Peavey Backstage

Pre Post Volume and Saturation (THE most misunderstood control ever..its not Distortion!!)Mid high bass and reverb control. Two inputs, I'm assuming hi and low gain inputs. It has a jack input in the back for a footswitch, I don't own one but its probably to turn the reverb on and off. 20 watts into a 10 inch speaker. This is a 1982 Backstage, not the plus or the 20 or the 30.

Here's the thing. Most people think that "saturation" means distortion, so they crank the pre amp knob (like you would normally do on a tube amp and then add the saturation to increase the distortion. If you do it this way it really sucks. If someone is reviewing this amp and says the distortion sucks I guarantee you they are doing just this.
What you should do is crank the master volume (the post) and use the pre as the volume and add saturation to taste. if you put the amp at: 3 on pre, 6 on saturation and 7 on post it sounds like a chunky little amp, almost Vox like with a really healthly clank when you mute the strings and go ka-chunk. It sounds especially good with low output PAF type pickups. If you crank it louder you'll notice that the stock speaker can't really handle the sound (hey its a ten inch). The reverb is nice just don't use too much. I'm curious what the Bandit of that era sounded like with a 12 inch.

its a peavey, it'll work a 100 years from now.

its peavey, they have the best customer service out there.

I own tons of equipment, including several practice amps that I use at my teaching studio. They all have nice distortion built in. Thats what people usually look for in a practice amp. This is too loud for that and too clean (clean like ac/dc not country clean) for most kids to appreciate. I am sure it was meant as a practice amp, and if you crank the pre and saturation you'll get big time crappy distortion. If you set it up like I suggested it'll sound like a mean little amp, just add a damn pedal if you want more distortion. I picked this up for the price of a used distortion box ($32). I will try out a better speaker with it, I don't think I can put a 12inch in the cab but I betcha if I put a decent 10inch (like a Evm10) it'll handle the sound better. try one if you see it out there.

Peavey Backstage, I think it's 20 or maybe 25 watts, bought it in 1980 for $130 new. Single channel, 10 inch speaker. 2 ins, 7 knobs, 3 are the Pre/Saturation/Post section, 3 are the Bass/Mids/Treble, and the other is the reverb. No headphone, no effects loop. This was my first real amp. LOVED it! I practiced and played live with it. Plenty of power for a small venue. I had it for 22 years before lightning got it.

I played a Gibson LP Standard and Fender Squier Strat through it. Played everything from country gospel to hard rock. It' suited me well. Not noisey at all. You could hear a faint noise at extremely high volume. Has good clean and distortion sound. The clean channel would distort some at high volume, say around 8.

What? Are you kidding me? I've dropped it, turned it over many times, it has slid around in the back of a truck many times. It took lightning to kill it.

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I've been playing for about 30 years. I now own the Peavey Bandit 112, a Crate 100 watt amp and a Fender FM 212. I'd pick the Bandit if I had to choose one. I now play a Fender MIM strat with vintage noiseless pickups and a Ibanez RG-270.

Peavey Backstage 20, pro'ly from 1982 or so. Single channel, 10 inch speaker. 2 ins, 7 knobs, 3 are the Pre/Saturation/Post section, 3 are the Bass/Mids/Treble, and the other is the reverb. No headphone, no effects loop. For jamming w/friends and practice use this thing is great. And loud, really loud.

I use this amp w/a Fender Tele, an 82 Ibanez Strat, a Les Paul Jr & an Agile LP clone. Playing the usual mix of Coltrane/Minutemen/Sabbath/Frisell. The amp sounds GREAT on everything. Like the guy below said, this thing NAILS the tube sound, w/out the tube hassles. The Pre/Saturation/Post knobs really let you dial in your sound - smooth creamy clean, a little overdriven with some nice tubey break up when you lean into it/or a rawer overdrive with the settings dimed. If you want distortion, get some pedals, that's not what this thing does. That being said, it works well with pedals of all sorts. Not noisy at all. Reverb is great! Nice reverb tank, Accutronics I believe. With the knobs set on clean, and the reverb on stun the Tele sounds amazing. Basically a simple machine, not a lot of extra dorky frills. Plug in, turn it on, play. Tweak knobs as needed. You do not need to be an engineer to use this amp and you will not be so confused by the 80,000 modelling options that you start to consider drumming as a better option.

Crazy dependable. I got this with a dead reverb pot and the ground prong busted off. Fixed them both up and went over everything carefully while I had it apart. Solid as a rock as all of the old school peavey stuff was.

Peavey is great to deal with. I don't have any new school stuff from them, but their old stuff I've got. I've contacted them for a variety of things over the years and they always seem stoked to hear that their old gear is still out on the road. They've hooked me up with all manner of manuals & parts and are good people.

