Peavey Axcelerator AX

When I was in a band with my friends, I used to love the guitar my friend used to take out of his case and play. It was a gorgeous Peavey Axcelerator. I used to think that I would buy a guitar like that someday when I would earn more money. A couple of years later, I purchased an Ibazez with a single locking tremelo and a jet black body. It was a step up from the old Dean I used to play, which I had bought from a garage sale. The Ibazez looked great and sounded good. My friend, for some reason was looking to add that to his guitar collection and offered to trade one of his other guitars for it. He mentioned that he was reluctantly willing to part with his Peavey if I would trade him my Ibanez on top of some cash. I jumped at the chance, but by being friends, I talked him out of the cash portion of it and made out like a bandit with the Peavey. I have kept it almost immaculate, just like he did. It was really a no-brainer.

The guitar has a wonderful blue clear paint job. You can see the flow of the grain and the excellent craftmanship of an American-made instrument. The double locking tremelo has a gold finish with a pearloid pickguard and gold hardware. It has a Kahler locking nut. It has two single coil pickups, complemented by one humbucking pickup. The single coils can produce a brilliant vintage sound that is so hard to find nowadays. It looks as great as it sounds. You can play a brilliant sounding blues song or beef up the sound with heavy distortion. This guitar can dish it out with the best of 'em! It was my friend's best guitar, both in sound and looks. Now, I have it and I am taking just as good care of it, if not better.

I recently went to the Peavey website and typed "Axcelerator" in the website search. To my dismay, the search came up empty. I am assuming that they no longer continue to make this guitar. It is a pity, for it truly is a great sounding, great looking, light on the shoulders guitar. I wish that they still made them, as I would love to see any upgrades they might have on this model, such as a set neck. My guitar has a bolt-on neck and I would much rather prefer a set neck.

The guitar is in great quality. It's hardware is in perfect condition and has lasted many years and through many recording sessions. It is sturdy and has not given me any problems. I have used it to record tracks, as well as play live. It has not let me down. It is always great to see the look on peoples' faces when I open my guitar case and they see this beautiful blue guitar, with it's pearloid pickguard and gold hardware sitting in the pit of the black padded hardshell case. Their eyes seem to get bigger when they catch a glimpse of this instrument. Once again, it is equally important, if not more, that the instrument not only looks good but sounds excellent. The Peavey Axcelerator does both.

This guitar is my best guitar and I have not played any guitars that are less than the price range of $800 to $1000 that sound as good as this one. I do not know the price of this guitar when it was being sold, but it sounds like a competitor for high end guitar models, such as the Gibson Les Paul. The look of the guitar is unbeatable, especially considering that this guitar is used, yet in perfect condition. A note to the Peavey company: please bring this guitar back!

This review was originally published on http://www.musicgearreview.com

The Peavey Axcellerator has a decent sound, but it wasn't something that'll blow your socks off. The bridge pickup in this was an old school DiMarzio Super Distortion. This was a pickup installed by the previous owner, and it actually works out pretty nicely. They're super fat and it's very powerful. If you ever wanted that old school hard rock/metal tone, this is your pickup. It's awesome in single pickup guitars as it's fat enough to work for both rhythms and solos. The neck pickup in this was the stock single, and it sounded very thin. On top of that, it was super low output, so it couldn't compete once you used the middle position. It would probably fair better if you replaced the neck pickup with a nice single coil humbucker.

UTILIZATION

It's hard to beat this guitar for the price. They go really cheap on the used market, but they're great gigging guitars. They also sound pretty good. Just expect to spend some time doing a proper set up on it and possibly doing a refret/fixing the nut.


SOUNDS

sounds pretty good, but nothing that really stood out to me.

OVERALL OPINION

The guitar is put together decently, but it's no exquisite piece by any means. The neck joint on this has a slight gap to it, and it can potentially hinder tone in a negative way. The frets on this were pretty worn, but that was to be expected for a guitar that's well over 20 years. The nut also needed to be recut as it was worn pretty heavily around the wound strings. This is a pretty common issue that occurs in older guitars. The bridge on this is really bizarre, and I'm not sure what they were thinking when they made it. It works decently, but it just feels really odd. I think they were almost going for an old school HS Charvel vibe with this guitar.

Made by Peavey Custom Shop in the USA and delivered in Case "Peavey", this guitar was in the late 90s the top of the line Peavey.
For 7500 francs (1200 euros) to little more than a deluxe Fender guitar offered this much:
- Beautiful maple neck
- Swamp ash body mass (swamp ash)
- Trussrod plate and pearl
- Translucent blue lacquer (the only color available in France) who can watch the grain of the wood)
- Joe Barden pickups / Peavey USA (the same as those used by Lou Reed):
* 2 Dual Blade sounds round, warm and slamming both
* 1 quad blade humbucker in his huge (managed by a mini 3-position switch on top, split for the "Fender", amid dual microphone down position called "Turbo" ie quadbucker the whole, it deposit!)
- 5-way selector
- 1 chrome floyd very stable and easy to adjust
- Accoustillage chrome (not plastic ...)
In short the whole guitar exudes quality, we feel it is built to last.
Note that many guitarists are pictured with this guitar: Marc Rizzo, Dewil Zappa, Blue Saraceno ...
I put 9 because perfection does not exist even if they are approached.


UTILIZATION

The handle is between Musicman and Fender, it's fast, soft and aréable.
The guitar is perhaps a little heavier than a Fender but it's just a sign of quality in my opinion. I've always been wary of small guitars ...
Ergonomics is a stratum, then RAS.
You can choose or not to use the floyd but for my part, I prefer to vibrato vintage guitars out of tune even if I do that the floyd tremolo use.
With all possible combinations of microphones, hard not to find his "sound".

SOUNDS

I play blues to Hendrix, of Clapton, Gilmour solos and Mark Knofler, a little Santana and harder stuff like the Stooges, Sonic Youth, the extreme versatility of the guitar allows me to address all these styles without hassle.
- The DB2 (neck and middle) have a grain Fender but more powerful and silent, no ronfletttes in saturation, it's nice! They combine gentleness and slamming.
- The DB4 Quadbucker in "turbo" has a huge sound and produces heavy colas with plenty of sustain, it sounds twice as loud a Gibson Les Paul.
Just go up a notch swith for the sound of a regular double
and another step to the microphone splitter and return a wink to his fender. 3 + 5 short positions it's been 8 different sounds ...

Again it would be hard to find fault. Look carefully you could say it's not a guitar for the modern metal sound is too hot for that but for the Satriani or Van Halen it goes very well.


OVERALL OPINION

I use it for 12 years, I just bought a Fender Stratocaster USA I do not use because I find the sound too dry. To return to the axcellerator AX is a guitar that offers 8 sound so ultra versatile without being bland. A bit like a Musicman Luke. In short, it's a great guitar, a long-term investment for serious guitarists but already a good level.