So everybody talks about the Mk III (late 70's?) and later amps, what about the earlier ones?
When I was in high school this friend of mine who was a bass player got a new Peavey rig*, a Bass head and the standard 2 x 15" cabinet. It was certainly loud for the era (1974) but it never floated my boat.
His had a sort plastic front panel with metal knobs that had slots cut into them.
I recall before this (seeing them in a music store in Tampa) seeing a Peavey bass head that was just flat metal, with just plain metal knobs, and that amp just said "Bass" on it.
So I take it the metal front panel one was a Mark I, and my friend's was a Mk II? I don't believe they called them Mk anything until the Mk III came out but did I get the history right?
What was the last head Peavey made like this, Mk VIII or so?
Analogeezer
p.s. *So when my friend bought his Peavey rig, he needed a way to get it home, he had a competing band but hey we were all friends of course so my drummer borrowed his Dad's VW van to go to Tampa and pick up George's new amp.
This drummer (I forget his actual name but everybody called him "Woody", the kind of drummer who would play a solo while smoking a cigarette LOL) was like THE WORST Driver. He is chattering away and blows through an intersection in downtown Tampa and we almost get T-Boned.
About a year later we were practicing at his house, I would just leave my bass and amp over there and ride my motorcycle there but for some reason I didn't have my bike so I needed a ride home. So Woody takes me in his Dad's van and again he was the kinda guy who would just jabber as he was driving and I suddenly go LOOK OUT! He rear ends an old (late 1960's T-Bird, the one with the suicide doors in the back).
It was a low speed event, so nobody was hurt, the T-Bird had a couple of dents in the trim around the trunklid but the VW van had a big bumper sized dent in the front. The front of the VW had stooped down when he hit the brakes hard, so the bumper on the VW was UNDER the car he hit; so a huge big rectangular dent in the metal above the actual bumper of the van.
It worked out really bad for the lady we hit, she was down in FL with her husband (who had finally just found work) and kid from upstate New York. Turns out she did not have insurance. So she got cited at the scene for that and you could just tell she was poor. She should have had insurance of course but totally not her fault.
So VW van story number 3.....back then we used to have bonfires and keg parties at the old abandoned phosphate mines, out in the middle of nowhere. (We also used to ride our dirtbikes around on the rim roads that surrounded the pits).
All you needed to know on a Saturday night was to hear "party at the pits" and out there you went.
So this night I am on my bike, and go out there, Woody turns up in the van with his double bass drumkit in the back.
We all go to leave the party, I am behind because no way am I going to ride IN FRONT of Woody, suddenly he gets a wheel off the dirt road and the van rolls, he had like six or seven people in it and his drumset.
The van did not fully roll, just onto his side and this big fat dude was in the pax seat, with his seatbelt on. He lets go of the belt and falls down onto Woody (who was also a big dude).
I jump up on top of the side of the van, pull the sliding door back and inside it's all just arms and legs and drum hardware LOL.
Thankfully it was a low speed event, nobody got speared by a cymbal stand but I helped the people in there get out of the van.
We all then proceed to roll the van back onto it's wheels. After a long time it finally starts, of course belching tons of oil smoke from the engine being sideways.
The driver's side of the van is trashed, and Woody realizes he needs to go home, so he takes everybody to his house, his dad comes out, reads him the riot act and the rest of the people are stuck there in his driveway.
I gave one of the guys (there were two girls in the van too) a ride some miles away on my bike to get his VW bug. So he comes back and crams the rest of the people into the car (I might have taken one home on my bike as well).
Well as you can imagine, that was the end of Woody driving his dad's van, shortly afterwards he bought an old, rusty 1966 MGB, not the best ride for a drummer with a double bass set.
All I can say is thank god the Peavey amp was not in the van when he rolled it!
nice mk IV !!! I have imported quite a few of the xp series to Holland every time it one gets used as a house installation somwhere I tend to "lose one" and the desirable models are starting to increase in price..... But in the US I imagine this is not an issue....
. By dust issues I simply meant that all the fan assisted units need a vacuum once in a while. The basic mk3 does not. It's been closed for 26 years and was very clean inside need not have opened it. I ran it in the early days for many years at 2 ohms out of ignorance so think the huge heat sink probably saved it.....
