Electric Guitar Trends

In the early 1950’s, there were no standards for electic guitar cords and jacks.  If you bought a guitar amplifier, it came with 2 wires hanging out of it.  Connecting your amp to your electric guitar was your problem.

It was not long before guitar cords all had 1/4 inch jacks and you could find an  assortment of guitar cords at your local music store.

I remember coily cords.  These were popular in the 1960’s.  The idea was that a coiled cord could alert the guitarist if he was getting near the end of his tether.  Not only did this idea not work, it also increased the length of the connection between the guitar and the amplifier.

Today, we understand that a long guitar cord means some loss of highs.  This happens because the coaxial cable has some capacitance.  The longer the cord, the greater the capacitance.  You can try this yourself, a 25 foot card will sound differnt than a 10 foot cord for example.

I see 3 trends occurring with guitar cords:  one trend is for cord manufacturers to make premium cables with low capacitance, another is for guitarists to go wireless, and thirdly, cable manufacturers have brought back ’vintage style’ cables.

George L’s led the charge with premium cables a few years back, and electric guitarists responded.  Today there is a bewildering array of premium guitar cables available.

Wireless systems are still not in the mainstream.  Players complain about units failing mysteriously within a few months. One bright light is the X2 wireless units, which use a digital, rather than analog signal.

The vintage style cords are a non-starter for me - I don’t want to go backwards in terms of sound quality.