JUGGLE Manual

1 · What JUGGLE is

JUGGLE cuts a loop into slices, lays them out as pads, and plays them back from a sixteen-step sequencer in a new order. Pick a preset and the same loop comes back as a different groove: a Dembow, a Jersey bounce, a drunk swing. Then shape each pad, perform over the top with holds and XY squares, mix it on a sixteen-strip console, and drag the result into your DAW as a WAV.

The whole Vault loop library is inside it. You can also drop in your own loop, or (in the plug-in) record a few bars straight off a track in your session.

JUGGLE comes three ways, with the same controls in each: an effect plug-in (AU, VST3, AAX) that also takes MIDI, a standalone app for Mac and Windows, and a browser version at vault.yurtrock.com/labs/juggle.

2 · Requirements

3 · Installation

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

Mac

1. Open Juggle.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.
2. Restart your DAW and rescan plug-ins if it doesn't find JUGGLE on its own. JUGGLE is an effect that also takes MIDI: in Logic it appears in an audio track's effect slots under Audio Units → Yurt Rock → JUGGLE.

Windows

1. Run Juggle-Setup.exe and follow the installer. It installs the VST3, AAX and standalone versions. The installer is signed, and it adds Microsoft's WebView2 runtime if your PC doesn't have it yet (JUGGLE's window needs it).
2. Restart your DAW and rescan plug-ins if it doesn't find JUGGLE on its own.

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 & what's locked

JUGGLE is fully playable before it's activated: every loop in the Vault, every preset, every control, with no demo mute. What activation unlocks is getting the flip out — Export and drag-to-DAW.

Click Export, or the locked strip at the bottom of the plug-in window (Activate JUGGLE to export), to open the activation panel. Two ways in:

• Enter your serial from your purchase email and click Activate. JUGGLE serials start with JUGL-, and one serial works on up to three computers.
• Sign in with The Vault — Vault members, no serial to type. Your browser opens the sign-in page and JUGGLE finishes activating by itself.

Moving to a new computer? On the old one, open the ⋯ menu at the right of the top bar, choose Licence, then Deactivate this computer. If a serial is already on three computers and you can't reach one of them, free it from Your Plug-Ins in your Vault account and try again.

The browser version

At /labs/juggle, signed-in Vault members can export straight away. Owners activate the browser with the same JUGL- serial (Export → Already bought it? Enter your serial); each browser counts as one activation, and the ● Licensed badge in the status bar reopens the panel to deactivate it.

5 · The window

JUGGLE is one window. The left column holds the Loops and Presets tabs; the middle has the Loop card, the Sequence and, under them, Pads and Perform; the right column has the Ring and Shape. The plug-in adds a drag strip along the bottom.

The top bar

Every edit lands in the history, so undo is always there — and every roll, shake and edit also lands in the Takes strip.

6 · Finding a loop

The Loops tab, top left:

• Search — type to search every loop in the Vault.
• Mix — a fresh random crate of Vault loops each time, a few from each of a dozen releases. ↻ deals a new one.
• ★ — loops you've starred.
• Mine — loops you've dropped in, kept on this computer (or in this browser). × forgets one.
• Surprise me — loads a random Vault loop.
• Drop your own loop — drop a WAV, AIFF or MP3 on the box (or anywhere on the window), or click it to browse.

Click a loop's artwork to audition it; click the row to load it. JUGGLE listens for the transients and cuts the slices.

Browse the Vault

Browse the Vault ↗ opens the full catalog window: every loop by release (with its artwork), by instrument or by artist, a search, and a tempo filter (Any tempo, under 90, 90–110, 110–130, 130+). The Yours side holds your favourite loops and presets and your saved flips. Tap a loop to audition it, Load to chop it.

7 · The Loop card

The loop's name sits at the top with its tempo, length in bars and slice count. Click the name for a menu of every loop in its pack; the ‹ › either side step to the previous or next loop in the pack.

The waveform shows each slice in its pad's colour. Tap a slice to hear it and select its pad.

8 · Sequence

Sixteen steps, one bar of sixteenths, grouped in four beats. Each filled step plays one pad.

On a step

A selected step opens a bar underneath with its Pad, Volume, Chance (100 / 75 / 50 / 25), Stutter (×1–×4), Lock and Clear (⌫).

The Sequence row

9 · Pads

One pad per slice, each in its own colour, with its number, its key and a small waveform. Tap a pad (or press its key) to hear it and select it; drag a pad onto a step to place it. The selected pad is the one empty steps receive and the one Shape edits.

Small tags show what's been done to a pad: its pitch, R reversed, P pump, D drive, F flutter, ··· delay. With 32 slices, the A · 1–16 / B · 17–32 switch picks the bank, and the keys play the bank you're on.

