G12M Green back review

[Lake Placid Blues]

I've been trying out set of Greenbacks and really like them in a closed back 4x12.

I taste tested them open backed, and found they had a weak bass, with a somewhat boxey midrange.

In a closed back cab they are an completely different animal though. They give a big huge sound in a Marshall 4x12 cab. The bass is deep and solid. The mids are rich and woody, and the highs are open and clear, without harshness. Distortion textures are simply classic, and they do have a nice touch sensitivity. When you lay into the strings they respond with a bark and a bit of break up. They seem ideally suited to a 4x12 cab.

 

[esandes]

Re: G12M Green back review

what amps did you use? what volume settings?

the speakers are only 25W each so i wonder how they respond to a cranked amp.

 

[shredaholic]

Re: G12M Green back review

Which G12M's are we talking here - pre-Rola's, Rola's or modern reissues?

 

[Lake Placid Blues]

Re: G12M Green back review

Oh sorry for not providing enough info. It's easy to get bogged down in details when talking speakers.

They are the modern re-issues. I don't have the kind the pull to land pre-rolas.

The amps are Marshalls ranging from 30 watts to 100 watts. I Have tryed these out in several different setups from 1x12, 2x12, and 4x12. I have hit them pretty hard really. Including a cranked and distorted 50 watt head through two of them. I have a Jubilee Marshall as well, and that has a fairly high gain capability. The GB's didn't blow up or mush out. I find that there's some misconceptions on the net about speaker power handling ratings matched to the amps RMS rating, with some incorrectly assuming that speaker rating must be twice the amp ratings. With a cranked Marshall it's hard to say how much the speaker is breaking up and how much is the power amp. I have a V30 loaded cab that I can A-B against and the distortion is the same amount.

Last night I gigged them with a 50 watt Marshall Jubilee head turned up to 8. I was very pleased with the tone. I also had the V30 cab and used it some by itself and combined with the GB loaded 4x12. The GB's were just as tight in the low end as the V30's.

I really like the V30 and the GB's combined, but the V30 can overwhelm the GB's in loudness. The main diffrence, other than loudness, seems to be that the V30's are more compressed sounding, much like my 50 year old Jenson alnico.

The guitars I use are my own home made strat types with bridge humbuckers and singles in the neck and middle. I have a mahogony H/H tele and that sings nice through the GB's. I borrowed a LP with burst buckers, and it was pretty middy, but not inarticulate through the GB's.