So what's wrong with Peavey?

[GilmourD]

 

I'm 99% sure that Hartley Peavey himself drew that, WAAAAAAAY before the company ever existed.

[streetknight]

I've had a Classic 30 and Classic 50 4/10 that I loved both, but I'm a bedroom player and they're just too loud for at home no matter how good they sound.

I'm supposed to pick up a USA Peavey Predator today. I hope it's a keeper.

[Brocken Jr.]

I've barely looked at Peaveys myself, because I always took them to be for br00tle m3ttle.

[BryanMichael]

I'm 99% sure that Hartley Peavey himself drew that, WAAAAAAAY before the company ever existed.

That's true, I think he drew it in High School - that's why he is so attached to it. It's like a personal totem to Hartley or something.

Personally, I've always hated it like many others. I liked the logo they had on a couple of the classics and other amps. I had a Classic 30 and it was probably one of the best amps I've ever owned.

[Funkwire]

I think a lot of us do get caught up in the idea that affordable = beginner gear. I bought a Peavey Encore 65 in 1984 (all-tube 50w 1x12 combo). It's been in the repair shop twice. The first time, when a beer got spilled on it. The second time, when a tube slipped out of the socket and arced. It's still going strong, although it needs to be re-tubed. But it sits in my basement, having been superseded by a Fender HRD and now an Egnater Rebel 30. Why? Because the Peavey (to my ears) was a perfectly good tube amp...but didn't have that certain something that the Fender and Egnater do.

And it's not just the logo...when I bought the amp in 1984, the logo was already gone. The owner told me, "It's around here somewhere...I took it off because it's so damn ugly." I told him not to bother looking for it.

[GilmourD]

That's true, I think he drew it in High School - that's why he is so attached to it. It's like a personal totem to Hartley or something. Personally, I've always hated it like many others. I liked the logo they had on a couple of the classics and other amps. I had a Classic 30 and it was probably one of the best amps I've ever owned.

I have to admit, I MUCH prefer the more modern logo. That's the logo I've got on my Wolfgang and my 412MS 4x12 cab loaded with Sheffield 1290s (LOOOOOOOVE this cabinet!).

 

However, the logo won't keep me from buying Peavey products. I'd love to get my hands on a 5150-II/6505+.

[vintage clubber]

the local GC had a used 5150 2 x 12 combo last week. I tried to pick it up to see just how heavy it was and it weighed a freaking ton! I believe it's gone now though...

[csm]

Owned a Peavey amp during the 1980s -- a Deuce 120w combo, which I eventually decided I didn't like. The thing was loud as hell and built like a TANK, but once I committed to Fender guitars, I found that its basic tone, and the way it was voiced, didn't get me what I wanted from my Strats and Tele.

 

During the '90s, my band had a Peavey PA system, which was EXCELLENT, and my bass-playing (now ex-) wife used some of their smaller combos for home practice and lo-vol duo/restaurant gigs.

 

In my current band, our bassie -- your friend and mine Marc 'The Exorcist' Jefferies aka metalheadUK -- currently plays a Jazz-alike Peavey Milestone bass, which he prefers to his orthodox genuine-article Fender Precision. Our harp player recently did a straight swap of his Classic 50 for a Fender Blues DeVille with a guitarist he knows ... both parties figure they got the best of the deal, so everybody's happy.

 

And whenever I've been lucky enough to hang in the Mizzippi Delta soaking up the local blues, I saw Peavey gear EVERYWHERE ... including the local pawnshops.

 

Conclusion: I give Peavey high marks for build quality and VFM ... decidedly lower marks for style and design.

[Philfixit]

I used to have a Classic (early '80's, baby brother of the Mace/Deuce) and it never really 'worked' for me. The stock speakers really held it back. I also had a couple of different Backstages and they weren't great either. These amps have fueled my anti-Peavey bias for life.
Brother had a Peavey bass amp from the same era as my Classic; The 210 watt head on top of a 2-15" Black Widow cab. It was lifeless.
He currently has a Peavey combo bass amp (50 watts thru a 15" Black Widow, can't remember model . . ..) and it sucks too.
But, a dude I play with often has the newer Classic 30 and it's a pretty nice amp. It's on my amp GAS 'long list'.

[Dash4814]

It's already been said: the price point gets people into the "eh, seems cheap" mentality. Plus, most of their SS amps suck.

I have a tweed Classic 30 with an upgraded speaker, and I'll never, ever get rid of it. I play everything short of metal and it can handle it. It's definitely loud as hell, though, but when you get the clean channel up to breakup it sounds great (but loud, dear god so loud). I keep the OD channel gain around 11:00 for teh rock.

