Guitar Cables and Tone Manipulation (part 1.)
When it comes to creating the ultimate guitar tone, there are many factors that account for this carefully calculated recipe of tone. Yet, who’s to say what the best guitar sound is? This is completely subjective to the person being asked. However, there are common key elements that are present in most every great guitar tone, and a full spectrum of frequencies are indeed one of those key elements.
Today, we’re going to look at guitar cables and examine what this simple little lifeline is (or isn’t) doing for our core guitar tone…
(Core Guitar Tone or CGT, is your guitar plugged directly into the front of the amp with absolutely nothing else in the signal chain anywhere.)
The first thing we must accept is that a guitar cable does indeed affect the signal and the tone of your sound. One simple single guitar cable can be responsible for good or bad quality immediately. This is exactly why I recommend that you spend some time working with different guitar cables to pin point the one you like best. You’ll only have to do this once, because after the initial time spent to narrow down your choices and finally pick, you’ll want to use that type of cable throughout your entire signal chain to maintain consistency.
So, talking from experience and knowing what helped me to quickly overcome this process of cable comparisons and eliminations, I simply spent a couple days rounding up and locating as many different types of cables as I possibly could. This includes cheap ones and expensive ones and everything in between. I was able to borrow tons of different brands of cables from a local music store I worked at. I also rounded up all the cables I personally owned and ones that my friends personally owned.
This may sound like a crazy thing to do, but it was one of the best things i ever did to educate myself on cables regarding signal loss and tone robbery. I would never have thought to even do something like this if it weren’t for months and months of wondering why my guitar sound would change now and then, when I wasn’t changing any components in the rig. I would notice gain loss, or presence loss and the worst of all saggy bass instead of tight focused bass.
One day, i was swapping out a simple patch cord and noticed a difference immediately in my entire guitar sound. It then dawned on me that the patch cord was affecting my overall guitar tone. That’s when I started experimenting with my cords and realized the huge amount of influence my cables had on my core guitar tone. Keep in mind, i was using all kinds of mixed matched cables at the time. This didn’t help the scenario any.
This is why I spent the time going through tons of different cables to discover what worked best for me. As i mentioned, you’ll only have to do this once if you spend the time gathering as many cables as possible, then do it all in one day.
I advise you to record your audio auditions of each cable and document the brand so when you can play them back, you be able to further analyze each cable. But… odds are you’ll know when your playing through the cable right then and there if it sounds right, and feels right. Yes, you’ll feel it in the guitar as well.
You’ll notice differences in things like
- Frequency drops or frequency harshness
- Loss of gain or enhanced gain
- Loss of clarity or enhanced clarity
- Saggy low end or tightly focused low end
- Big roundness of frequencies or narrow nasal frequencies
- Massive loss of sustain or increased sustain
- Dull responsiveness from the guitar or making the guitar feel Alive
- No- transparent and cloudy or crystal clear with sheen
All of these things are what you’ll will notice when you’re able to rapidly examine at least 20 different types of cables through the same guitar and amp rig in one simple setting.
More on this subject when we dive into part 2.
Be sure to read part 2. of “Guitar Cables and Tone Manipulation”
Coming Soon…
Please Leave A Comment below and Share Your Thoughts.
More Soon,
Bob
If you have experienced similar changes such as the ones mentioned above, please share them with all of us.
Thanks,
Bob
I remember years ago when I started playing guitar, I used some unnamed stock cables that generated a slight bad noise that affected the tone and sustain… first I thought it was coming from my amp. and then many weeks later I realised that it was coming from my cables ! Anyway I share the same idea as Bob, I think cables are a very important factor of a good tone…
One of the first guitarists who identified this effect and the sound deterioration by the additional loading from effect boxes was Jerry Garcia. He had a buffer driver installed on the output from the guitar to overcome this.
Very good subject though, I’m working on this myself.
I’ll have to agree to the generalities explained.
But if you have low guitar output impedance + high input impedance to your amp, cable capacitance/resistance won’t make much difference anyhow….
But if you have high output guitar & high amp input impedance as with most passive guitars through tube amps, then cable capacitance can have major effect.
You want cables with the lowest capacitance/resistance possible.
Remember also that some cables (due to the extrusion process in wire production) are even directional as to their ability to pass electrons unaltered and thus unadulterated tone.
I have experienced this cable enlightenment. Many guitarist don’t take this as serious as they should. I won’t mention names of cable companies that I have A-B tested with students and friends on have been surprised. I have changed all the cables I use (pedal board, gtr-amp…etc.) and pack up from gigs now without wondering why my gear sounded dull,
and all the differences mentioned in your article. It is tough to put this sound thing into words. I believe one guitarist will experience it different than another depending on all what gear- cable – to the wall socket they are plugged into. Thanks for this, I look forward to part two.
Also while looking into cables I had to consider the length.
This factor plays a major part in the tone as well.
There should be a simple impedence and resistance tester to identify the condition best audio cables.
EVERY cable suffers from oxidation on the copper. General rule (IMHO): Dump all cables every three years.
What´s the best guitar cable brand?? and which one is the worst?
I agree. years ago, I used one of those coiled cheap radioshack cables. I read it somewhere that SRV and Jimi were into those cables. It was great at the time because it took the harsh high end off the cheap solid state amps I was using at the time. whenever I used a regular cable I could hear the difference. People thought I was crazy but I guess I was on to something.