Supro 1695TJ Black Magick Combo

Supro Black Magick Combo.

I recently acquired a “B-Stock” Supro Black Magick combo from Proaudiostar for less than the used prices. The Black Magick is a modern, mass produced take on the Supro Coronado that Jimmy Page used on Led Zeppelin I. The lore of Jimmy Page’s Supro Coronado is that the stock 2x10 baffle was Replaced with a 1x12 baffle that had an Oxford speaker reconed with a Pulsonic cone.

Jensen P12Q in the combo.

This particular model, the 1695TJ, comes with a modern Jensen P12Q speaker, instead of the more common Eminence-made, Supro-labeled BD12 speaker. I wavered between the two models, but ultimately went with the Jensen-loaded model. I saw that the Sundragon Standard, the Jimmy Page-approved boutique recreation, also used a Jensen P12Q RI.

The P12Q is a bright speaker and balances the amp’s dark voicing. It is much brighter than my Weber 12A125A and A12Q speakers, my only other 12” American-style speaker references. The speaker is housed in a plywood cabinet, a nice surprise.

I thought that the Tone control’s most useful range was between 10:00 and 3:00 at cleaner settings. At 3:00, the Tone Control started to cut a significant amount of low end. I did think that cranking the Tone control’s most useful was necessary for certain thinner and gainy Led Zeppelin tones, like Communication Breakdown.

The amp has an input jack that links Inputs 1 and 2, to allow for channel blending and to achieve more gain beyond cranking a single channel. Each channel individually is clean when set at 2:00 and below.