The Celestion Vintage 30 in the Bogner Alchemist 112 can sound a little cold/biting at some amp settings -- I imagine the Veteran 30 is the closest substitute -- what do you think would be the next speakers in line to progressively move away from that harsher tone?
Color-wise it would be good to know if the recommended speakers would move the Alchemist more towards a Jimi sound, an Eddie sound, etc.
Thanks!
Ah yes, I REALLY wanted one of those when they first came out ... then I played through one ...
Why on earth did they chose that Vin 30 with it's signature midrange bite, anyway?? I don't get it? This amp was supposed to be more of a wide-open create-your-own tone kinda amp. Okay, with that off my chest ...
Reaper HP: this speaker would give you the most flexibility ... not Jimi, not Eddie ... but whatever you choose to create.
Retro 30: keeps w/the vint 30 vibe, but makes it much bigger and more 3-dimensional, adding a lot more lows, and a little more shimmer to the urgent midrange. I would consider this a bit on the Eddie side ...
Remember that Jimi's tone was low-wattage speakers screaming out for their lives, Marshalls on 11, and ugly distortion pedals like the Fuzz Face! Having said that, the Invader would be your best bet ... actually a GB would be, and it would really nail Jimi's tone right before it blew ...
I realize this is a reply to a very old post (almost 3 years ago), but what the heck. I recently picked up one of these Bogner Alchemist 1X12 combos for under $300. It's in very good shape and I could tell it was used very little. I got it just to practice around the house. I don't plan to gig with it because I've heard of reliability issues. Anyway, I was terribly unhappy with the Celestion vintage 30 that was in it. Clearly this isn't the right speaker for this amp. I decided to go with the WGS Retro 30 because of the recommendation on the lows and the way the speaker handles mids and highs. This is, in my opinion, a HUGE improvement to the tone of the amp. I put up a quick demo of it on YouTube, but unfortunately my camera was still a bit too close to the amp so there is a small amount of clipping, plus YouTube adds compression to the video during processing. The result makes the amp sound like the reverb is cranked up way more than it was and it's not as clear as I would have liked... but you get the general idea.
Thanks for posting the recommendation on the Retro 30. It was exactly what I was looking for.
http://youtu.be/zP0LGzq2fHM
Thanks for taking the time to post your results ... yea, this is an old thread ... I actually bought an Alchemist about a year back in a head cab ... then bought a 1x12 cab from Bogner cuz they were blowing them out, and put in an ET-65. I've made it my defacto grab-n-go no-pedalboard 1x12 combo for gigging since last Halloween ... and I LOVE it! The ET65 turned out to be a nice fit for the amp, and with it's medium magnet, actually shed a few pounds from a "stock" Vint 30!! I'm not afraid...gig w/it all the time...
https://wgs4.com/bogner-alchemist-%E2%80%93-ultimate-sleeper-amp