Peavey Blues Classic

$600 for the first, $700 for the second. Luv these so much I drove 650 miles to get another. One made in 1995 (original owner), other made in 1996 (3rd owner). This amp's name is misleading - "Blues" Classic - only thing that makes it "blues" is that blues amps were selling like hotcakes in the mid and late 90s; it has one 15" speaker cone instead of the Peavey Classic 40 from mid 90s (that had 4 10" speakers); and reverb voicing. Tweed cover. I took the Peavey symbol off the grill cuz it ruined the look. Now everyone goes "Wow! What is that, a Fender Bassman? A Fender Deluxe?" And that's AFTER they hear it!
There are 2 channels: Clean and dirty. Also, 2 inputs: Normal and Bright. Effects send and return (helps quite a bit). No headphone jack.
There are many features I used to wish it had, when I wasn't a very good player and bought into the whole Marshall onboard F/X stuff. Now I see this is the way to do it - simple, stripped down, one clean, one dirty. Oh, and actually, you don't even need the dirty channel if you know how to knob the clean channel. There is a "Normal" volume control and a "master". Push the "normal" way up (pre) and use the "Master" as your control (post). You will get righteous, natural, tube breakup and tone.
I use this amp at rehearsals and gigs. There has never been a gig it couldn't handle. Large outdoor festivals to little clubs, to the music studio. It is awesome. That is not an understatement
The tubes are better as mesa boogies', I haev found, than the chinese ones. It's got 3 big tubes and 4 little ones.

there are no features I never use. I use them all, especially the Presence.

I use a Fender SRV Strat with Texas Specials; I use a custom made Strat-style with DiMarzio humbuckers that have coil select push-pull knobs (dimarzio PAF in neck, super distortion in bridge), a Jay Turser JT50 SG copy with Seymour Duncan 59 'buckers.
I used to play blues blues blues, but have branched out now to roots and roots rock. this amp blows away the fender deluxe, the VOX AC30, and any marshall I've played through. A possible competitor? An old 1968 Fender Twin I had.
This amp suits rock, rock and roll, americana, and of course jazz and blues. Also, you can get that nice british invasion and AC/DC sound from the dirty channel if you knob in.
this amp is not noisy.
The variety of sounds this amp can make is only limited to your imagination. Tone, Tone, Tone, as another reviewer put it. Other than metal, this amp will do it. Oh, and it's great at funk/reggae too.
The clean channel will not distort at high levels unless you want it to. This is why it's great at pop and americana.
The distortion is not brutal. If you want brutal metal distortion, go buy a good pedal or another brand.

Minor issues over time, but they could have been avoided if I had properly cared for it. Luckily, they were fixable.

n/a

I have been playing 12 years. Played through Fenders, Marshalls, Peaveys, Vox, and Kustom amps. STrats, teles, sg copies, had a Epiphone Casino at one time. Own simple pedals - Tube Screamer; Wah; Boss Delay, Boss Compression. I find more than one overdrive pedal with this amp is silly.
Where else could i have gotten a highly acclaimed amp for a great price? the day I brought it home I traded in my Marshall 1969 vintage cab. four 12's are too big, unless you're playing the fillmore next weekend. Even then, c'mon. Smaller cars, smaller amps, smaller computers, smaller iPods...go out and buy a half stack. That makes complete sense!
What I love about this amp:
1. The versatility of the sounds
2. Warm tone, variable on how you push the amp
3. The "Presence" setting - how up front do you want your guitar in your sound? This lets you dial in.
4. Tone
5. Tone
6. Tone
7. I have heard worse tones from $3000 dollar custom boutique amp heads. See at that price, the amp makers use the ampheads as a pulpit from which to scream the tones THEY think you ought to sound like. An amp like THIS one allows you to dial/knob in to what you want.
8. Responsiveness from how you attack/pick your guitar
9. the sparkly high end and booming bass from the 15" cab enclosure
10. The open back cab and speaker jack makes using ext cabs easy enough if you want to tighten up the sound using a couple 10" speakers. The drummer likes the open back too.
11. BEst reverb ever. Actually, my '68 Fender Twin had awesome reverb, so this comes in second.
What I hate:
Honestly, there is nothing that I wish this amp had. Not for me, at least.
I just wish it were lighter! The usual tube amp and good wood cabinet stuff, maybe 45-60 lbs.

