Celestion G12H Anniversary

The Celestion G12H30 is one of the lesser known Celestion speakers for some reason. It’s a standard 12’’ speaker with a ceramic magnet, comes in either 8 or 16 ohm configuration, can handle up to 30 watts of power, has a ceramic magnet, a round cooper voice coil and made out of pressed steel.

This has always been one of my favorite “mixing” speakers. On its own, I find that the speaker tends to be a bit darker than other speakers out there. It has some decent treble, but the bass is fairly strong on this, as well as the low mids. Because of that, I find that it can get a touch buried in the mix at times, especially at lower tunings. One of my favorite speaker mixing combos is actually a G12H30 and a Vintage 30. When you combine both of these, it gives you that awesome dark, thick tone of the G12H30 and that nice bite of the Vintage 30.

One interesting thing is that some people say these are bright. Maybe it’s the speakers I tried, but I never found that to be the case. It could be do to them being made in England vs China, could be how broken in they are or could even be the amp. I just never really bonded with them on their own for the style of music I play, and I find the Vintage 30 to be the best speaker suited for death metal.

One problem with this speaker is that there are barely any cabs that come with these installed. Because of that, they can be a real pain to try out at your local music store. What I recommend is trying to see if you can find a friend or someone on Craigslist who has them and will allow you to come out and try them. Other than that, you’ll probably have to buy them blind and try them that way.

I have the Avatar Hellatone version of the speaker which is the same speaker only somewhat broken in when you buy it new. It is a 12 inch 30 watt Celestion speaker and is available in 8 and 16 ohms . I love this speaker. The speaker sounds smooth and the frequency range that comes through is wide. The speaker emphasizes the lower mid frequencies and lets very high frequencies through. It lacks pronounced upper mids and can lack presence and could potentially prevent your guitar from cutting through a complex mix but it still sounds great by itself. The speaker sounds good when pushed and does not begin to sound harsh when played loudly. To me this speaker definitely prefers to be used in a closed back cabinet. However I have used it in an open back Fender Deluxe Reverb Reissue and it can work good there as well even though it takes some of the "Fender" out of the sound. This is due to its being a British sounding speaker that needs a closed back cab to help supply some of its punch and a rounded bottom end. This speaker is the classic choice for 70s heavy rock sounds. It sounds great in a closed back cabinet with 70s style distortion playing through it and delivers a warm meaty bottom end. I have also used the speaker along with a Celestion Vintage 30 in a Marshall cab. These two speakers compliment each other well because the Vintage 30 produces the upper frequencies that the G12H30 lacks and vice versa. Together they provide a full wide frequency range. I have also compared this speaker to the Celestion G12T75 which is found in countless stock Marshall cabs since the 80s. These speakers are entirely different and tend to sound hard and scooped. I do not particularly like the G12T75. Of all the Celestion speakers I've mentioned the G12H30s are easily may favorites. But I've learned that you never know what will work best with each particular combination of guitar/amp/cab/and speaker. When I play my semi-hollowbody Triggs 2 guitar with Alnico humbuckers through my Fender Deluxe Reverb Reissue with volume on 10 through my Marshall 4x12 cab, the side of the cab with the G12T75s sounds better for some reason than the side with the G12H30s and Vintage 30. For clean sounds through the cab with a Fender amp the opposite is true. If I were playing through a Marshall amp I might feel differently because of that amps natural E.Q.. But if I could only have one of these speakers to play through inside the Deluxe Reverb cab it would definitely be the G12H30 because its so warm and smooth. It is one of my favorite speakers.

Then c is a vintage HP rather, that I use 1 * 12 Blackstar HT5 head with:
For comparison:
- Plugged into a Marshall head lamps, clean and crunch: a fucking sound, the "bump" when plate agreements, the warm, generous, a true short fat clean!
- On the Blackstar: clean cooler but already much warmer than with HP means (FlexWave crate, the cab Vox Valvetronix) Crunch great!

- In saturation: the two heads that I have used are normally very clean sound distortion, but ca drool a little (but should really go big saturation!)

So c is not for metalheads ...
I also find that HP can make a better with single coil pickups

It also has an advantage, c is its low capacity (30Watts) allows him to make good low volume
I took 16ohm, but I confess I do not know the difference between the two ...

In any case, if you want a warm feel! : D