Asterope Guitar Cable Review

By: Dr. Matt Warnock

As guitarists, we spend countless hours searching for the perfect tone. We go through dozens of guitars over the years, waiting for the perfect axe to fall into our hands. We bring together every possible combination of heads and cabinets, combos and all-in-ones, tubes and transistors, trying to find the exact combination to bring to life the sound that’s floating around in our heads.

We’ll add delay, distortion, flange, reverb and chorus, and when all of these things come together in just the right combination, with a little help from the stars realigning themselves, we’ll land on a tone that is just right, that satisfies our ears and allows our fingers to run free, bringing to life each note and chord.

While guitarists will look at pedals, amps, guitars and strings when finding their desired tone, they’ll often overlook one thing that can make a world of difference, their cable. With this knowledge in mind, that cables can alter one’s tone and in fact make it better, the good folks over at Asterope have designed a series of instrument cables that not only allow guitarists to have a good, solid tone, but that bring out sounds in their instruments that they may have never heard before, something that players of all styles and backgrounds can enjoy.

When I first plugged an Asterope into my PRS McCarty, running it through a Polytone Mini-Brute II to test a clean sound, I immediately noticed a difference in my tone, without changing any of the dial on the amp or guitar. The cable itself was bringing new aspects of the guitar to life, with a clarity that really caught my ear.

The first thing that jumped out at me was the brightness in my tone that the cable provided. I’ve used other, similar high-end cables, for years, but where others seems to be focusing on evening out the tone, cutting out the highs and lows, the Asterope cable brought those areas of the guitar to life, providing a tone that was crisp and clear, without being tinny or becoming a distraction.

As a jazz player, I normally shy away from guitars/amps and other products that give me too bright a tone, so it did take a minute for me to adjust to the brightness of the Asterope cable. Having said that, once I was able to absorb the tone into my ears, allowing my fingers to play around with the new sounds they were hearing, I found that I really enjoyed this new addition to my sonic palette. As well, the cable really “popped” the notes off of my strings.

I’m a fingerstyle player, and I choose to play flatwound strings to lessen the noise of my nails on the strings. As anyone who plays flatwounds knows they dull-out fairly quickly, producing that characteristic jazz tone, but with a deadening of the string’s vibration at the same time. I found that the Asterope cable really kicked the notes out without any delay, even for a microsecond, breathing new life into strings that I had thought were dead and gone.

After changing my strings, I decided to see what the cable could do with a live, vibrant tone that new strings produce. Again, the Asterope tone was bright and crisp, more so than with the older strings, but never to the point where I felt uncomfortable with it, or had to adjust my tone to compensate for the cable’s brightness. All in all I was thoroughly impressed with the cable’s performance, and found myself using the cable in my daily playing long after I had run it through the paces for this review.

Now, these cables are high-performance, and with any high-end product they deliver the goods, but at a high price. Most people wouldn’t think to pay $99 for a 10-foot cable, but then again I don’t think Asterope is designing these cables for the hobbyist, these are professional grade cables made for professionals. As well, when you think of how long a $10 cable lasts, (maybe 3 months?), the value that one gets when buying a cable that will last years, even decades if taken care of properly, is incomparable.

If you’re looking for a new high-end cable to add to your rig, check out the Asterope collection. These cables are crisp, clear, highly responsive and durable, everything one wants in a guitar cable. Yes, they are more expensive than many of us are used to, but you get what you pay for, and when you want the best you’ve got to shell out a few more bucks for those products. Give an Asterope cable a try, you won’t be disappointed.