DECADE Manual

What's new

Updates since the first release, up to v0.1.12. Your version number is in the bottom-right corner of the plugin window (§14).

• A Noise control, in a new Format panel (v0.1.12). Open Format at the end of the module list for all six formats and their Amount, Age, Noise, Bandwidth and Instability controls. Noise sets how loud the wear sounds — crackle, hiss, rumble, hum, dropouts — so you can have the tone of an old acetate or record with none of the static. Sessions and presets from earlier versions sound exactly as they did. See The era card & formats.
• A Yurt Rock folder for the plug-in files (v0.1.12). DECADE now installs into a Yurt Rock folder (the AU is named Yurt Rock DECADE.component), so it can't collide with another company's plug-in of the same name. The installer tidies away older copies of ours, and your saved sessions still find DECADE. See Installation.
• Lighter drawing on older Macs (v0.1.12). On Macs whose Safari is older than version 16 (some macOS 12 Monterey machines), DECADE now draws its meters without glow effects, at standard resolution and about 30 frames a second, so the window stays up on older graphics hardware. Newer Macs look exactly as before.
• No more blank window on older macOS (v0.1.11). On Macs that never took the Safari 16 update (some macOS 12 Monterey machines), DECADE's window could stay blank. It draws there now.
• Your settings load with the session (v0.1.10). A reopened session now sounds right straight away, even if you never open DECADE's window — before, the rack only took its full settings once the window had been opened.
• A message instead of a white window (v0.1.9). If DECADE's interface can't start, you now get a panel that says so, with Try again, Copy details and Get help — and your audio keeps being processed meanwhile. See Troubleshooting.
• DAW shortcuts keep working on Windows (v0.1.9). After you click in DECADE's window, keys DECADE doesn't use itself — Space for your DAW's transport, for example — go on to your DAW instead of stopping at the plugin.
• Pro Tools on Windows, and Logic on first install (v0.1.9). DECADE's interface now starts reliably in Pro Tools on Windows, where it could open white. On a Mac, the installer registers the AU so Logic sees DECADE without a restart.
• Meters from the first moment (v0.1.8). In a DAW, DECADE's meters and scopes now move with your track's audio straight away, without playing an audition loop first.
• Stereo stays stereo in Pro Tools (v0.1.8). DECADE no longer offers a stereo-in, mono-out format, so a stereo track or aux can't come out mono by mistake. Stereo, mono, and mono-to-stereo (for a mono drum track you want to widen) are the choices.
• A resize grip in the corner (v0.1.7). Drag the grip at the right end of the bottom strip, beside the version number, to resize the window — the same place as in Pick Pocket and Dr. Fill. It works in every DAW, including the ones that only resize a plugin from its own corner (Ableton Live, Pro Tools). See In your DAW.
• Sign-in activates inside your DAW (v0.1.6). After you sign in in the browser, DECADE finishes activating on its own — even if your DAW hides the plugin window meanwhile, or you close and reopen it. The browser page tells you whether it worked, there's a Cancel sign-in link, and people who bought DECADE on its own can sign in too, no serial to type. See Activation.
• Questions / Comments in the ⋯ menu (v0.1.5), just above the manual. See The ⋯ menu.
• Your DAW's transport wins (v0.1.4). In a DAW, Space goes to your DAW, not to the audition loop, and pressing play in your DAW stops a running audition loop so your track is what goes through DECADE. See In your DAW.
• A calmer standalone (v0.1.2). The standalone app no longer runs your audio interface's input through the rack, so it can't feed back through a laptop mic, and neither the app nor a reopened session starts with the Throw still latched.

1 · What DECADE is

DECADE is a drum effect that answers one question: what would this kit have sounded like in 1958? 1979? 2024? You put your drums through it, pick a year on a map, and the whole rack — EQ, saturation, filtering, compression, transient shaping, room, and the playback format people heard it on — moves to that year at once. Slide across the map and the sound morphs continuously between decades.

Under the map is a real, six-module rack you can open, reorder and override by hand. DECADE sets every knob for you; you take over any of them whenever you want. A Throw pad adds a performance delay you play live, and 120 presets — 100 across the decades and 20 in the Experimental folder — give you places to start.

DECADE runs as an AU, VST3 or AAX plugin in your DAW, as a standalone app, and in the browser inside The Vault, where members can use it on any loop in the library. It's the same instrument everywhere — this guide covers all three, and says so wherever they differ.

