Dirty little secret

[ye olde fretmonkey]

So Lars and I and our wives went up to Tellypicker's Sunday jam at the Cotton Club in Granger last night and had a great time...heard some first rate pickin', met some nice folks, Dee sang a song or two with the band and Lars and I sat in.

Lars was playing through Jim's silverface Pro (is that right, Jim? Like a 50 watt Twin?) and I was playing a Peavey Nashville and...I liked it. Actually pretty warm and round-sounding for a solid state amp. It looks like my cred is shot for admitting to it, but they're not bad at all...I might even keep an ear to the ground to see if I can come up with one for myself.

Thanks Jim, we had a great time!

[tellypicker]

...for coming out. It was great to meet you, great to hear you and meet your wife. Hope I didn't break her camera when she took some shots!

The Pro Reverb is a 69 model, it's 40 watts. It's been "blackfaced" under the hood. Got 2 old Jensens from 1965 in it. I like it.

Yup, the Peavey is my dirty little secret too. I use it up there quite a bit. As you saw, the room is pretty big, the stage volume with a 7 or 8 piece band gets pretty cranked, and I need the power at times. I've had that amp modded too, to take the midrange honk out of it.

See ya,

Jim

[e-merlin]

Those Nashvilles are huge in the steel market. It doesn't surprise me a bit that a Tele player would like 'em. Great amp.

[LarryN]

I'm a big fan of some of the older Peavey solid-state amps. I own a couple of 130 Specials. I forget what it's called, but I really like the 200 watt combo with a Black Widow 12". These are the older 80's versions, with a saturation control. I'll have to check out the Nashville. Oddly enough, I just bought a '77 Pro Reverb. It sounds delicious! I'll probably try it with the Peavey as a pair. I find them to work well with a Fender. A very complete spectrum of sound, in combination.

[Ramblin Ray]

I'm real fond of my Special 130 also. Great workhorse---especially handy when a gig has stairs and I don't feel like lugging my Rivera Quiana.

[ye olde fretmonkey]

Any experience with the TransTube line?

[LarryN]

They sound good in the store, but I've never played one in the real world. I'm afraid they might sound anemic compared to these old heftier sounding models. I may have read a review that implied that. It might be worth going over to Harmony Central.com to see some user reviews.

[Billy Lee]

How old, and what model was the Peavey Session? (they made a few different versions of the amp.)

I've got an older Peavey Session 400 sitting here that I bought for a steel player that worked the summer with us a few years back. I knew they were good amps, and I had already played a Tele through a Session, but it sort of renewed everything I liked about it, when I plugged into right after buying this one. To be honest though, I haven't played through it in over two years (too many other amps sitting here)

I played through the Transtube Series Peavey, and they are a good solid amp....not that I would swap out my Fender Twin stage amps to get one though.

[ye olde fretmonkey]

No idea. Lots of knobs and the brushed aluminum strips down the sides of the grille, so I guess 80s?

[tellypicker]

...it were a Nashville 400. Don't know what year, they made millions of them, but I'd guess early 90's, maybe late 80's. I got it from my steel player buddy, he had a couple and sold me one. For maybe 200 bucks. I don't remember.

Now the SESSION 400 you speak of, that's a good amp. Jerry Reed played the heck out of those things for years, since they first came out in 74. At first, they had JBL D130's in them, and those are gold today. After Jerry Reed kept blowing the JBLs up with his Tele and DynaComp, Hartley came up with the Black Widow and the rest is Peavey history. The reason the the Session 400, and it's partner the LTD 400 (one of Redd's currently most used amps) are so cool is this. They are loud and clean and have tons of headroom but still sound warm. And they do not have any compression circuity built in. You goose it, you hear it. Of course, like all makers do, they have to "improve" on things, and then you have the Session 400 Limited, which doesn't sound as good, and then went to the Nashville 400 line and by that time they had built in compression circuits to try and protect the speaker from blowing. Remember, these were all designed for steel guitarists. I know of NO other instrument that plays louder or has a wider tonal spectrum than a steel guitar. The lowest strings on the C6 neck are bass strings, like .70 to .78 gauge, and of course the high end of a steel cuts glass. What the steel pickers call "playing up in John Hughey territory". Then there is the issue of cabinet size. Most new steel amps are a narrow cabinet width, like the old LTD, or the newer Nashville 400. Some steel pickers swear by the old wider panel Session amps. They say the tone is better on the wide box. I don't know, never had one, but heard plenty of steel players use them over the years.

[Billy Lee]

The Peavey Ltd. was a great little amp, as was the Nashville 400 from the mid 80's (I had one of those Nashvilles and regret letting it go).

The Session I have here is one of the first...Has the OLD silver knobs that Peavey used first. Has one of the first Black Widow 15" speakers the produced. I always said that the Sessions of that era had a "warm" sound, even though they were solid state. It's hard to describe.....but it wasn't at all "sterile" sounding. I had one guy tell me that this old amp would actually be a "sought after" item by the steel players, if I wanted to part with it....which I actually have been thinking of selling it.

I know, as they tried to improve (or what they thought they were improving), the Peavey amp sound changed to a point. I love the sound of the original Session 400, and I liked the Nashville 400 that I had. I know there were alot of the Session 500, but that amp was "love-hate" amp. I know alot of steel players that used them, and I know quite a few that wouldn't get near one. When they reintroduced the Session 400Ltd., it was similar to that. Now, I hear alot of good things about the Nashville 1000, but I've yet to plug a Tele into it.