Peavey Ultra Plus

[Antipolitik]

Hi guys!

Today I bought my first tube amp. I decided on a Peavey Ultra Plus
(http://reviews.harmony-central.com/reviews/Guitar+Amp/product/Peavey/Ultra+Plus/10/1)
only the head. I got it cheap and it was in excellent condition. Looks almost new.
Since I've only played guitar for about one year I don't know much about cab, speakers and stuff like that. I am hoping someone here could give me some hints on what cab to buy. I borrowed an old Carvin 4x12 of a friend just to hear the head and play around with it. I was stunned, I really like the sound coming out even if the cab is old and don't have "metal" speakers like V30.

I have ordered a high-gain retube kit from Eurotubes and those are coming next week. So, I got a week to think about what cab to buy. The sound aka tone I'm looking for is like Marshall meets Mesa and it actually sounds a bit like it already... I'll put in EQ in the loop as well so I can dial in more specific tones. If anyone have any suggestions I would be very happy to know!

I will be playing some Slayer, new Metallica and BLS and well my own songs

Thanks,
Jonas

 

[Rob Logic]

This was actually my first tube head. Went to my local mom and pop guitar shop as I remembered they used to sell Mesa with the intentions of getting a dual rec. They stopped carrying mesa and recommended this amp to me. I think I picked the head and the cab up for like $1500 brand new. I guess it was around 10 years ago now (jeez). For what its worth, I absolutely loved this head while I had it. Played many shows with it and never once failed me, other than power tubes dying a couple times. I would have little use for this head now that I have a Randall RM100 and a Peavey Triple XXX but it should definitely take care of some good high gain crunch and decently clean tones for you. The glowing Peavey logo that changes colors with each channel (Red, Orange, Green) always turned heads though. Hah!

As for the cab, my guess is just about anything with decent speakers, celestion or eminence should sound good. Check into an Avatar vintage or contemporary cab. Vintage starts under $500 brand new and you can get it loaded with just about any speakers Avatar carry. Otherwise ebay marshall or mesa cabs on the cheap.

 

[Antipolitik]

Very thankful for your answer!

Yes, I bought the amp since I've only played for about one year I felt I couldn't go buy any expensive amp yet. I'm no Puff Diddy. :Smokin:
I also like the older sounding amps and I read about it on the net and many people liked this old tuberhead. The head costed me 590$ and that's not expensive for me, because the amp is like brand-new. Not a scratch, you can use the front as a mirror and everything even the pedal is 100% working. Peavey logo hehehe as well is working. Cool stuff!

I have as a said ordered a high-gain retube kit and I am also going to a swedish amp tech with the amp at the end of the month (http://www.tommy-folkesson.nu) who mods these head and all other heads too. On my amp he will decrease the "noise" in the distortion without making it a sizzydistortion (he says ) so downtuning will not make the bass rumble as much as it does now.

He will also fix the tonecontrols so you can finetune "all the way" and not like it is original. He is also installing biaspot tweak so you can tune in the tubes correct. It's fixed bias stock so that's really good I suppose. I will try to record some clips now so I can upload a compare track later when I have it modded by him. The mod cost 570$ and that's almost as much as the head but afterall I like the "older stuff" and I have no problem putting money into my oldschool Peavey Ultra Plus! If it cleans up after the mod and gets a little extra gain from the retube kit I will be ready to rock! I do mostly Ozzy, Randy Rhoads kind of guitar playing so it should be ok!

Some of my demos are here: http://www.myspace.com/deciphers
Recorded with ONLY a DF-7 distortion pedal straight to computer and I didn't play that good on those tracks either. Had played guitar for like 6-8 month only. Will record those songs again with my modded head!

My first try with different impulses (too bad I accidently had some reverb switched on at the master bus hahaha ). Head straight to soundcard and only Kefir with some different impulses. http://www.soundclick.com/Antipolitik

Later and thanks again Rob the cab info!!!