I finally did a controlled, recorded comparison of a vintage EVM-12L (Series II, probably 1985 manufacture) and an Eminence EM12, in a ported TL-806 1x12 cabinet. I’ve discussed these speakers quite a bit in the past. As you can see above, they don’t sound quite the same. What’s maybe not obvious from the frequency response plot is how much better the EM12 sounds when recorded.
Out in the room there’s really not a huge difference, but with a mic on the speaker, the EM12 is much easier to deal with. For this comparison I used an ultra-flat omni condenser mic, the Avenson STO-2, about 3″ back from the grill. That way, there’s no proximity effect, it picks up the whole cone and the port, and it’s flat 20Hz-20kHz.
The EVM has a pretty gnarly peak up around 5.5kHz, which is almost certainly a cone breakup mode. That can add a lot of ‘zing’ to guitar tracks, but it’s so sharp as to almost sound like a ‘whistling’ noise (you can hear it clearly in this YouTube comparison, on the distorted EVM clips). Every EVM I’ve ever used has had this (I’ve owned 6 of them at various points), which forces you to mic off-axis and very close. It clutters the lower treble and in a mix it can mask details in snare drum and cymbals, as well as reduce intelligibility in vocals. That may be why it’s known as a “lead guitar speaker” (*eye roll*). Positioning has always been finicky when recording. The EVM also has a bump around 500Hz that is definitely artificial.
The EM12, on the other hand, sounds a touch darker when you’re standing in front of the cab (which means it’s more ‘beamy’ in the treble, I think), but the recorded tone is much more natural, and works better across a wide variety of positions on the speaker -- on axis, off axis, close, far, whatever. It’s just a very ‘finished’ sound right out of the box, without anything weird or annoying happening. It has a little more upper mids than the EVM, which helps it to cut through, but the treble roll off is smoother. It rolls off earlier than the EVM, but more gradually -- it’s -10dB vs the EVM at 5.5kHz, but +10dB at 7kHz!
Low end in this cabinet is comparable between the two speakers, which is to be expected given how similar their T-S parameters are.
A caveat here is that EVMs of different eras are really all over the place in terms of sound -- that said, the new-manufacture “Classic” model has even more treble peakiness than the vintage ones. The EM12 is also 1dB less sensitive than the EVM12L - the graph above was normalized to 1kHz for comparison purposes.
If you want an EVM-type sound and your main use is for recording, the EM12 is no-brainer. It’s also literally half the price of the EVM.
Here’s the audio of the EVM, and here’s the audio of the EM12. These are not level-matched -- but they are gain matched, so you hear the slight difference in overall efficiency between the two speakers. Don’t evaluate these files on laptop speakers! Use decent headphones or monitors.
