Acid house drum pattern

130 BPM · 52% swing · 16 steps · MM-RYTM

Acid house came out of Chicago in the late 1980s, when producers ran a TB-303 bass line over a drum machine. The drums stay simple on purpose: they leave room for the squelch of the bass.

The pattern

Acid house drum pattern at 130 BPM, 16 steps. Each number is the velocity of the step, 9 the loudest and 3 a ghost note; an empty cell is a rest.

Voice	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	11	12	13	14	15	16
Kick (BD)	9				9				9				9
Snare (SD)														3		4
Closed hat (CH)	7	4		8	7	4		8	7	4		8	7	4		8
Open hat (OH)			8				8				8				8
Clap (CP)					8								8

The sounds in MM-RYTM: kick Carassi, snare Psy 12, hats 909, clap 909.

Why it works

The kick lands on every beat and the clap doubles the backbeat on 2 and 4. The closed hat plays all sixteen steps with an accent just before each beat (7, 4, 0, 8), the open hat sits on every off-beat, and two ghost snares on steps 14 and 16 pull the loop back to the top. 52% swing and a short reverb on the clap keep it raw.

Two variations

Drop the clap for three bars and bring it back on the fourth: the bass line carries the groove on its own.
Move the open hat one step later (steps 4, 8, 12 and 16) for a looser, shuffled ride.

Program it on any drum machine

Set the tempo to 130 BPM and the swing to 52% (50% is straight).
Program one voice at a time from the grid, starting with the kick, then the snare and clap, then the hats.
Use the numbers as velocities: on a machine with only accents, accent the 8s and 9s and leave the 3s and 4s as soft notes.
Or skip all that: open the beat below in MM-RYTM, every step, sound and effect is already set.

Play it, download it

General MIDI drum notes: kick 36, snare 38, clap 39, closed hat 42, open hat 46, low tom 45, high tom 50, cymbal 49. One bar, swing included.

Change it, then press SHARE in the header of MM-STUDIO: you get a link to your own version.

From Maudite Machine

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