I’ve been carrying 5 of these speakers on bike to pedal powered concerts for over a year now with my band SHAKE YOUR PEACE!, and I’ve been very happy with them. They’re light, thunderously loud, and the pedal power hack that Rock the Bike did has all been working great. I’ve had no tech issues yet, and this is after speakers have fallen off of bike trailers at 15mph (I hope I didn’t just void my warranty!)Â Everything still feels and sounds robust. I’ve even used these speakers in AC mode (non pedal-power, conventional mode) for DJ and wedding gigs and they rock the party just as a non-modified JBL would.
That said – JBL’s line of PRX speakers aren’t the most clear and balanced sounding PA speaker you could possibly buy. But frankly – I’m a musician and a sound engineer, and only the most geeky audiophile types would find any fault with JBL’s PRX line. I feel very confident when I pull out my PRX’s and listen to them both onstage monitoring myself as a singer, and when I’m out in the crowd riding the faders. The bass is commanding, the mids and highs are solid and clear. Also, the speakers are pedal-powered, which makes even a shitty car-audio speaker sound magical! Let us not forget that our ears are connected to our hearts and brains, and ethically and conceptually, pedal-powered audio resonates on a deeper level than AC-powered audio. You probably already know this, and that’s why you’re here on this site reading this review anyways 🙂
As for portability, the 12’s fit well on an Xtracycle, but the 15’s and larger are too big and heavy to comfortably carry unless you have Xtracycle’s new sidecar thing. On a Yuba Mundo, you can get away with carrying the 15’s and subs, but unless you’re a real muscleman you’re really asking for a topple in my opinion. My recommendation is to transport these speakers with a bike trailer and keep them low to the ground. Also – as with carrying any giant piece of metal and wood, if you’re going up big hills and you only weigh 150 lbs like I do and you don’t want to kill your knees, an electric assist bicycle helps a lot.
Dig it,
Gabe