The Ring

Top right: the sixteen steps around a clock face with a sweep hand. Each hit flashes its pad's colour and throws a spoke — short for dark slices, long for airy ones. Swing visibly pushes the off-beats round. Every pass leaves a ring of what actually played, and printed XY moves ride the outside as arcs in their effect's colour.

10 · Presets & takes

JUGGLE has 300 presets: six worlds, five categories each, ten presets per category. A preset is a new groove for whatever loop is loaded — it re-hits the loop's own kick, snare and hat slices (in the Melodic world, its chord stabs) in a written pattern, with its own swing and effects. The same loop and the same preset always give the same flip.

Every preset is level-matched when it loads, so stepping through them compares grooves rather than loudness, and heavy ones don't slam the output limiter. Loading a preset starts playback if it's stopped.

The preset browser

Click the preset name in the top bar. Worlds and their categories are on the left; the category's ten presets on the right, each card showing the rhythm it will play on this loop. Clicking a card loads it and keeps the browser open, so you can audition your way through while the loop plays. Search across all 300, star favourites, Surprise me for a random one, and rename your flip at the bottom. Keys: ↑ ↓ to move, ↵ to load, ← → or Page Up / Page Down for the previous or next category, Esc to close.

The Presets tab

• Favourite presets and My flips — your starred presets and saved flips, one click to load.
• The folders — all thirty categories, each opening to its presets with a rhythm preview.
• Category tiles — tap a colour for a random preset from that category.
• Roll (R) — any of the 300, at random.
• Shake (F) — keeps the shape and re-rolls the surface: a few like-for-like swaps, a stutter, nudged dynamics. The Subtle ↔ Wild slider sets how far a roll strays from the loop as recorded.
• Keep 1 — locks step 1 so rolls leave the downbeat alone.
• More — Rolls (stutter the off-beats), Loosen (ghost a few steps to 75 / 50 % chance), Fill the gaps (Euclidean ghosts of the selected pad), Riser (dark → bright), Front-load (loud → quiet), Rewind (reverse the step order), Original (the loop as recorded).

Takes & Breed

Every roll, shake and edit lands in the Takes strip. Click a take to bring it back — nothing is lost. Star two takes and Breed makes a child of the two most recent starred ones.

11 · Perform & the XY squares

Hold these while the loop plays.

Print to loop / Live only

The switch at the top of Perform decides whether your moves are kept. Print to loop: holds and XY moves are written into the steps they pass while the loop keeps going — printed steps are tagged echo, brake or climb. After a take, Undo take removes it and Keep it dismisses the prompt. Live only: holds are momentary and nothing is kept.

The XY squares

Four squares, each running one effect over the whole mix. Drag the puck while the loop plays; let go and the effect switches off. The menu at the top of a square picks its effect — choosing one that's on another square swaps the two.

The squares start as Filter, Echo, Gate and Swirl. Lock leaves the puck where you let go. With printing on, the puck's path is written into the loop and, hands off, the puck follows the printed path; Clear removes a square's printed moves.

12 · Shape: pad & master

Shape has two tabs: Pad (the selected pad, ‹ › to step through pads) and Master (effects on top of every pad). Hear plays the selected pad; Reset clears the tab's effects.

Pad

Every step that plays this pad hears these settings.

Knobs: drag up or down, double-click to reset.

Master

• Out — a meter of the level after the master effects.
• Basement ↔ Air — master tone: left to drown it, right to thin it.
• Reverse all — every pad backwards.
• Knobs — Compression, Phaser, Pitch and Level; More adds Decay, Filter, Delay, Reverb, Drive, Flutter, Punch and Bitcrush.

13 · Page 2: the Mixer

A console with sixteen strips — one per pad (with 32 slices, pads 17–32 ride the same strips) — a drum bus and the main outs, under a bridge of VU meters (0 VU = −18 dBFS). With Chop off, the whole loop goes straight to the drum bus.

Voicings

Each strip, and the bus, has three voicings. Voice the whole desk sets every strip at once; Learn more explains each.

A strip

Trim (±12 dB) and Drive · HPF and Comp · EQ: HF, LF (±15 dB, at the voicing's frequencies), Mid (±15 dB) with its Freq · three Inserts · Pan · Mute and Solo · the fader.

Click an insert slot to add an effect: FET Comp, Tape, Filter, Crush, Chorus, Delay, Plate or Tilt EQ, each with two controls and a bypass.

Drum bus & Main

The drum bus has its own voicing, Drive, Glue (bus compression in the voicing's character), Low 70 and Air 11k, three bus inserts, mute and fader. Main carries the master effects — the same controls as Shape → Master, so turning one here turns it there — Reverse all, and the main fader, which is also the top bar's Out.

