Supro has added a 50-watt tube amp head and matching 1x12 extension cabinet to its Royale Series – a range of amps that packs the features in, and stacks the headroom high.
Clean tone freaks and keepers of epic pedalboards will have a lot to like here. There is a footswitchable effects loop, boost and tube-driven spring reverb at hand. The Royale promises to be tactile, with forensic detail given to your dynamics. That, of course, is a two-way street; it brings out the best in your playing, but also punishes sloppiness. If you play a wrong note, everyone is going to hear it.
But that’s part of what makes the electric guitar such an exciting instrument. You can run the Royale at 35-watts as a Class A amplifier, which is traditionally Supro in its cathode-biased “bold, spongy midrange”, or in a grid-biased Class AB mode at 50-watts, promising a West Coast scooped accent to the tone, with tubby bass and fast response.
The Royale’s control panel has dials for Volume, Boost, Treble, Mid, Bass, Reverb Level, Reverb Dwell, and Master. There you will fine the toggle switch for its Class A/Standby/Class AB, and a power On/Off switch, plus three toggles for the effects loop, boost, and reverb.
On the rear of the amp there are dual speaker outputs at four and eight-ohms, with a single 16-ohm output. There are footswitch inputs for the boost function, effects loop, and reverb, and the tube-buffered effects loop itself.
Under the hood, the Royale is packing three 12AX7s, a 12AT7, and 12DW7 valves in the preamp, with a duo of 5881 tubes in the power amp. The amp is housed in a poplar cabinet finished in stylish Black Scandia Tolex with cream piping. A dog-bone vinyl handle is on the top of the amp, while the hemp with gold thread grille cloth finishes the amp off nicely. Supro amps always scrub up well, and this is not exception.
Supro has also launched the Royale 1x12 extension cabinet, which has the similar finish and poplar cabinet, in which you’ll find a custom Supro BD12 speaker, a high-power driver that has a similar “mid-range punch and clean articulation” its siblings in the combo, but with even more stage volume.
This is definitely one for those who want to turn it up and keep it clean, and it looks like it would make a formidable pedalboard or multi-effects pedal platform.
Available now, the Royale head is priced $1,499. The 1x12 Royale extension cabinet is priced $669. See Supro for more details.
