Supro USA is now shipping the Tri Tone: a black and gold three-pickup solidbody guitar, inspired by the rare 1959 Supro Triple Tone.
The Supro Triple Tone was a tuxedo-black, 3-pickup, art deco masterpiece that made its original debut in 1959 and was produced for only a single year. Now, sixty years later, Supro is re-introducing this unique instrument for 2019 with modernizations like set-neck construction, tune-o-matic bridge, tummy cut and increased access to upper frets—making the Tri Tone a serious player’s guitar with authentic vintage mojo. The Tri Tone shares its distinctive, single-cutaway body shape with the best-selling Dual Tone model, played by Link Wray and David Bowie. The body of the Tri Tone is made of solid mahogany. Its fully bound neck is constructed of hard rock maple, sporting a seductively smooth, black satin finish and a 12”-radius pau ferro fretboard.
Along with the distinctive jet-black color, reverse-stairstep tailpiece, brushed-gold hardware and stylized double pickguard, a defining highlight of the original instrument was the trio of Ralph Keller-designed Vistatone pickups. Although they look like humbuckers, Vistatone pickups are in fact noise-cancelling single coil pickups that deliver a ton of output. For the brand new 2019 Tri Tone, the triple-pickup format combines an overwound Super Alnico unit in the bridge with a pair of authentic Vistatone pickups in the neck and middle positions. These custom-made, powerful, vintage-correct single coils deliver a wide variety of Supro tones, ranging from warm jazz and smoldering blues to southern rock and fuzzed-out psychedelia. The full sonic palette of the Tri Tone can be accessed using the dedicated volume knobs for each pickup, the 5-way selector switch and the master volume control.
Specs:
• Jet black finish
• Mahogany body
• Maple neck with black satin finish
• Set neck construction
• Vistatone neck & middle pickups
• Super Alnico bridge pickup
• Pau Ferro fretboard
• Block inlays
• 24.75” scale length
• Gold hardware
The Tri Tone is now available at Supro dealers worldwide, retailing for $999 USD. Visit suprousa.com/tritone.