I have been playing for a long time. I own a bunch of silly junk and some nice stuff too. I'd really like a little boutique low watt tube amp. Thought about a few of 'em, tried a bunch, and keep on realizing that the Peavey sounds just as good, and it is already paid for. When I got this thing it was filthy and had a couple of issues. Scrubbed the carcass down w/Simplegreen and Armour-alled it. Replaced the Reverb pot, replaced the cord. Looks brand new, works great. Not a lot of distractions, simple to use, good stuff, just a great sounding amp. Find one cheap on Craigslist and buy it.

alright,it's a 1983 peavey backstage amp..2 channels..20 VERY loud watts thru a 10 inch speaker.
i used to snicker at these little amps years ago when i was a tube amp nazi...no longer.i now own a Peavey special 130(see my review for that beast!)a backstage plus and this little sucker.
you know,for the money i used to spend on tubes i could have bought nearly a dozen of these,and none of them would have broken on me,like the tube amps always seemed to.
i mean it..i take very good care of my stuff,and it seemed like i was always sounding different day to day using the tube amps...i always sound exactly the same thru these little suckers..and consistancy is vital.
i use this in stereo with the backstage plus...i split the signal from a pod xt live into the 2 amps,and all i gotta say is WOW...
for solid state they both have such a lovely sound to them...

running a maple necked strat into the front of these 2,also a telecaster( which totally rocks by the way...)..i can get a wide amount of textures just playing around with the tone controls on the amps...they also sound great running a chain of stompboxes in front of them too...
about those controls...well the louder you turn them up..the more you have to watch the mix on the backstage/backstage plus as well..they can get a little sharp sounding...more so on the backstage amp.the controls are so sensitive that it can DRASTICALLY change with just even a small turn on the dials...so,tune it to the room you're playing in,and you'll be fine.
i usually don't use the built in distortion for distortion...i use it,like others do,to add a bit more presence to the sound,it really warms the amp's up when you dial it in just right.
i side by sided it with a friend's fender princeton,and it just ate it for lunch...he sold his princeton,and now he's playing these so called "practice" amps out live in clubs,like i do...and he gets a killer sound live...like i do now.

well,it's a peavey....drop it,kick it burn it,drown it,it will still work.
depending on the age of yours,the pots will need a good deep cleaning,and i usually armor-all the crap out of mine,so they look good as well.
these older units are the better ones,by the way...the newer ones...just don't sound right to me...they seem to be softer sounding too.

just about the best out there,they happily send me manuals when i need them.love their customer support staff too.

well,i'm 38,been playing for well over 20 years now,and pro for 15 of those.i also own a carvin mts 3200 tube head that sounds wonderful,it's just too damn loud to play the small clubs that are still around here in seattle.i needed something that was reliable,portable,and sounded great too.on all these points,my peaveys excel at...especially these two little amps,the sound guys always look at me kinda funny when we show up to play,and they soon stop cracking wise once they hear how they sound.my big peavey,the special 130,is a fantastic amp too,but i only take it out when we're playing big places.these little amps are perfect for small to medium club use,and they never need tubes...YAY!i don't know about you,but i can't afford a new set of tubes twice a year,because when you play out as much as i do,that's how often you need to do it.

seriously,go try one out...they are plentiful,and sound wonderful when they're dialed in right.
by the way,always read the manual with these kind of amps,tit really helps understand what they can do.

Only features are distortion, head phone jack and a cd input, because thats really useful.

The sound clean is okay for a practice amp, but the distortion is awful. you could use this as a bedroom practice amp on clean and thats it. its only 15 watts so its not very loud.

I don't think I could break this.

Its a just acceptable practice amp. You can get alot better for the same price.

2 channels, no effects loop, very well built,supposedly tube emulation, but sounds like solid state. Headphone jack. Bought this thru Sweetwater Sound, but never used it, because the sound quality was poor and you could not change the tone, sort of dark sound.

Never tried distortion channel, 10 watts thru 6 and 1/2 inch speaker. not bright enough for me, like a Fender sound. Seems to have the one sort of muddy sound on clean, eq doesn't effect tone. Was using a guitar with single coil pickup.

Seems to be built like a brick, amp came as a demo or return, seems to have problem with power switch,doesn't go off for about 3 seconds after you turn it off

Customer support was a nightmare, I got in touch with the President of the company and he was very nice, he had some guy call me the next day who wanted me to keep it and they would refund the money,it seemed broken or just lame sounding to me, finally got them to e-mail me a mailing slip.

Been playing over 30 years, piece of junk, don't buy it. Maybe with some pedals you could get some better tone out of it. You get what you pay for. 59 bucks. Ibanez Tone blaster, same price, same price, blows this away, probably will pick one up for practice amp. Addage is true, they don't make things like they used to.