Hartley Peavey stands for a photo with Peavey Electronics gear in this photo from the 1970s. Submitted photo

Peavey Electronics is celebrating this year as the musical instrument and audio equipment manufacture marks its 60th year in business.

 

Founded in 1965 by Hartley Peavey, Peavey Electronics has grown from a one-man shop to an industry icon. His vision was to provide quality equipment at affordable prices.

 

A significant number of aspiring artists, who might not have had the chance otherwise, were able to pursue performing careers thanks to the affordability and accessibility of Peavey gear. Long before the advent of the internet and easy access to everything from everywhere, Peavey was the brand that numerous professional artists, as well as those striving to become pros, trusted most.

 

It wasn’t just the artists that were directly impacted by the visions of Peavey. Hartley’s efforts changed how the whole industry operates. Peavey’s approach helped dealers and distributors around the world build businesses and thrive. This vision of collaboration is what has helped build Peavey into the global icon it is today.

 

Learning to play an instrument with a Peavey amp has almost become a “rite of passage”.  The company’s TransTube technology, released in 1982, changed how all quality solid-state guitar amplifiers sound and is still a “benchmark” to this day.

 

In garages across America, bands started out with great performing and reliable Peavey amplifiers. Josh Homme (Queens of the Stone Age) revealed that one of Peavey’s smaller amps from the 1980s (the Decade) was “key” to the Queens’ sound. Decades went from a student amp to setting the second-hand amp market on fire! For this reason, Peavey will be releasing an updated version of this iconic little amplifier in 2025.

 

Peavey was also among the first to build electric guitars in the mid-70s on CNC equipment, and today’s guitar manufacturers utilize the same methods Peavey pioneered. Finding inspiration from firearms in the way they were precisely mass produced, Hartley correctly surmised that the same machine used to make gun stocks could make guitar necks and bodies. His pioneering broke down barriers and kick-started the hot-rod guitar market of the awesome ’80s, opening the doors for a myriad of new guitar brands and artists.

 

Peavey also led the charge in the evolution of power amplifiers, as the first company to break the “dollar per watt threshold” with the CS 800, and Hartley’s frustration with so-called high-end loudspeaker suppliers resulted in Peavey designing its own ranges of high-performance pro loudspeakers. Its Black Widow® and Scorpion® speakers have the feature of field replaceable baskets/voice coil assemblies. This feature enables users to eliminate expensive and tedious reconing while preserving factory specifications.

 

Perhaps the biggest, but often unseen, Peavey innovation started in 1993 when its MediaMatrix system revolutionized pro audio in large pro venues.  MediaMatrix was the first digitally configured and controlled audio networking system that is now utilized in over 10,000 commercial installations globally, including many international airports, casinos, cruise ships and other large pro applications.

 

Far from its humble beginnings, Peavey is now one of the largest makers and suppliers of musical instruments, amplifiers, and professional audio systems in the world—distributing more than 2,000 products in 136 countries.

 

Peavey is both proud and grateful for the support it has received from artists, dealers and end users for the past six decades. The core values that Peavey was founded on 60 years ago are still intact today, and they will continue to be what drives the company forward.