1995 Peavey Blues Classic - the original owner. I play rock music in an original band. I use the amp mostly for studio work - as it has such great tone, and blends well with my bandmates AC30. As the best clean tone i've heard from a guitar amp - even cleaner and crisper than a roland. Increasing the presence gives a great edge for lead riffs and a blues tone. Switching to the lead channel - with some tweaking- can get a close european low-watt rock sound -i.e. Vox, orange, hiwatt. (2 channels). The channels can be switched through a foot switch or a manual switch. Additionally, there are 2 inputs (bight and normal). If I were to change anything, I would add an EQ for the second channel. The 50watts (tube) provides plenty of power - I have used it in clubs with a rock band (no mic) and cut right through.

This is what makes the amp so great - amazing tone! -aside from being so well priced for its ability.

It is a great gig amp. Very durable - but heavy! I installed snap in wheels to transport it. It still has the original tubes and fuses - all original and sounds great. Handle is very durable - unlike many other amps I have - which I had to replace the handles - for a marshall JCM2000 DSL head, and a Framus Ruby Riot.

I have never had an issue with the amp, and, therfore never had to contact peavey.

I have many guitars that I use with the amp, but I mostly use a Gibson Custom Shop Elegant Les Paul. I have a plethora of pedals that I use, but I usualy do not use them with this amp. I love the tone, price, look, and size of the amp. I would be pissed If I lost It, and I look to get another one.

Dual channel. 80's design. Foot switch with lush spring reverb

The Tone of the Blues Classic is just that ...Classic, Real and Righteous. Clean or overdriven.
After owning many different amps in my career, there is really something very special about this amp that eclipses them all. Very fat tone with the 15" speaker. It sound reminds me of my old Vox AC-30 Top boost on some settings and my old Marshall Plexi on other settings. After changing the stock Chinese tubs for UK Mullards, well.. it is now a Tone monster. I've recently sold my Bad Cat and am not unhappy.

100% Dependable. After 15 yrs. of constant gigging, it is still going strong. Some people are so concerned about "point to point soldering" REMEMBER... let "your" ears be the final judge and don't let anyone sway you into what "they" believe is right. Peaveys PC boards are an excellent,solid design.

I have never needed it.

TONE is KING and this amp has all that I ever have needed in ANY musical setting.

2 channel switching w/Reverb

Fantanstic. in my very true opinion. I am stunned. I've owned EVERYTHING... and compelled to always return to this one for it's TONE.

100+ It hasn't failed, ever. Change the Chinese tubes to something that will make it less harsh, and you can easily put it against ANY boutique amp. Hands down.

Excellent

I've been at it for 30 years.
You can't find these easily.
Tone, tone, tone..
It reminds me of a cross breed of my old VOX & Marshall.

Listen Guy's the reason I an writing this review is because I sold this amp many moons ago and I am desperatly searching for another after recently taing up the guitar again. Let me stat off by saying that selling this amp wsa the single stupidest thing I ever did.

I cannot remember the year of manufacture and features are already listed in the countless reviews before this.

I played solely blues on this amp, my main axe at the time wsa a first year Stevie Ray Vaughan signature strat. I had it set up with 13'2, sometimes 14's and all 5 springs on the trem.

The combination of the heavy guage strings, texas specials and this amp sounded out of this world. now, while i am the first to admit that I will never be a Stevie Ray i used to enjoy playing and could get a stupidly good tone with this amp.

You would have to be a complete idiot to sound bad with this amp, it's that simple.

As for volume, well it was louder than my old Vox solid state 100W combo (and sounded 1, 000, 000 times better), while i admit that valve amps are louder anyway, this one just kept on coming. I never had it on full volume.

Had it for around 4 years with not one single problem. Got is serviced at the shop I bought it from but had no issues at all in the whole time i owned it.

I can't rate this because i never needed it. The amp wsa an ex demo one from the Peavey roadshow which meant that i got it a little cheaper and it had been gigged a lot but as I said it seemed like a workhorse and I had no issues at all.

If I lost it!!! How on earth ca nyou lose something that size! The only drawback with this amp is it's weight.... it is heavy! Istupidly sold it and I want another badly! The only thing iwould have wanted to change on it would have been t ohad had a switchable output on the rear i.e. 20, 30 wat, etc

I do not know the year of the amp. i would guess early to mid 90's. I play classic rock to country to blues and this amp covers them all extremely well. I gig with this amp about two weekends a month and have never had it fail me. This amp has two channels. one clean and one dirty, but i only use the clean channel as i let my pedals to the talking. This amp has plenty of power(50 watts into one 16ohm 15" speaker.

