Peavey classic 20 mh, Celestion Gold harsh sound?

bermudianbrit

Hi all,

I've spent a frustrating afternoon yesterday trying to sort this out, but can't seem to get there.
I'm running a Peavey Classic 20 MH and a celestion gold through a 1x12, using a Les Paul, PAF pickup sounds, maybe a little hotter on the bridge.
Clean, with no drive pedals or anything, it sounds quite good actually, but applying any kind of drive pedal results in a really harsh freq peak, at either the upper mids or lower trebble regions....sorry I can't give numbers I am not that well-versed just yet lol. If I turn down the trebble, I get mud, turn down the mids, I get a horrible boxy, toneless bit of unpleasantness. Pedals are a TC boost and a JHS Angry Charley Andy Timmons pedal.
I don't even bother with the Peavey drive channel because its a sizzling mess, but hoped to use this thing as a pedal platform.
I really like the cleans for twanging country sounds though!

So, is it the amp? the speaker? or what?
I'm not running it particularly quietly, maybe halfway up.

Thanks

Matt

ICBM

It could be the speaker. Is it new, or well broken-in? The Gold can be really harsh from new, in that upper-mid/clangy metallic treble region. They do smooth out after a while.

It also might be the amp, particularly if you have the channel volume (probably labelled 'Pre' on a Peavey) low, because these often have a bright cap which brings out the top-end harshness in pedals. I don't have a schematic for that amp so I'm not sure.

bermudianbrit

hmm that's unfortunate. I rarely get to really crank the gold for break-in purposes.

No channel volumen on the classic 20 mh but the master was about half way up. not quiet but not cranked.

Winny_Pooh

Could be the amp. Try to loan another head or take the head n cab into a music shop and "shop around"

Cirrus

Yeah, the gold does have a particular zingy brightness to it that sounds great and lively when clean but accentuates some harshness when using overdrive.

The good news is that it does get better over time. After 6 months of gigging and band practices the ones I've had in the past have sounded smoother. Still one of the brighter speakers I've used but nothing crazy.

It's funny, they're supposed to be cut from the same cloth as the Celestion Blue but I consider them very different speakers.

I see you live in Birmingham, book a few hours at a practice studio (I use Robannas), take the amp and some earplugs and crank it up, or maybe even just leave a signal looping and go shopping for a bit.

ICBM

Cirrus said:

It's funny, they're supposed to be cut from the same cloth as the Celestion Blue but I consider them very different speakers.

I think they sound like an 'Alnico V30'. I tried a previously-broken-in one in my Mesa Trem-o-verb alongside one of the original V30s and they actually sounded very similar - the Gold was a little brighter and didn't have as much of the aggressive mid peak as the V30 or that slight grittiness, but it wasn't far away.

bermudianbrit

hmm. well that is a bit of a shame in a way as I don't get much practice time so likely will take quite a while to break in. But thanks for helping narrow down the issue.

Cirrus

It might sound like the start of a elaborate scam, but I've been wondering how a gold would sound in my 1x12 Genz Benz Black Pearl 30 - my concern is that it'd be too bright, but I did like them with my AC30. If you wanted to do a speaker swap for a few weeks I could use it for some band practices.

Note that I won't be surprised or disappointed if you turn down this dubious offer from a total stranger.

bermudianbrit

haha. its actually a great thought. Depends largely on how easy it is to get it out of the cab. I'm incompetent at such things. Let me have a look.

Matt

ThePrettyDamned

Golds are strange speakers. People that like them love them. I have never fallen in love with them, I much prefer greenbacks, g12h65s and blues. 

What you're describing just sounds like a gold. Have you got another cab? It could work nicer with something woodier like a greenback, or an American voiced speaker possibly. 

crunchman

I had a Gold that sounded similar to that.  I bought it and put it something I sold, and then put it in a Cornell Romany Plus - I got exactly the same kind of thing as you are describing.  It may have got better as it got broken in with more playing time but I think that's a matter of degrees of harshness rather than a completely different sound.  I'd used mine enough that it would have got through the worst part of being a new speaker.

You might be able to get away with a Blue in a Classic 20.  For me that is a completely different sounding speaker.  Otherwise try and track down the Tayden version of a Blue which I think has 25W power handling.  It doesn't sound quite the same but it's a very good speaker.

bermudianbrit

everyone's been talking to me about creambacks  i.e. g12m-65s lately. I know nothing about speakers. This is becoming more and more aparent haha.

ICBM

bermudianbrit said:

everyone's been talking to me about creambacks  i.e. g12m-65s lately. I know nothing about speakers.

They sound fantastic - and even better mixed with the G12H-75 (also confusingly called a Creamback) in a 2x12". Very close to the sound of the G12M-25 Greenback and the G12H-30, but with much higher power handling so you can run them with bigger amps with no fear of blowing them.