Worth mentioning: it's the older version without the "dip" on the front, which means the logo was easily removed with a screwdriver. I didn't do it but I would have.

[Westorbust7]

I think you chalk up the Peavey hate to a few things:

 

1. Brand name snobbery. Every manufacturer has their share of duds, Peavey is no exception, however Peavey doesn't just build amps or guitars (mics, pa, synth units, drums, etc...), whereas companies like Marshall have a narrower focus.

 

2. The logo. I love some of that peavey gear, but that old logo is ugly. It screams 1978, which can be cool in some regards, but that isn't.

 

3. Perception. Peavey has had a hard time breaking out of the "affordable for beginners" market. Eddie's guitars and amps helped that somewhat, but then that is part of their marketing. So, you make money where you can make money.

 

Some of the best gear I've owned is Peavey, and some of the worst gear I've owned is Peavey. However the same can be said for some of the Marshall, Fender and Ibanez products I've used over the years.

[Rich4Once]

 

Well, better guitar or not, the Nitro never achieved icon status. And I'd have to disagree that your guitar is better. It could be....I like the on/off switching you have there. I also have the same style switching on my Hamer USA Chaparral and on my MIK Westone Corsair, but neither of them are as good as my Vandy, so switching alone can't win the day. Personally, I prefer the 24 frets, ebony fingerboard of the Vandenberg; it looks like you have a Peavey-licensed Floyd Rose...I prefer the Kahler 2700 mine has (although not all Vandys had them, true). Maybe you have the 2700, too...I saw a few YouTube vids of Nitros with the Kahler. I also love the unique violin cuts on the Vandy, and the body seems to be slightly larger than the Nitro, which I also appreciate. The action is extremely low, and the tone rocks on my Vandy, so the Nitro is probably as good, but really can't be better. It may just be personal preferences, but the Vandy definitely commands more on the market than the Nitro...saw a baseline Vandy go for $800 a few months ago...and the neck-through signature models, if you can find one (I haven't seen one on eBay in years) probably go for close to $2k. Though since I haven't seen one available, that's a complete swag on my part. Still, the important thing is you love your guitar and I love mine. I wouldn't trade, I'm sure you wouldn't either.

 

 

Mine came with the 2700, but I hated it. It's had a Schaller Floyd since '90 or so.The best thing about my Nitro has (opposed to the bolt-ons) is the smooth heel, contoured body, and ebony fretboard. I had a Hamer Steve Stevens (also 24 frets) and never liked the neck pickup's positioning. 22 is enough for me, and the neck pickup sounds better. You're certainly right about resale...my Nitro listed at 1k in '88, and I've put money into it (bridge and pickup swaps) and it's worth $500 if I'm lucky. Probably closer to $350 in reality...it doesn't really matter though, 'cause it ain't for sale.

[DavidMgT]

I prefer Peavey amps to Fender amps almost in every case.

 

 

I agree; however with the notable exception of the Fender Twin.

[GAS Man]

 

 

I don't see anything wrong with it!

 

 

He Ha

[onerailunder]

Our band is gonna print T-shirts with the band's name in the Peavey font, just 'cuz it's dated, funny and so damned recognizable.

[WRGKMC]

My buddies band has an endorcement with Peavey. He used to ask me about improvements for their products. I used to repair alot of their older blackface stuff which I was not impressed with by any means. The circuits were simple and easy to access and repair but The components and build weren't very good and they havent held up to the test of time.

 

Being a tech can be a curse when you know whats inside, and much of their old stuff containes 90% air and 10% components, it's like, "wheres the beef?" when you open it up. and you se tofu instead of beef you cant possibly give a good endorcement especially when you do regular repairs caused by the same cheap components.

 

Many newer products are very good. I own one of their power heads and they are built very well with quality components and. Their tube stuff is well made too as are some of their higher end bass amps. So I suppose its like anything else, you get what you pay for. Buy a budget unit and you get something that looks OK from the outside with budget components inside built in a budget manor. You still see alot of the old stuff in use, mainly because so many were sold, not because they were high quality and stood the test of time. If they had used some better caps at least it would have been a whole different story. If you do own an older one, power caps are the key to keeping them running. If you put good caps in there theres much less likely chance of catastrophic failure which was part of their design fault as well.

 

I'm not a big fan of their guitar amps as you can guess, probibly because I was already spoiled by better amps already. Didnt like their transistor tone. Bass amps were OK, fairly punchey. Some of their earley PA stuff was complete junk. ans as I said, their new power heads are great. I did my share of repairs on them all as an electronic tech so that definately left a bad taste in my mouth. Even though I know they do make some really good products now. They were like the berhinger of the past to me.