2 · Requirements

3 · Installation

These links always give you the newest release — they're safe to bookmark:

Mac

1. Open Decade.pkg and follow the installer. It installs the AU, VST3, AAX and standalone versions; you can deselect any of them on the Installation Type step. The installer is signed and notarized, so macOS won't warn about it.
2. Restart your DAW and rescan plugins if it doesn't pick DECADE up on its own. In Logic, DECADE appears under Audio Units → Yurt Rock → DECADE.
3. Prefer a disk image? Decade.dmg holds the same installer.

Windows

1. Run Decade-Setup.exe. VST3 installs to C:\Program Files\Common Files\VST3\Yurt Rock, AAX to a Yurt Rock folder in the Avid plug-ins folder, and the standalone app to Program Files.
2. If Microsoft's WebView2 runtime is missing, the installer fetches it — DECADE's interface needs it.
3. Rescan in your DAW.

Where the files go

Our plug-ins sit in a Yurt Rock folder (the AU carries a Yurt Rock name) so they never clash with another company's plug-in of the same name; updating moves older installs there automatically, and your saved sessions still find them.

4 · Activation & demo mode

In the plugin and the standalone app, click Demo · Activate in the strip along the bottom of the window (or the Demo mode chip in the header) to open the licence panel. Two ways in:

• Sign in with Yurt Rock. For Vault members and anyone who bought DECADE — no serial to type. A membership includes DECADE; a purchased licence on the same account works too.
• Paste your serial from your purchase email and click Activate. DECADE serials start with DCDE-. The Paste button beside the field reads your clipboard, for DAWs where ⌘V doesn't reach the plugin window.

Signing in

1. Click Sign in with Yurt Rock. Your normal web browser opens the Yurt Rock sign-in page, and the button in DECADE reads Waiting for sign-in….
2. Sign in in the browser. DECADE finishes activating by itself — you don't need to copy anything back. This works even if your DAW hides the plugin window while the browser is in front (Pro Tools does), or if you close the plugin window and open it again before you're done.
3. The browser page tells you how it went: that DECADE is activated and you can close the page, that you signed in but DECADE couldn't activate (return to DECADE — the panel says why), or that sign-in didn't complete.

Changed your mind, or signed in with the wrong account? Cancel sign-in, under the button, stops waiting so you can start again. If you sign in with an account that has neither a membership nor a DECADE licence, the panel says so — check you used the email you bought with.

Machines and staying activated

Activation needs an internet connection, and after that DECADE starts without one — no dongle, no iLok, and nothing is checked when your DAW loads a session. When it's online, DECADE quietly renews its licence in the background from time to time; if a machine stays offline long enough for that to lapse, reconnect it briefly and it carries on. A membership activation needs renewing more often than a purchased licence, and ends if the membership does.

One licence or membership covers three machines. Once activated, the bottom strip reads ✓ Active; click it to see whether you're activated by licence or membership, or to Deactivate this machine and free its slot. You can also free a machine from Your Plug-Ins in your Vault account.

Demo mode

Without a licence DECADE runs fully — every decade, every preset, every control, on your own drums, with no clock running — with two exceptions: the output fades to silence for about a second every 45 seconds, and presets don't save. A Demo mode chip in the header lights up in time with the fade, so you always know that's what you're hearing and not a fault.

Vault members signed in to The Vault, and activated plugins, never hear demo mode. Everyone else can buy DECADE outright for $49 — Buy DECADE in the licence panel opens the product page.

5 · The map

The map is the instrument. Left to right is the year, 1950 to now, in eight decade bands with their own colour. Bottom to top is the room, from tight and dry at the bottom to huge at the top.

• Drag the puck anywhere. The sound follows continuously — there are no steps between decades, the rack interpolates.
• Click a dot to land on a preset. Hover one to see its name.
• Arrow keys nudge: ← → for the year, ↑ ↓ for the room. Home and End jump to 1950 and now.
• The description under the year rewrites itself as you move — it describes what the rack is actually doing at that spot.

6 · The sound card

The left card is what you're hearing right now: the year, its console, and the handful of controls that always matter.

7 · The era card & formats

The right card shows the format the listener would have heard the drums through — the last stage before the output, because it models what happened after the record was finished:

The format follows the decade on its own. Click the format object (or press L) to lock it — keep cassette while you slide the year into the 60s, say. A Locked chip appears; click it or press L again to hand it back to the map.

Open the Format panel at the end of the module list (§10) for all six formats and the five controls every one of them shares:

The map sets all five for you. Touch any of them and the Format locks where you put it, exactly like picking a format by hand; Follow the year hands it back.