Knobs: drag (Shift for fine), double-click to reset. Faders: double-click for 0 dB. Zero the desk puts every strip back to unity with no inserts. The export includes the mix.

14 · Export & drag to your DAW

The export is a loop, ready to drop on a track:

• 2–4 bars, cut on the bar line. A one-bar groove is printed ×4, a two-bar loop ×2, a 3–4 bar loop once, and anything longer as one pass.
• It loops seamlessly. The delay and reverb tails from the end ring into the start, so it repeats without a click or a gap.
• Everything is in it — the pattern, pad and master effects, printed takes and the mix, at the current tempo (in the plug-in, your session's).

In the plug-in and standalone

The strip along the bottom of the window shows the file. Drag it onto a track in your DAW, or click it (or Export) to save it — the save dialog starts on your Desktop. Files are 24-bit, 44.1 kHz WAV, named after the loop (juggle-<loop>.wav). Until you activate, the strip reads Activate JUGGLE to export; clicking it opens the activation panel.

In the browser

The strip at the bottom says Drag to your DAW: drag it onto your DAW's timeline (Chrome), or click to download. Locked, it offers Buy JUGGLE, Enter serial and Sign in.

15 · In your DAW, MIDI & recording

• An effect that takes MIDI. Put JUGGLE in an effect slot on an audio track. It outputs its own stereo sound in place of the track's; the track's audio is what Rec records. To play pads from MIDI, route a MIDI track to JUGGLE (in Logic, the plug-in's MIDI side-chain menu; in Ableton, the MIDI track's MIDI To).
• Tempo & transport. JUGGLE follows your DAW's tempo and plays in time with its transport and position. With the DAW stopped, JUGGLE's own Play button runs it.
• Sessions. The loop itself and the whole flip — pattern, scenes, effects, mix — are saved with your session, so it plays back even with the window closed.
• Latency. JUGGLE reports a small fixed latency (128 samples) to your DAW, which compensates for it.

MIDI

MIDI notes C1 to D#2 play pads 1 to 16, at the note's velocity, timed to the sample. (Note names follow the convention where middle C is C3; in DAWs that call middle C "C4", that's C2 to D#3.) Play them live or program a part in your DAW.

Record from your DAW

Rec on the Loop card captures audio from your session as the loop. JUGGLE records the track it sits on; to record a different track, route it into JUGGLE's sidechain input instead. The little meter shows when JUGGLE hears it.

1. Pick 1, 2, 4 or 8 bars.
2. Click Rec to arm. Recording starts on the next bar line while your DAW plays.
3. When the last bar ends, the take becomes the loop at the session's tempo and is chopped like any other.

Stopping the transport mid-take drops the partial take (a loop needs its full length) and stays armed for the next play; click again to cancel. The standalone app has no Rec, and never takes in your audio interface's input.

16 · Keyboard

Some DAWs keep keystrokes for themselves; click inside the JUGGLE window first.

17 · Troubleshooting

Export and the drag strip are locked.

That's the only thing activation unlocks. Activate with your JUGL- serial or sign in with The Vault (section 4).

"Already active on its maximum number of computers."

A serial covers three computers. Free one from Your Plug-Ins, then try again.

MIDI notes don't play anything.

JUGGLE answers notes C1 to D#2 only (C2 to D#3 if your DAW calls middle C "C4"), and needs a loop loaded. Check the track's MIDI input reaches JUGGLE.

Rec stays on "Armed".

Recording starts on the next bar line while the DAW is playing — press play. If the meter is flat, JUGGLE isn't hearing a track: route one into its sidechain (or input).

The sequencer and pads are greyed out.

Chop is off on the Loop card, so the whole loop plays through the master effects. Switch it on.

A step won't change when I roll or click it.

It's locked (padlock on the step). Alt-click it, or use Lock in the step bar, to free it. Keep 1 locks step 1.

My performance moves keep coming back.

Print to loop is on, so they were written into the loop. Use Undo take, Clear on an XY square, or Undo — or switch Perform to Live only.

The Vault loops won't load.

Browsing and loading need the internet. Loops already in a session, and your own files, don't.

JUGGLE doesn't show up in my DAW.

It's an effect, so look in an audio track's effect slots, not the instrument list. Rescan plug-ins and restart the DAW. In Logic, check Plug-In Manager for a failed validation and click Reset & Rescan.

The window is blank.

Close and reopen the plug-in window. On Windows, make sure Microsoft's WebView2 runtime is installed (the installer adds it). If it persists, tell us — Questions / Comments, or reply to your purchase email.