This amp has a great clean channel. at higher volumes it does have slight tube break up. I use this in conjunction with the 115E cab. together, this amp kicks ass! I do not like the lead channel as much. The pedals i use sound much better. I use a Marshall Gov'nor original, a Keeley modded tube screamer, a guyatone compressor, a boss GE-7 guitar EQ, and a Boss tr-2 tremolo. This amp makes every one of those pedals sing. The only noise to the amp is the cooling fan is a bit loud but hell, for the tone of this amp, thats a slight compromise.

I have never had an issue and i do not use a back up.

I have never had to deal with peavey for this amp.

I have been playing for 23 years. 10 of those years in clubs. I own tons of equipment including a 1971 Kustom sidewinder guitar amp that introduced me to the single 15 combo guitar amp. And i must say that this peavey classic blues amp blows that amp away. If it were lost or stolen i would get another one. but these are getting harder to find since peavey does not make these anymore, I wonder why, so i hope this never ends up lost or stolen.

This is an update on my first review of this amp 10 years ago. I think I was the first person on Harmony Central to review it, just before I went off to do a bachelor of music. This amp has held up very well with almost no problems in ten years. Features are covered in other reviews, but basically it's a Classic 50 with one 15" speaker. Mine is an early/mid 90's model.

I use this amp with a custom built archtop with floating pickup, a custom dual humbucker electric, a strat, and occassionally an Epiphone Emperor. I use it in jazz combos and in a rock band. I run an Ernie Ball volume, T.C. Electronics chorus, Line6 Delay Modeler, and a Diamond J-Drive into the front. I used to the effects loop, but the cords were getting ridiculous and I don't notice a difference in sound (those are all pretty quiet pedals, though).

The best thing about this amp is that it sounds like your guitar only louder and (depending on where you set the master) warmer. I have never found another amp that sounds as open and uncolored on the clean channel. Having separate volume and master knobs is great because it means you can dial in the same level of warmth on a clean channel at any volume. The volume knob is dead clean and the master dials in a bit of warmth.

I'm about to pickup a Classic 50 - 410, which makes a nice match to run with the BC in stereo, but the BC has a far superior clean sound (not nearly as compressed as the 410). The clean headroom is amazing and works out nicely for chord solos which can turn into mud on a lot of tube amps. However, if you're looking to push the clean channel into a speaker overdrive you might find the headroom frustrating.

The lead channel is fine, but not mind-blowing. I usually use pedals for dirty sounds so it doesn't bother me. Again, the clean headroom on the clean channel is nice because you basically get your pedal's distortion and not some garbled mess of a couple competing distortions.

I also own a Fender Blues Junior for smaller gigs. That amp can get surprisingly loud as well, but there is no clean headroom (plus the reverb tank's broken twice in six years). Basically, if I'm playing an archtop and there are drums I need the BC to get the sound I want.

When I first reviewed the amp I gave it a 9 for sound and I stand by that. More precisely, the Clean is a 9.5 and the lead is an 8.5

I've used my BC on gigs and recording for 10 years now and have had only one problem. I started to get this screaming sound out of the amp even when it was on standby. Re-tubing fixed the problem, but it was kind of weird...

Cosmetically it's held up well, though it hasn't been meticulously cared for. The speaker's fine. I haven't it run it at absolute full blast very often, but another reviewer mentioned his cone ripped from doing that.

After ten years of playing this amp, I feel like I'd be lost without it. I have no idea why Peavey stopped making it because I'd love to get a backup. Peavey gets crapped on all the time for being a lower-end amp manufacturer, but I've never found anything as nice as the BC, particularly for using an archtop.

I've compared this amp with the Fender Hot Rod Deluxe, Deville, old and new Twins, the Bassman, the Deulxe Reverb reissue, as well as Traynors, Rolands, Polytones, Marshalls, and the Peavey Classic 30. The basic sound on the BC kills them all at any volume. If you own a nice guitar and use a fairly clean sound, do yourself a favor and check out this amp.

