Chorus Pedal - best for Juno-like sound?

[LPF83]

Have you found a good pedal for achieving the Juno sound?  Please share.

Chorus is such a simple effect that it seems like it should be easy to replicate the famous Roland Juno chorus, yet I've found *good* chorus to be somewhat elusive.

The best I've heard is the Strymon Mobius -- I've tried most of the popular chorus plug-ins, but to my ears nobody really gets this effect right in software. The strength of the Mobius is also its achilles heel -- it has so many algorithms and settings that probably nobody is going to stumble across the exact sound they want just by demo'ing the pedal, so I think many never even realize the Juno sound is there, or how good it really is.  I assume this is what the Strymon Ola is for -- a dedicated vintage chorus solution... it seems to get rave reviews.  At $300 for the Ola, the Mobius is IMO better value due to the phaser, flange and other useful fx which I do use.

I noticed TC is coming out with a V2 of their June-60 pedal.  Reviews indicate the V1 was a dog and sounded nothing like vintage Roland chorus.  I might keep an eye on V2, especially at such a low price point and given that there don't seem to be many alternatives directly pursuing the Juno sound.

All of this said, I will say that my ears do like the built in chorus that comes out of my Sequential synths that have it (P6/OB6/Rev2 etc).  I get a great deal of use from an external pedal, however.   For example, the P10 sounds great with just one oscillator run through chorus (freeing up the second oscillator for dedicated polymod duty).

[Manbird]

I recently sold a TC June-60 pedal. It sounded rubbish on synths and a little too warbly on guitar for me to keep it around. I have an ancient Ibanez CSL Stereo Chorus pedal for my Prophet 6, when I'm in a grumpy mono-out-and/analog-only mood. As long as the input level isn't jacked up too high, that pedal sounds gorgeous. For my P5, I use an MXR Stereo Chorus. Maybe that one can be tricked into Juno territory, which is what you're specifically asking about, but I've not put time into trying to get *that* sound. The sound of Prophet-into-chorus is a gorgeous world of its own, and I've not felt the need to reach for that extra Roland twang. That said, didn't someone on this forum once post some P6 chorus settings that were meant to approximate the sound of a Juno chorus?

Side note - I have the Korg MS-20 Legacy plug-in, which I've used pretty much only as an FX processor. Only recently discovered that the Polysix Ensemble included with it sounds REALLY good. Close enough to the real thing to impress my cloth ear!

[LPF83]

I recently sold a TC June-60 pedal. It sounded rubbish on synths and a little too warbly on guitar for me to keep it around. I have an ancient Ibanez CSL Stereo Chorus pedal for my Prophet 6, when I'm in a grumpy mono-out-and/analog-only mood. As long as the input level isn't jacked up too high, that pedal sounds gorgeous. For my P5, I use an MXR Stereo Chorus. Maybe that one can be tricked into Juno territory, which is what you're specifically asking about, but I've not put time into trying to get *that* sound. The sound of Prophet-into-chorus is a gorgeous world of its own, and I've not felt the need to reach for that extra Roland twang. That said, didn't someone on this forum once post some P6 chorus settings that were meant to approximate the sound of a Juno chorus?

Side note - I have the Korg MS-20 Legacy plug-in, which I've used pretty much only as an FX processor. Only recently discovered that the Polysix Ensemble included with it sounds REALLY good. Close enough to the real thing to impress my cloth ear!

I've heard good things about the MXR pedal, I might check that one out.  Yeah, I find Korg plugins to be worth the ask.  I recently picked up the Wavestation plug-in..  its not the best for to tweakability and programming interface, but for having all the old Wavestation sounds in one place its great.

