How I use Arturia Tape J-37 on vocals, synths and parallel busses

I am very picky with tape emulations.

And honestly, this one was a huge surprise for me.

It’s funny, because I was actually about to purchase an $8,000 tape machine. Then this plugin got released, and suddenly I didn’t feel the need for it.

This is Tape J-37 by Arturia.

Arturia? I knew their synths were good, but the FX? I did not expect to love this so much.

I started testing it casually, no big expectations, but it turns out that it sounds better than almost any digital tape emulation I have tried so far.

And yes, you already know this about me: I still use Ampex for mastering. But for mixing or stem mastering, there is nothing like the J-37.

Vocals and synths

One place where I really love J-37 is on vocals. When you have that slightly annoying digital microphone tone, this plugin gives you exactly the correction you are looking for. It smooths the top, adds weight and makes the vocal sit in the track “naturally”.

The same thing happens with digital synthesizers: if they sound cold or lifeless, J-37 brings a much nicer character very fast, and gives you outstanding width.

How I use it the most

Above everything else, the place where J-37 shines the most for me is parallel channels. Yes, you heard me right: this tape works great in parallel.

I added it to my parallel compression busses, reverbs, saturations, you name it.

Most of the time I use Color 1 when I need extra width and “vibe”, modern style.

Important to note: this tape is very sensitive to gain staging, so don’t feed it hot.

If the song still feels too bright or aggressive on the top end, I switch to Color 4.

This mode has a much stronger low-end presence and gives me that warmth I often miss, especially in urban and electronic music, where the sound tends to be very clean and cold.

I honestly did not expect this plugin to become such an important part of my workflow, but here we are. Tape J-37 is staying.