I bought the Blues Classic new in 1993. It is hands down the best amp I've ever had or heard anywhere. I've had Marshall combo(blew it up). Mesa Boogie Mark III, just sold it for a fortune! Gibson Gold Tone GRS, waste of money (too ducky, too heavy, broke down, it actually died at a big gig, very dissappointed with the Goldtone), sold that too! I'm trying Hughes and Kettner next, we'll see, but I'll never sell the Peavey. Can't gig with it much longer though too heavy and it's getting beat up, the chassis is actually coming apart. I don't know though, I'll probably keep dragging it back out on stage, because nothing sounds like it. The original speaker is still in there, I did have to replace the tubes last year after 12 years of weekly gigging with it, amazing!

I mainly use this amp for classic 60's rock and sometimes hookup a
2-12 Vox cabinet with it, makes it sound huge on stage, makes your pant legs move and I only have it on 6! I stupidly disconnected the cooling fan once, because it was too noisy through the speaker when I cranked the gain (I haven't heard anyone complain about this yet?), I resoldered it though since, too risky and have blown up amps from cranking them to ten. I mainly play SG's and Les Pauls though this, but have also used an old CX-3 organ(that just died) and varoius synthesizers through it.

The amp has never broken down, like I said I had a noisy tube a few years ago and have since replaced them all with groove tubes and it sounds fine now. No back up needed ever!

Never had to call Peavey. I have Mesa and Gibsons numbers memorized, not a good sign for them. I replaced the tubes myself.

Been playing for 25 years. Do yourself a favor and pickup this amp. You'll thank me and never regret it. I took a chance and bought it after my old Marshall combo died 12 years ago and I've tried many other top names in the business, but nothing compares to this amp!

Peavey Blues Classic 50 watts into a single 15" speaker

My main guitars are a 1952 Fender Tele re-issue and a Gretsch Streamliner re-issue. This amp makes 'em both sound fantastic! I have a matching Peavey Classic 50/410 amp as well. For shows, I stack 'em and run the 15 inch speaker as an extension for the 50/410. The combo is unreal. The 15 inch provides punding lows while the 4 10 inchers provide the mid crunch and sweet highs.

I bought it used with a few road scars but it is well built and still plays like a dream. Don't know how old the tubes are but it still sounds great so I'm leaving them alone. It's my main gigging amp and my only practice amp.

Never needed Peavey's help.

Been playing casually for about 30 years, serious gigging for about 7 years. I love the classic tweed look and sound. For my money it's every bit as good as any of the Fender Tweed re-issues at a much better price point. If this amp were lost, I'd try to find another one quick. I don't want my 50/410 to get lonely!

This amp was shipped in 1994, but I received it as a Christmas present a month ago. I play blues, blues rock, early prog (Captain Beyond, Mountain, Gentle Giant) & originals in those categories. Some rock when sitting in w/ friends. Although I've always been a Marshall man, this amp suits what I'm doing now w/out additional FX.
Two channels, clean & lead, foot switchable W/ single preamp pot for Normal & pre & post gain pots for lead. A little too clean w/ the Normal gain turned down, but it gets fatter w/ it set @ 9 or above. Lead channel screams w/ the preamp gain set high, & the reverb opens up both channels very nicely. HAven't used the FX loop yet, but plan on using a tube screamer & maybe a chorus on the loop for the Normal channel. Enough power to use w/out miking if I decided to, but haven't yet except for practice.
Four EL84s driven by a 12 AX7, two more 12AX7s in the preamp.

Primary guitar is a '84 Gibson Invader w/ Zebras, also a fat Strat as backup. No noise, but I've got conditioned power & don't use a lot of pedals. If I add pedals I'll run them through the FX loop to avoid power drop off & noise. Currently, I've got the Normal channel gain set @ 9, lead channel pre @ 10 & post @ 9, reverb @ 5. Equalization is set heavier on the bass & midrange, playing through the bright input. Presence is set @ 8, but I'm still playing w/ settings. The clean channel is just starting to get fat @ the current settings, but I haven't played it @ volume yet. Great sustain on both channels, lead just screams. Back up amp is a Marshall Studio 15 that we mike, no where near the flexibility of the Peavey, but it's a Marshall.

The guy I bought it from bought it new, gigged w/ it the whole time & never had a problem.

Peavey is known for their CS, & got right back to me on dating it & info on tube & speaker replacement options. Warranty was only a year, but I do most of my own work anyway.

Just recently started playing again after a long layoff. I'd mangle anyone that stole the amp, & would replace it. Like it better than the Fenders I've played through. Most of the comparisons I've heard were w/ the Fender Blues DeVille, but it's more versital than the Blues Junior & some of the reverbs w/ similar sound on the clean channel.