 

They do realise they had that bad rep among techs and have done huge turnaround from being a budget maker to a player, so I give them major credit for that. And because of that, they are making better products now. Many companies accept littel or no feedback so at least they have their ears to the pulse of what musicians want and need.

[MahaloVision]

I think it's justly deserved. I played on a friend's Bandit 1x12" for a year before I bought my own amp. I knew it sounded terrible, even then. The cleans were flat, sterile, lifeless and dull. The "gain" channel? Harsh, metallic, piercing with absolutely no smoothness or definition. The reverb was pitifully bad. I recently had rehearsal space in a full-blown warehouse, and my bassist dug an old Bandit out from his house and had it laying around. We plugged it in for about 10 minutes, and unplugged it quickly after. It was as bad as I remembered it back in the 80's.

 

 

The Transtube Bandits aren't all that bad, unless you're trying to play metal on the distortion channel and aren't miking the amp or using a 4x12 with it. I think that's the mistake most players make with the transtube series amps - they use the distortion channel instead of the clean with the transtube knob and perhaps a good distortion pedal in there. My son was using my old Bandit that way, and was surprised with how much better the tone was when I set him up on the clean channel with his distortion pedal and the EMG 81/PA-2 equipped guitar. The clean channel gets much louder and gives the transtube a chance to do what it's designed to do.

 

Johnny Hiland had no trouble dialing in a good sound on his Valve King's.

[svejkist]

i work in marketing in los angeles for some of the biggest brands in the world. i can name a million fantastic logos in pretty much any market you want to talk about. the peavey logo is not among any of them. it's atrociously executed likely hand drawn type (drawn poorly at that, from a typography standpoint) that's terribly, terribly dated.

Off the top of my head, I would say the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament logo was pretty Earth shattering.

[fuzwah]

They must be doing something right to stay in business for so long. Some of their crappy solid state amps gave them a bad rep, but they have survived it.

[Fangorn]

I own a Predator PLus EXP - made of cheap woods, the pup's are tinny and naff, licensed floyd floating bridge..... but it's built like a rock and the action is very damn fast - fekking love it.

 

Best "cheapie" i've owned!

 

As for the logos, mine's the older version which looks smarter then current ones.

[svejkist]

I like it.

 

"Pointy logo, oh pointy, pointy,

Anoint my gear, anointy, nointy."

 

Please tell me that Peavy makes an Explorer. That would be the pointiest guitar ever! Even the logo is pointy!

[DRPool]

Funny, I used to hear all the time that tone was in the fingers. Guess now tone is in the logo?

 

Either way, my 15 yr old C30 has made guitar playing more fun for me. I've managed to pick up a 112e and 410e cabs to go along and it's just made the amp even better. Pedals sound good through it, stupid goofy effects sound good through it and all this while being built like a rock.

 

It's the only amp I use and to be honest with you when I started reading this thread I could not remember what the logo even looked like. Doesn't matter to me and I can't believe someone would make any kind of serious buying decision based on something so irrelevant.

[honeyiscool]

Are you guys all missing the part where I bought a Peavey amp for myself...

[svejkist]

Funny, I used to hear all the time that tone was in the fingers. Guess now tone is in the logo? Either way, my 15 yr old C30 has made guitar playing more fun for me. I've managed to pick up a 112e and 410e cabs to go along and it's just made the amp even better. Pedals sound good through it, stupid goofy effects sound good through it and all this while being built like a rock. It's the only amp I use and to be honest with you when I started reading this thread I could not remember what the logo even looked like. Doesn't matter to me and I can't believe someone would make any kind of serious buying decision based on something so irrelevant.

 

I wear the logo with pride. The amp (Bandit 65), OTOH, I gutted. The best part was when I told my friend And he said, "at least it is at peace, playing Lynard Skynard covers in heaven."

[GAS Man]

Bandit models seem to have really varied. I bought one for my stepson back in the early 90s that was an excellent SS amp. I offered him my Marshall VS8080 or my Fender Super 112 for it and he wouldn't bite.

 

I also bought a Classic 30 for an ex GF around 1997. I thought it was pretty nice but a bit towards the Marshall side from Fender (but closer to Fender) but it didn't have quite the resonant thunk.

 

I'd like to try out their Delta Blues 15 some day, but I have no footprint space left in my house.

 

The only guitar of theirs I've bought was the Reactor, but I've hung onto that guitar as a cool novelty, i.e. a $200 USA guitar is indeed a rarity these days.