[Manbird]

I recently sold a TC June-60 pedal. It sounded rubbish on synths and a little too warbly on guitar for me to keep it around. I have an ancient Ibanez CSL Stereo Chorus pedal for my Prophet 6, when I'm in a grumpy mono-out-and/analog-only mood. As long as the input level isn't jacked up too high, that pedal sounds gorgeous. For my P5, I use an MXR Stereo Chorus. Maybe that one can be tricked into Juno territory, which is what you're specifically asking about, but I've not put time into trying to get *that* sound. The sound of Prophet-into-chorus is a gorgeous world of its own, and I've not felt the need to reach for that extra Roland twang. That said, didn't someone on this forum once post some P6 chorus settings that were meant to approximate the sound of a Juno chorus?

Side note - I have the Korg MS-20 Legacy plug-in, which I've used pretty much only as an FX processor. Only recently discovered that the Polysix Ensemble included with it sounds REALLY good. Close enough to the real thing to impress my cloth ear!

I've heard good things about the MXR pedal, I might check that one out.  Yeah, I find Korg plugins to be worth the ask.  I recently picked up the Wavestation plug-in..  its not the best for to tweakability and programming interface, but for having all the old Wavestation sounds in one place its great.

I bought the MXR for guitar gigs, really, but when I picked up my Prophet 5, I felt those two belonged together for good. I don't often use it anymore... I'm too lazy to unplug the P5 from its glorious mono channel in the mixer. If I need stereo chorus these days, I use the Arturia Chorus Jun-6 plug-in, which has much more "authentic" vibe than the TC pedal. I'm curious about the revamped TC pedal, but I'll soon be bringing my Berlin back to California, including my Ibanez chorus. There are only so many chorus pedal hours in the day!

[timboréale]

There are only so many chorus pedal hours in the day!

Indeed, only 24! 

I have had fairly good success with an Eventide H9 which is my swiss army knife effect, replicating various swooshy swirly thick choruses a la Juno. The nicest thing is that they each make you go "ooh a vintage Roland chorus!" But they're each also a little different - Each method for recreating that vibe has differences which can be leveraged to really complement specific patches. Not being one size fits all is actually a huge plus to me. I've got maybe three or four presets that are different algorithms doing their version of the Juno chorus, and I just flick between them as needed. Expression pedal adds additional control for e g slow or fast, more or less, etc.

[Jan Schultink]

Boss Dimension C https://www.boss.info/us/products/dc-2w/
It is very subtle, it is almost always on in my setup, at the lowest setting, using it basically as a stereo widening tool. Not the same as the Juno 106 (I own a vintage one, 1984) but nice. Boss is owned by Roland, and this analog Dimension C is a reissue of the original from around the same time (1983 I think). Roland/Boss understands 1980 chorus.

For the complete feel, put an MXR Phase 95 in front of it, again in a subtle setting https://www.jimdunlop.com/mxr-phase-95/

[LPF83]

Although not a hardware solution, Roland released their Juno 60 Chorus plugin for cloud subscribers. 

I've only done some quick tests, but initially was very impressed at how well it captured that Juno sound, moreso than I was during first impressions of competitor equivalents.  I'm looking forward to spending more time with it, and comparing it to my other chorus pedals (Boss CE-2w and Strymon Mobius) to see if it can dethrone them.

The one thing that irks me is that they didn't implement bypass in the VST specification.   It has its own on/off switch and wet/dry of course, but inside the DAW, if I bypass the channel strip it doesn't affect the plugin.  One has to wonder why... this is standard on all my other plugins and I don't know why Roland would leave something like that out.

[LPF83]

Boss Dimension C https://www.boss.info/us/products/dc-2w/
It is very subtle, it is almost always on in my setup, at the lowest setting, using it basically as a stereo widening tool. Not the same as the Juno 106 (I own a vintage one, 1984) but nice. Boss is owned by Roland, and this analog Dimension C is a reissue of the original from around the same time (1983 I think). Roland/Boss understands 1980 chorus.

