. Just take the unit, go direct. But it’s only when you see it IRL that it dawns on you just how radical all this is.
Like when MusicRadar caught up with Vower guitarists Joe Gosney and Rabea Massaad at the 2024 ArcTanGent Festival, ostensibly for a video tour of their pedalboards. There was a catch – there was not much 'board to tour.
The pedal collections were left at home, with both players favouring the Neural DSP Quad Cortex as the “main brain” of their setups, with a couple of pinch-hitter stompboxes. Gosney says it was not always like this.
“As I am sure Rabea can attest to, I was probably one of the people who was most against using something like this," he says. "But this is the first amp modeller that I’ve tried that feels like a real amp.”
Massaad is of course part of the Neural DSP artist lineup with his own Archetype signature guitar plugin suite – the one with the synth. Both are sending the signal straight from the Quad Cortex to the power amps of their Victory tube amps onstage for “the best of both worlds”.
Gosney’ setup is more involved, with his Quad Cortex complemented by a Boss Waza Craft TB-2W Tone Bender fuzz pedal and a custom-built “harmonic exciter” that is based on a pedalboard mainstay of Frank Zappa’s, the Systech Harmonic Energizer.
“It’s basically a fixed-position wah with a gain stage in it,” says Gosney. “We use it for that sort of fixed-position-wah, Queens Of The Stone Age kind of sound.”
You can hear this throughout Zappa’s discography – and it’s what Joe Gore used on Tom Waits’ All Stripped Down. Gore wrote about this lost ‘70s unicorn here.
As for Massaad, he just has his Quad Cortex and an expression pedal. But with these things it is how you set it up; the devil is in the detail.
Vower have had some more time together since this festival appearance. If you caught them on their recent UK run, you would have heard some more dialled in sounds. That these modellers got them through a festival set with little notice, not much time for preproduction, is a testament to how practical these units can be.
Vower tour the UK again in May. See Bands In Town for ticket details and dates. And check out the video above for how Gosney and Massaad have their QC's configured.
ArcTanGent has announced Tesseract and Wardruna for its 2025 lineup. The festival takes place on 13 to 16 August in Bristol. You can view the bill and find ticket details at ArcTanGent.
