1972 Gibson Les Paul Triumph Bass Natural mahogany

"A Plethora of Great Sounds for the Learned Devotee"
"and this one can be used with a normal cable and a high-impedance amp"

1972 Gibson Les Paul Triumph Bass

The Les Paul Bass was first introduced in 1969. It had two low-impedance pickups which required a special cable and a special transformer. "Within two years, the low-impedance guitar and bass models had their first makeover. First, they were trimmed down from 13 7/8" to 13 1/2". A wide, comfortable, rear chest contour was also incorporated. With such heavy woods and pickups, there wasn't much change in overall weight, unless it was built with very light mahogany. A new black, four-ply binding was added on both the Recording guitar and the Triumph bass models. Headstocks had the undotted, pear-inlaid "Gibson" logo and split-diamond inlay set straight into a black plastic veneer with no finish applied. The black body binding contrasted with the new lighter, natural-finished mahogany… Gibson still touted these models' remarkable qualities, saying, "With sensitive control panels full of revolutionary sounds, the artist can actually 'mix' his own sound the way a recording studio engineer does." All the electronics were now consolidated onto a large laminated plate with an added onboard lo/hi transformer output with slide switch control, Switchcraft 12013 pickup selector, and output jack. A front routed 1 11/16" x 8 1/4" by 3 1/2" cavity received the guitar and bass console works. Gone was the need to use a bulky inline transformer…" (Robb Lawrence. The Modern Era of the Les Paul Legacy 1968-2009. p. 48).

The Les Paul Triumph Bass was first announced in 1971, appearing in price lists from November, but most likely did not ship in volume until 1972. It would appear that there were only prototypes or show models in 1971. Early Les Paul Triumph Basses (with a six digit serial numbers beginning with a 6) have summer 1971 pot codes, but again it is unlikely that they were actually shipped before the end of the year. A significant proportion of the instruments recorded as Les Paul Bass were actually the Les Paul Triumph Bass - it is impossible to say how just many were shipped but probably almost all, certainly from 1973 onwards were Les Paul Triumph's. Introduced around the same time as the Les Paul Recording guitar it has a very similar control plate and control layout as well as low impedance humbucking pickups. This low impedance circuitry was designed to be used with a special cable and transformer to give a Hi-Fi quality reproduction of the pickup signal. However the Triumph Bass could be also used with a normal cable and high impedance amp - as there are high/low impedance selector switches on the control plate.

GIBSON introduced the LES PAUL TRIUMPH BASS in 1972. The Les Paul Triumph Bass was introduced around the same time as the Les Paul Recording guitar and it has a very similar control plate and control layout as well as low impedance humbucking pickups. This low impedance circuitry was designed to be used with a special cable and transformer to give a Hi-Fi quality reproduction of the pickup signal. The Triumph Bass could be also used with a normal cable and high impedance amp - there are high/low impedance selector switches on the control plate. White finish was an option from 1975 onwards. The Triumph Bass was discontinued in 1979. (#2140)