10K Audio’s Gyro is a plugin like no otherPlay edition £10 / Pro edition £129, 10k.audio
Gyro is a unique instrument that’s tricky to describe but easy to use. The best way I can sum it up is that Gyro is to melodic loops what a drum machine or sampler is to rhythmic loops. You can define the sounds, the rhythms, the chords and the harmonies of the loops you create. More importantly, and mirroring a good drum machine, Gyro makes all of this performable and jammable. The way it does this is elegant and rather clever – allow me to explain…

What is Gyro?
Gyro deconstructs melodic loops into a simple set of elements: the rhythmical pattern, the harmonic content, and the sounds used for each voice in the loop. It then presents each of these elements in different sections of the plugin window: Pattern lets you work with the timing of notes, Chord is where you establish the chords that will drive a loop’s harmonies, and the Sound section determines the sounds that will be heard. In addition, there’s an Effect page for adding audio enhancement, and a Mod section for creating variations in the sounds and patterns of a loop.

How does Gyro separate rhythm and harmony?
Gyro comes with a vast and musically diverse collection of presets and, thanks to the plugin’s main Perform view, you can go a long way without needing to delve any deeper. This also means you can enjoy more of Gyro’s mesmerising visualisation in which each sound source creates splashes of spreading fluid colour that merge and interact. But when you delve deeper, opening the detailed views for each section of the plugin, you start to see how intertwined – and downright clever – Gyro is.
Gyro presets contain a Chord Set of up to 14 chords, although this can be changed by loading another set from the included library, or by inputting your own chords. Chords can contain up to six notes, and can be defined via a set of six dial-in fields or by enabling the Chord view’s Record mode and playing some keys on a keyboard controller. Gyro works out the name of the chord but this isn’t foolproof because it always assumes the first note in the chord is also the root note, so make sure to hit the chord’s root note first if you want an accurate chord name.
The chords within a set are assigned to the white keys of a keyboard, starting from C3, and to a strip of buttons arrayed across the bottom of the plugin window. Pressing one of these keys/buttons starts Gyro playback, with the selected chord interacting with the Pattern section to create the loop you hear.
Patterns consist of four channels, each driving one of Gyro’s sound sources (which I’ll come to in a moment). A Gyro preset can contain four patterns, each up to two bars long and offering swing, direction and loop mode options. Switching between patterns is simply a case of clicking a button in the plugin interface or playing white keys C2 to F2 on a controller.
The plugin comes with a large library of patterns to load and edit as needed, or you can create new patterns from scratch via a familiar grid-style editor. However, the grid consists of only six lanes, one for each note of the currently selected/playing chord, and this is how Gyro separates a loop’s rhythm from its pitch and harmony. Clever stuff.
Pattern View. Image: Press
What sounds does Gyro play?
As mentioned, each channel in a pattern drives its own sound source, these being a set of four sample-based synths. While not on a par with synths like Serum and Pigments, Gyro’s synths are reasonably versatile, with a choice between multisample or wavetable mode, a pleasing filter, separate amplitude and filter envelopes, and a dedicated LFO.
Gyro comes with hundreds of well-crafted multisamples and wavetables to use here, not to mention hundreds of sound presets built from them. At the time of writing, there’s no way of importing custom samples/wavetables but, as a result of user feedback, 10K is busily developing this ability to include in a future update.
Alongside the four pattern-driven synths is an additional Drone sound source. This uses the same synth engine as the other sources, but is limited to working with one of 17 included noise recordings that simply loop whenever Gyro is playing.
All sound sources have their own level and pan settings, along with basic EQ, chorus and compressor processors, and individual sends to the plugin’s global delay and reverb effects. These are configured from the plugin’s Effect view, and although quite simple, they sound nice and offer a choice of different models.
The Effect section also houses controls for the plugin’s five insert effects: Half-Time, Multiband Compressor, Tape, Gate and Limiter. The first of these can be enabled individually for each of the sound sources and for both send effects, and allows a filtered, half-time version of those chosen sources to be blended with the overall at-tempo mix, resulting in rather cool effects.
The remaining insert effects work on the entire mix, and their function is self-explanatory. Notable, though, is the multiband compressor. This makes a loop sound like it’s been lifted from a mastered recording, and it also does overdrive and distortion well. I do, however, find that it can make Gryo’s output overloud and undynamic, so it should be used with caution (and thank goodness for the built-in limiter!).
Effect View. Image: Press
Modulation and randomisation in Gyro
The LFOs found in each sound-source/synth can only control parameters within that source, but Gyro also includes three global LFOs. Two of these produce conventional waveforms, and the third allows custom shapes to be drawn, making it perfect for creating rhythmic and ducking effects. These global modulators can be routed to pretty much any Gyro parameter, as can mod and pitch wheels and a global macro controller.
Configuring the modulation routing isn’t quite as slick as the systems seen in many modern synths, but it’s easy enough. More to the point, being able to create synchronised modulations of this sort in a musical loop is a far cry from what can be achieved with audio loops.
For those who enjoy hunting for happy accidents, Gyro has extensive randomisation options. At the basic level, this allows you to load random presets – full Gyro presets, or chord sets, or sound presets etc — but it goes deeper. Each sound source can be fully randomised, for example, as can patterns, and I particularly like how there are different pattern algorithms to choose from to create different types of pattern – a bassline or an arpeggio, for example. Basically, every hexagon you see in Gyro’s interface is a randomisation button and – somehow – every click on a hexagon creates a new, original loop that invariably sounds good and has the potential to inspire a whole new musical idea.
Sound View. Image: Press
Should you buy 10K Gyro?
Fundamentally, Gyro isn’t doing anything that can’t be done by hand in a DAW. But what makes it special is how well it streamlines the process of creating musical loops, and how much real-time performance control it allows over those loops.
There’s room for improvement – longer loops for one thing, and the ability to change the key ranges that trigger chords and select patterns for another.
But, overall, the balance weighs heavily in Gyro’s favour because, rather than forcing you to shape your ideas to fit your loops, it means you can easily shape your loops to fit your music.
Chord View. Image: Press
Key features

Plugin instrument for VST3 and AU compatible hosts
Runs on macOS 13.4+ (Apple Silicon or Intel) and Windows 10+
Over 1500 presets (including pattern presets, sound presets, chord sets, etc.)
Content created with Gyro is royalty free* and yours forever (*certain caveats apply – see 10K’s FAQ page)

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