Supro 1275JB Tri Tone Guitar in Jet Black

The Tri Tone is an updated incarnation of the 1959 Supro Triple Tone guitar. This tuxedo black Art Deco masterpiece sports the same body shape and set-neck construction of the David Bowie Dual Tone model, plus a custom-made set of brushed-gold Supro pickups.

Designed specifically for the 2019 Tri Tone, a calibrated pair of Vistatone pickups in the neck and middle position are mated with an overwound, Super Alnico unit in the bridge. Expanding on Supro tradition, this custom-wound boutique pickup set is wired with a 5-way switch, dedicated volume knobs for each pickup and a master volume control.

More about the Tri Tone...

The original Tri Tone had a 3-way switch, allowing only one pickup to be used at a time. On the vintage versions we have seen, the routing for the middle pickup cavity was done after the paint job. This leads us to believe that the bodies started out prior to assembly as Dual Tone guitar bodies, which were then modified to become Triple Tones. For the brand new 2019 Tri Tone, we combined two Vistatone pickups with an overwound Super Alnico unit in the bridge, giving access to all the vintage tones (and more) on a 5-way switch. Like other vintage-inspired guitars in the current Supro line-up, the Tri Tone received modernizations like set-neck construction and increased access to upper frets, making this a truly awesome guitar with major vintage mojo.

The Triple Tone was Supro’s 3-pickup version of the Dual Tone, which was produced only for a single year. Besides the beautifully distinctive jet-black finish, gold hardware and double pickguard, one of the main highlights of this instrument was the trio of Ralph Keller-designed Vistatone pickups. Although they look like humbuckers, they were in fact unique noise-cancelling single coil pickups that delivered a fairly hot signal for the time.

Guitarist Magazine