8 · The Throw

A delay you play by hand, under the era card. Hold the pad to throw the drums into it and let go to hear the repeats tail out. Left to right is the delay time, synced to the loop's tempo in seven divisions (1/16 · 1/8T · 1/8 · 1/8D · 1/4 · 1/4D · 1/2); bottom to top is feedback.

• Latch keeps the throw open without holding the pad.
• Tone darkens or brightens the repeats; Level sets how loud they come back.
• The delay's character follows the decade: tape echo in the 50s and 60s, bucket-brigade in the 70s and 80s, a digital rack in the 90s and 2000s, granular now. Click the mode name to pin one; it cycles through the four and back to following the map.
• A user preset saved while the Throw is latched keeps it as part of the patch. Loading any preset that doesn't hold the Throw releases it and silences the repeats.

9 · The signal path

The strip across the middle is the rack: six modules, each with one macro knob, in the order the audio passes through them.

• The map sets every knob. Turn one to take it over — a dot appears next to it, and the map stops moving that parameter until you double-click to hand it back.
• Drag a module by its grip to reorder the chain. Order is part of the sound: compressing into the gate, or filtering after the room, are different effects. Reset order returns to the default.
• The power glyph bypasses a module. Input and Output are fixed at the ends; the format is always last.
• Presets that pin an order slide the modules into place when loaded; presets that don't leave your chain alone.

10 · The detail panel

Click any module to open its full controls in the panel below. Most panels also show a live picture of what that module is doing:

Follow the year in the panel's corner hands every parameter in that module back to the map at once. For the whole output at once, choose Show analysis from the ⋯ menu (§17).

11 · Presets

Click the preset name in the header (or press P) for the list: eight decade folders, the Experimental folder, and your own. The ‹ › arrows (and [ ]) step through them in the order the list shows.

• Every factory preset is a point on the map — you'll see them as dots — plus whatever it changes by hand. Moving the puck after loading one keeps its overrides.
• Save (⌘S opens the list with the name field ready) stores your current sound, including chain order, format lock and a latched Throw, in the User folder. User presets can show on the map as well (⋯ menu).
• The Experimental folder is twenty deliberately odd racks — a trap kit cut to a 78, a hall compressed backwards, a phone speaker in a stadium, distortion before the EQ — one for every decade, each built on its own chain order.

12 · A/B, Compare & the dice

• A / B in the header holds two complete settings. A flips between them.
• Compare (the ⇄ button beside A and B) flips between A and B automatically, every bar, while the loop plays — so you can listen with your hands off.
• Bypass (B) in the header passes the dry drums straight through, latency-matched, without touching a setting — the honest way to hear what DECADE is doing. Each module has its own power glyph too (§9).
• The dice (R) rolls somewhere new on the map with a random set of overrides. ⌘Z takes you back if it wasn't the one.

13 · Audition loops

DECADE carries its own loops, in the plugin as well as in The Vault, so you can hear the rack with nothing playing. The play button in the header starts one (Space does too in The Vault; in the plugin and standalone app, Space is left to your DAW — see §14); the dropdown beside it picks it. Every launch opens on one of ten starter loops with a random decade preset, so you never start on a blank page.

• Starter loops — ten from the Vault catalog, listed with the player and the tempo.
• Get more in The Vault opens the catalog, in the plugin as well as in the browser: pack covers, then that pack's loops, or search across both. Vault members — and, in the plugin, any activated install — audition the whole library through DECADE.
• In the browser, whatever is loaded in the bottom player shows up in the menu too.
• Open a file… uses a loop of your own — or drop an audio file straight onto DECADE.

The waveform under the map shows dry against wet. In your DAW, playing the track feeds the same picture and the same meters, so the analysis is about your drums, not the demo loop.

Tempo, in the header of The Vault version, is the play-at tempo. The loop's own tempo is the default and plays untouched; type another (or use ½× / 2×) and the loop is time-stretched with Signalsmith — the same algorithm the plugins use natively — so it holds together without the warble of cheaper stretching. × returns to the loop's own tempo. The Throw's divisions follow the play-at tempo. In the plugin, DECADE syncs to the host tempo automatically and the control reads SYNC (§14).

Export, at the end of the audition strip in The Vault, renders the loop through DECADE exactly as it's set — preset, chain order, format, a latched Throw — to a 24-bit WAV with a two-second tail for the room, or drags it straight into your DAW. It's for Vault members and DECADE owners; everything else is open to everyone. In the plugin there's no export button, because bouncing the track is the export.

