Anyone tried the latest Peavey Butcher?

[frthib]

disclaimer : this is a Necrobump

I just bought a used one for pocket change. (+-300$ US!)
The store wanted it out of their sight.

There is a general feeling of quality about that thing, it weight a ton so there is good quality transformers and no paper-thin PCB with SMD in sight...
I'm really surprised about the JSX50 link, it awesome that thing flew under the radar, I always liked the sound of the JSX.

I played it quickly before taking it out, it as a very definitive crunchy british vibe.. It love boosts, even more if using the internal boost.

I will try to report back once I spend more time on it

 

[Hamer95USA]

From what I understand, the JSX became the XXXII, the XXX became the 3120 with EL34's, and the 6534 is just a 5150 w/ EL34s and preamp tweaks. The Butcher is the JSX 50w that never made it to production.

That's interesting to see what those amps became. Didn't know the Butcher was the JSX 50. The original Butcher was basically Peavey's first attempt at a hot rod Marshall...that evolved into the VTM series.

I know originally Ultra 120 was the inspiration for the XXX. Lynch had been messing around with the Ultra 120, got involved with Peavey and they designed the XXX. Peavey was all set to go as the XXX being George's sig head...I even saw the advertising for it at NAMM in Nashville that year...then George/Peavey for whatever reason pulled his name of it.

The JSX was Joe's refinement of the XXX...like what he's done with the stock JVM and the Satch model but all of them go back to the Ultra 120.

That's a great history of how the high gain Peavey amps evolved! I owned the VTM 60 & 120 heads with the matching 412MS 4x12 cab with the Celestion G12K-85 speakers that everyone likes now. I had no idea of what kind of tube amp to buy back then, but we all learn. I ran mine as one huge pedal platform with an old MIJ Boss DS-1 in front of the amp for the overdrive. I eventually sold off both of the VTM amp heads, went to rack gear, kept both of the 412MS cabs, and bought a pair of used 212MS cabs from a friend who was moving. The current high gain, multi-channel Peavey amps have come a long way, sounds decent, is affordable, and is made for the working musician. If I had to borrow or rent one from a store, I could make it work for my sound and play a show with it.

Guitar George

 

[ZEEGLER]

Don't forget the Triumph

Triumph -> Ultra -> Ultra Plus -> Triple XXX -> Triple XXX II -> 3120

 

[frthib]

So I had some quality time with the "new edition" butcher

It's a really interesting amp... I really like it.
It's 100 watts. I never played a real 100 watts tube amp before. I didn't knew it was "that" loud.. (going from a 20 watts 2 el84 to 4 el34).

I always wanted to have "that" sound, 4 el34 with great output transformer. Playing a "virtual" (ampsim) 100 watt is nowhere near the real deal. I wasted a lot of time here..

There is two footswitchable great master volume to tame it down to whisper level if needed. The pots don't match, one master is louder than the other.. I suspect one pot is alpha while the other is audio..

It's not the typical higain preamp 6l6 peavey.. I would qualify the gain as "midgain" on it's own. I think it's probably on the plexi gain
level. To be honest, at first, it was a shock to ear that there was no more gain available. I'm so used to play modern higain amps that I felt completely naked when playing that.
But when I when over that, I played my usual songs and everything I played merged 100% with everything else.. The guitar was clear and distinct, the gain was perfect, there was no annoying sizzle or tubby bass.

This thing loves to be boosted with an external boost. That 100% solves the "not enough gain" thing. When boosted, it does the boosted marshall thing perfectly ala sd1 into jcm800. It sounds very similar to that.

There is a switch to make it 50 watts. My guess is it disable the two outer power tubes since you must half the impedance when switching to 50watts (it's written on the back)

The loop is active and there is a pre and post level control. You can tame the volume even more there

It came with Ruby El34 and JJ ECC83S.. I don't know if it's stock since I bought it used.. I won't switch them, i'll burn them before swapping them. They sound perfectly fine

Saddly, now when I play the jca22h it sounds like a toy. Tubby and fizzy at the same time.

The PV bravo still sounds great.. I now can ear the difference el84 and el34.. Different tools for different jobs.

I thought my diy cabs sounded bad but when I tried the amp at the store I played through a mesa oversized and the sound was almost the same so the "problem" I was hearing before was not the cab.. It was the amps I was using them with.

 

[stephen sawall]

When I played on one I thought it was alright.