And as with all empires, there was decadence. Plug-in chains grew ornate: tape emulators, convolution reverbs with cathedral IRs, granularizers that chewed the output into stardust. Whole subgenres bloomed — Empirewave, Moon-Market Pop — each with its own tattoos and tempo preferences. Festivals added a "TS" stage where acts played only with the VST patched through analog hardware, two-deck improvisations that sounded like rituals. Critics rolled their eyes at first, then quietly admitted that an entire sonic mood had been birthed by a single piece of software.