14 · In your DAW

Put DECADE on a drum track, a drum bus, a single snare or the whole mix. Everything in this guide works the same there; this is what the plugin adds.

Tempo and transport

DECADE follows the host tempo on its own — the header reads SYNC and the host's bpm, and the Throw's divisions lock to it. Nothing to set.

Your DAW's transport comes first. While an audition loop plays, it takes the place of your track's audio in DECADE — so the moment you press play in your DAW, DECADE stops the loop and your track goes through the rack instead, and the play button in DECADE's header goes back to stopped. Space is left to your DAW's own transport too; an audition loop starts only from DECADE's play button (the same goes for the standalone app). In The Vault, Space still plays and stops the loop.

Automation

Sixteen controls are host parameters, so you can automate them or map a controller with your DAW's own MIDI learn: Year and Room (the map), Mix, Authenticity, Format amount, one macro per module (Tone, Grit, Filter, Squash, Hit, Room), the format amount (listed as Vinyl), and the Throw's time, feedback, hold, tone and level. Throw Hold is the one to put on a controller button or an automation lane — it throws while it's up, exactly like holding the pad. Move a knob in DECADE and the host parameter follows; automate it in the host and the interface follows. Automating Year is the point — a chorus that arrives in 1972 and a verse that sits in 1994 is one automation lane.

Bypass and latency

DECADE reports 6 ms of latency (the format stage) and your DAW compensates for it. The host's own bypass is wired to DECADE's: bypassing from the host passes the latency-matched dry signal, so nothing shifts in time and nothing in your patch changes.

Sessions

The sound saves with your DAW project and comes back with it: where you are on the map, every parameter you took over by hand, the chain order, the format and its lock, and the Throw pad's position — and it takes effect as soon as the session opens, whether or not you open DECADE's window. The Throw itself always comes back released — DECADE never opens already throwing — so re-latch it if the session needs it. Your user presets, skin and window size belong to DECADE on that machine, so they follow you into every session and every DAW.

The window

The plugin window opens at 1200 × 800. To resize it, drag the grip in the bottom-right corner — at the right end of the bottom strip, beside the version number — anywhere from 720 × 480 up to 2880 × 1920; the interface scales to fit whatever size you leave it at. (Hosts that also let you drag the window's own edge, like Logic, work either way.)

The status strip

A thin strip runs along the bottom of the plugin window, outside the design:

• On the left, the licence chip — Demo · Activate until you activate, ✓ Active after. Click it for the licence panel (§4).
• Beside it, the host's tempo and whether the DAW is playing — or play the DAW for host tempo until the host has sent one.
• In the bottom-right corner, the version you're running. When a newer release is out, Update available · v… appears under it; click it to open Your Plug-Ins in your browser, where the new installer is.

Standalone

DECADE also installs as an app you can run without a DAW — the same plugin, playing through your audio interface, which is the quickest way to play with loops on their own. Its sound source is the audition loops and any file you open or drop on it: the standalone deliberately doesn't run your interface's input through the rack, so a laptop mic can never feed back through Grit and Room into your speakers. Choose your output device in its audio settings. To process live audio, use DECADE as a plugin in your DAW.

15 · MIDI learn

Right-click any of these for a MIDI menu: Mix, Authenticity, Vinyl, the map (Year and Room), each module knob, the Throw pad (time, feedback and hold) and its Tone and Level. Press Learn, move a knob or hit a pad on your controller, and they're tied. × clears it; the ⋯ menu clears everything.

• Continuous controls take a CC. The Throw hold takes a note or a CC button — press to throw, release to tail out.
• Program change steps the preset list: PC 0 is the first 1950s preset.
• Mappings are remembered per browser, and MIDI learn is a browser feature. In the plugin, sixteen of these controls are host parameters instead (§14), so map and automate them with your DAW's own MIDI learn.

16 · Keyboard shortcuts

On Windows, read ⌘ as Ctrl. In a DAW, keys DECADE doesn't use itself pass on to your DAW, on Mac and Windows alike.

17 · The ⋯ menu

The ⋯ button at the right of the header opens DECADE's settings and extras:

Skin and window size are remembered on that machine. If DECADE ever detects a sustained tone in its output, an extra item appears — Tone detected · copy report — which copies a technical report to your clipboard to paste to us (§18).

18 · Troubleshooting

The sound drops out for a second every so often.

That's demo mode — the Demo mode chip in the header lights as it happens. Activate with your licence or Vault account (§4).