For the complete feel, put an MXR Phase 95 in front of it, again in a subtle setting https://www.jimdunlop.com/mxr-phase-95/

Thanks for this, I actually did pick up a DC-2W and really like it.  Came back here to report something new I tried more out of curiosity than with a purpose:   I put my CE-2W in front of the DC-2W in the signal path and the results are just stunning.  Between the buttons and modes of the DC and the range of the knobs on the CE, there's a huge range of variation and sweet spots.  I don't know that it's necessarily a Juno chorus but it's the best chorus solution I've heard, pretty much any synth tone run through it sounds amazing, so on the Prophet 10, it is next-level sonic territory.   Granted, its kind of an expensive way to achieve multi chorus and I'm not sure how long I will leave that configuration as-is...  There is a specific preset on the Mobius called "Ends Here" that is a multi-chorus that has a similar effect on the signal, although not quite as versatile or purist-analog sounding.

[Manbird]

Curious if anyone here has picked up the TC June-60 V2 pedal. As I mentioned ages back, I didn't like the first version much at all, but supposedly the V2 is a reasonable re-jig and sounds much more like the Juno chorus it's emulating. Easy enough to buy and return things these days, but I'm hoping to hear if anyone here has used the new pedal.

[LPF83]

Curious if anyone here has picked up the TC June-60 V2 pedal. As I mentioned ages back, I didn't like the first version much at all, but supposedly the V2 is a reasonable re-jig and sounds much more like the Juno chorus it's emulating. Easy enough to buy and return things these days, but I'm hoping to hear if anyone here has used the new pedal.

It's on my "todo list", but I haven't jumped in because of the cons mentioned at the end of this video and also the places that have it in stock seem to be selling much higher than MSRP... Would also love to hear what others who may own it think of it, though.

 

[LPF83]

Also just a side note since you have a System 8... you can run a signal into the inputs of it and use it as an FX unit, including Juno chorus (vocoder is nice too).

[Manbird]

Also just a side note since you have a System 8... you can run a signal into the inputs of it and use it as an FX unit, including Juno chorus (vocoder is nice too).

Nice to know about the signal in option. I tried out the vocoder only briefly when I got the System 8, but have since moved the synth into a not-so-easy-to-reach-the-back-panel corner. Will re-investigate.

[Manbird]

I plugged my Prologue - mono out - into the System 8. Was a fair bit of fussery involved to get the chorus happening, but it did sound nice. Too much effort for real world use, but a nice option to have for rainy days!

[LPF83]

I plugged my Prologue - mono out - into the System 8. Was a fair bit of fussery involved to get the chorus happening, but it did sound nice. Too much effort for real world use, but a nice option to have for rainy days!

Yeah there is a bit of menu action on the S8 to get to some features, but in that sense it just reminds me of older Roland gear like the JP8080.

This review of the TC Juno 60 pedal leads me to believe they may need a V3 to really get the sound right.

[LPF83]

I've had a Strymon Mobius for a few years now, and I have to say that it has become my favorite modulation pedal.  So much so that I recently bought a second one. 

Although this thread is about Juno chorus, the reason for requiring two of these pedals isn't only about chorus... its just that over time I've come to realize that the Mobius is the best sounding (of the options I've tried) at everything it does... and it does so much... And because it does so much, it takes a while to develop the muscle memory to know how to quickly get it exactly where you want it.  Because it's so massively tweakable, getting to the depths of its capability takes some time.  Not that it has a steep learning curve -- with the display, ease of use is brilliantly executed.  It's just that there's so much to discover that the options may seem overwhelming at first (and as far as I can tell this is the only reason anyone would ever sell one).  It's not just a matter of knowing each basic feature and how to use it, it's a matter of learning the various parameters for each feature and the effect on the sound of those parameters as it relates to the sounds each of your synths naturally produce.  Once you invest THAT learning curve, the rewards are phenomenal.

Over time I found the phaser to be superior to most others I've found; the tremolo, filter, and some of the other features to be hidden gems that offer so many ways to modify your output.  I have not been able to equal results from software, to date.

But yes, it does do a great Juno chorus.  The patches mentioned in this video don't come on the unit by the same name but you can not only very quickly find sound-alike settings, but you may quickly find settings that sound better than the original Juno chorus for a particular sound.