The Chorus of the Cosmos... first demo page 34!

[goroth]

The vibe sound is nice - but I don't really do vibe stuff much so I don't have a lot to compare to! The clock switch and knob control how wide the pitch variation is, and maxed it gets pretty "horrid" - covers a lot of the same territory as the pitch pirate (which I also have). However the more extreme settings of the PP (with a 1,5 octave swing) aren't possible on the CC. You can definitely get spooky tape breaking down pitch bending from the CC.

I think it is stupidly easy to dial in - doesn't really matter where you have the knobs and switches it just sounds good. Keep moving the knobs around and you'll work out what they do and how they affect the sound. I guess the one problem I have is that I often can't work out what sound I like best - for example the phase invert switch. I turn it one way and the difference in the chorus sound is fairly substantial, and I'm all like "yeah, this is how I want my chorus to sound". Switch it back and it sounds way different but then I think "wow, this setting was probably better, I'll roll with this". Then I switch it back...

I think a lot of the features are more for dialing out stuff that is annoying, or getting a particular sound closer to what's in your head. I've got an old Boss CE-2B, and that sounds great, but sometimes it'd sound nice with a wider pitch sweep. Most choruses you just have to live with that (or being too bright, or too warm, or too slow or whatever). With the CC you can find that nice sound, and then if you think it needs a slightly wider sweep you just flick a switch or adjust the knob. Same goes with treble, mix, speed... it's super good!

[Tristan]

Thanks for your extensive reply!
I figured something like that with all the switches and knobs, one needs to be a doctor and a scientist oneself and know what one wants, but I guess that's only fair because it's been made by one...
As for the sounds I'm looking for:
1. Thick and Lush Chorus (BC-9, CE-1, Small Clone, Stereo Chorus)
2. Very Shallow Chorus to add a bit of synthy metallicness to the sound (Small Clone with depth switch and rate knob at minimum)
3. Spooky and maybe bit Watery Vibrato (CE-1 Vibrato, dedicated Vibrato units)
4. Pitch Warble of a whole tone (Pitch Pirate on moderate settings)
I was thinking the Cosmichorus could probably do all that, if it would also be relatively easy to set these sounds up I would be set.
I'm actually thinking about replacing one or two knobs with an Option Knob (http://www.optionknob.com) to make it easier dialing it in playing live.

[AngryGoldfish]

The vibrato on the Cosmichorus V2 was very syrupy and juicy. It wasn't like traditional vibrato in that it can be a little lo-fi and thin, for lack of a better term. The vibrato on the Cosmichorus is found by maxing out the mix knob. This creates thick, lush pitch modulation with a full frequency range.

[Tristan]

Ok, that sounds good, there's actually a shop in Germany that supposedly has the Cosmichorus in stock so I'll have a look whether I can try it out there.

[Ryan]

Hi Guys,

New here, but I've been gassing for something Dr. Scientist quite long, the Cosmichorus especially (only found out about it as the Cosmichorus V2 was already discontinued).
I was just wondering, people are mostly talking about the Chorus side of the pedal but how does it do the Vibrato, is it possible to get it near CE-1 and Pitch Pirate sounds?
I'm really looking for the fattest sounding Analog Chorus / Vibrato available and so far I haven't had much luck with the boutique modulation stuff, it usually ends up sounding too clean and pristine for my tastes.
Chorus pedals I like are: CE-1, Small Clone, Ibanez BC9, MXR Stereo Chorus
Is it not too hard to dial the Cosmichorus in, it seems to be quite a lot to get your head around?

Hey Tristan, welcome to ILF and thanks for checking out the Cosmi!

The guys have covered this really well and thanks Griegy for being so in depth about it!

The CCv3 can do some crazy sounding pitch bending but I've never heard anything as dramatic and extreme as a Pitch Pirate. I've got one too and the CC definitely runs out of weirdness before the PP does.

There's two vibrato settings on the CCv3, with the invert toggle set to invert you have a slightly bass-cut vibrato and with it set to normal you have a full frequency vibrato tone, no bass cut, and enough treble control to go much darker or brighter than your dry signal.

As far as competing with the CE1 etc, I think the CCv3 can go head-to-head with all of them, any time! *smile*

My pedals like the CC and Trem and Elements have a lot of knobs but they're really easy to work with.. the knobs only control the basic parameters that a person would want/need to control in a straight forward way. A chorus pedal consists of a dry signal, a wet signal, a timing clock, and an oscillator, and you have control over the important aspects of them.

I have a dealer in Germany, in Ostfildern, Effekt Boutique, the owner is Andy Ebsen and he's a really nice guy who would be happy to show you the pedal.

Thanks again!

[Tristan]

Hi Ryan, thanks for your reply and welcome!
I'm only looking for a whole tone of pitch modulation max, I'm guessing the Cosmi can probably do that?
With the bass-cut do you mean the bass is acually cut from the entire signal or is it simply not affected by the chorus / vibrato? (the MXR Stereo Chorus has that option and it sounds pretty great on lush settings)
I'm still considering the V1 and V2 too because in the demo's I heard so far they seem to be more to my liking as they seem to sound warmer / fatter (or maybe that's just the video's?) but I guess I'll just give Andy from Effekt Boutique a call to see whether he can send the Cosmi to me so I can try it out, if by any chance I might not like it I can always try my luck with a V1 or V2 or something else.
I agree about the controls being fairly straight forward but in chorus pedals I usually find the delay time control to be almost too interactive, having a switch with even more range for the delay time could be quite mindblowing but I guess that's just me.
That hold feature on the V3 is amazingly cool though, what a cool thing to put on a chorus / vibrato!

[Ryan]

Geez I'm late replying here, sorry Tristan! *smacks forehead*

The Cosmi can easily do a whole tone of pitch modulation... I think... yeah it's gotta be, way more than that too!

I do a slight bass cut on the non-inverted wet signal only to help the wet and dry signals mix together properly. When you play with phase inversions you add or subtract certain frequencies and it happens that for the wet signal, when it's not inverted and mixes with the dry signal, it over-emphasized the lows a bit and sounds too different from the inverted mix, too boomy. There's no bass cut on the dry signal at all, none on the inverted wet signal either.

The v1/v2 might sound warmer/fatter in videos because they're darker than the v3. The v3 is trying to keep your signal sounding as close to the same on the way out as the way in. You can make it darker/warmer/fatter by turning down the treble knob but with the v1/v2 you can't do anything to make them sound brighter/clearer/more transparent.

The delay time control is necessary if you want to get large pitch bends and very light flanger sounds, but it's more important just for the general nature of the chorus sound, from thin and airy to thick and heavy... it takes a big range from low resistance and low capacitance to high resistance and high capacitance, can't be done by a switch or knob alone, gotta be a dynamic duo! *smile*

Let me know if you have any other questions about it and I promise I'll be faster than a month!

[Tristan]

No problem!
I hope / guess you were busy building pedals, enjoying life, which would be a good thing.
I'm getting very very excited about that Cosmichorus, Effekt Boutique only has the Zombie finish left in stock now though, I'm curious, do you think you'll be bringing out a new finish for the Cosmichorus sometime this year? (I also understand if you can't say so)
I don't mean to criticise, I love the Home Sweet Home finish but I'm not crazy on the grey (there's so many grey pedals out there nowadays) and I'm not a Zombie / Horror man either, on other pedals I don't mind so much but your pedals look so amazing it would be great if I could get something else.