A knob won't follow the map any more.

You've taken it over — there's a dot beside it. Double-click the knob to hand it back, or use Follow the year in the detail panel for the whole module.

I hear a delay I didn't add.

The Throw is latched — the Latch button is lit — or the preset holds it. Click Latch, or load any preset without a throw.

The format doesn't change when I move the year.

It's locked (the Locked chip). Click it or press L.

MIDI learn says this browser has no Web MIDI.

Safari doesn't support it. Open The Vault in Chrome, Edge or Opera to map a controller.

My DAW doesn't see the plugin.

Rescan plugins (Logic: Plug-in Manager · Ableton: Preferences → Plug-Ins → Rescan · Pro Tools relaunch). On Windows, make sure the VST3 folder you installed to is the one your DAW scans (§3).

The window says DECADE can't draw its interface.

DECADE draws its controls with the web engine built into your system, and here that engine didn't start. Your audio is still being processed — you just can't see the controls. Try again starts the interface afresh, which is often enough. Copy details copies a short technical report (your system, DAW, plugin format and version, and where loading stopped) to paste to us. Get help opens this manual in your browser. If it keeps happening: install any pending system updates (on a Mac, updating Safari updates this engine too), close and reopen the plugin window, and try the standalone DECADE app — if that draws, the problem is specific to the host. Then send us the copied details through Support.

The plugin window is blank or white on Windows.

DECADE's interface runs on Microsoft's WebView2 runtime. The installer adds it, but if the window stays empty, install it from Microsoft's Edge WebView2 page and reopen the plugin. Since v0.1.9, DECADE shows the panel above rather than a plain white window when this happens.

The plugin window is blank on an older Mac.

Update to DECADE v0.1.11 or later — earlier versions couldn't draw on Macs without the Safari 16 update (some macOS 12 Monterey machines).

My DAW's shortcuts stop working after I click in DECADE (Windows).

Update to DECADE v0.1.9 or later: keys DECADE doesn't use itself now go on to your DAW. Keys DECADE does use — Ctrl+Z for its own undo, say — stay with DECADE while its window has focus; click in your DAW to send them there.

I can't find the DECADE files where they used to be.

Since v0.1.12 our plug-ins sit in a Yurt Rock folder, and the AU is named Yurt Rock DECADE.component (§3). The installer removes the older loose copies of ours for you, and your saved sessions still find DECADE.

I signed in, but the plugin still says Waiting for sign-in…

Check the browser page: it says whether DECADE activated, or why not. If you closed the browser before finishing, click Cancel sign-in and start again. If sign-in keeps failing, activate with your serial instead — it's in your purchase email and in Your Plug-Ins.

Sign-in worked, but DECADE says there's no membership or licence.

You signed in with an account that doesn't own DECADE. Cancel, and sign in with the email you bought DECADE (or your Vault membership) with.

DECADE says it can't reach the licence server when I activate.

Activation needs a connection. If your studio machine is usually offline, activate on a connected network; after that DECADE starts without one, and only needs to go online now and then to renew (§4).

I'm out of activations.

A licence covers three machines. Open Your Plug-Ins in your Vault account and release the one you're not using; it's instant and you can do it yourself.

A loop plays over my track, or stops on its own.

In a DAW, an audition loop replaces your track's audio in DECADE while it plays, and it stops the moment your DAW starts playing, so your track comes through (§14). Stop the loop with DECADE's play button if you want to hear the track with the DAW stopped.

The standalone app doesn't hear my microphone or interface input.

That's deliberate — the standalone plays audition loops and files only, to avoid feedback. Use DECADE as a plugin in your DAW to process live input (§14).

The menu shows Tone detected · copy report.

DECADE heard a sustained tone in its output that it doesn't expect. Click it to copy a report, then paste it to us through Questions / Comments (§17) — it helps us track the cause down.

The drums sound out of time with the rest of the session.

They shouldn't — DECADE reports its 6 ms to the host and your DAW compensates. If your DAW has delay compensation switched off, that's the cause; switch it back on.

19 · Specifications

20 · Support

Stuck on something this page doesn't cover? Use Questions / Comments in DECADE's ⋯ menu, which opens our plugin feedback page, reply to your purchase email, or reach us through yurtrock.com — a human reads everything. Mention your DECADE version, from the bottom-right corner of the plugin window.

Downloads and licences live in Your Plug-Ins. The newest installer is always at Decade.pkg (Mac) and Decade-Setup.exe (Windows).