UPDATED DECEMBER 2023: I just updated this guide to include some new kits and sounds, and to take off the Machine Drum samples which are no longer available..
We all want the best free drum machine samples from the classics like the 808, but then we also want them sounding different to everyone else’s ! So I thought I’d share my favourite ones here, as there are a ton out there, but where possible with a focus on a different recording technique that makes them stand out.
See also: Studio Brootle 909 Sample Pack, Free Techno Kick Sample Pack, our free 808 Drum Kit. And our Best Free Ableton Packs guide.
Here’s a rundown of the best free drum machine samples:
- Boss DR660 kit from Legowelt
- The Goldbaby DMX606
- Roland R-8 from Boxed Ear
- The Goldbaby Tape606
- The Goldbaby Cassette808
- Krikor’s Ableton packs
- Abletons Live’s Drum Machines
- SampleRadar: 275 free retro drum machine samples
- Samples From Mars Free Kits
Machinedrum Samples from Inner Portal- The Reverb.com ‘complete collection’
Full info on these follow below.
First off, we have a ton of free drum samples, please give them a look…
- Studio Brootle 909 Sample Pack
- Studio Brootle 808 Sample Pack
- Brootle LinnDrum
- Brootle RZ1
- Studio Brootle 606 Sample Pack
You can find all our free drum samples here.
YOU CAN FIND OUR ABLETON RACKS AND SAMPLE PACKS ON OUR SHOPIFY NOW… GET 60% OFF WITH CODE ‘SBCOM60STWD‘ OR CLICK –> HERE.
Boss DR660 kit from Legowelt
You can get the BOSS DR660 kit from Legowelt’s sample page. The DR660 is a classic drum machine but often overlooked today – it was used on countless ghetto house tracks and you can hear it across the Dance Mania back catalogue. You could almost write a whole track on it with it’s bass samples (and that barking dog – you know the one!), it sounds great straight out the box, but especially overdriven into the mixer. Here the legend Danny Wolfers samples his own. Also check out the other samples on the page from his synths, it’s an excellent resource.
The Goldbaby 808 and 606 samples
Get the free Goldbaby samples here.
One of the best sample creation studios for percussion is Gold Baby. The New Zealand based studio is giving away some free samples too…
The ones I recommend the most are:
The Tape606 – the brilliant Roland acid house beat box run through tape for some really nice warm distortion.
The Cassette808 – Godlbaby’s 808 recorded to tape for tape driven 808s.
The Goldbaby DMX606– the 606 sampled into the Oberheim DMX. The DMX is a great Linn Drum-ish machine with digital samples. But it is also possible to load your own samples into it (via a long winded process tbh!). In this kit Goldbaby have burnt their own 606 samples onto the DMX’s EPROMS to make a downsampled and crunchy 606 kit. Sounds amazing, it is probably my favourite of all the packs here.
Be sure to check out their other stuff like “Xmas22 Digital Drums” which samples the amazing LXR-02.
Free Roland R-8 pack
You can get Boxed Ear’s Roland R-8 here
The Roland R-8 is a legendary drum machine used by Aphex Twin and Autechre. And has been used on countless Warp Records releases including the early Sheffield bleep tracks. This is a great free kit.
Also get the Vertice analog filterbank pack which is free and features various drums mangled with the feedback and filtering of the fitlerbank.
Krikor’s Ableton packs
Get Krikor’s Ableton packs here
Krikor is a much respected Parisian producer who has releases on Ron Morelli’s highly coveted Long Island Electrical Systems.
There are a few Ableton packs in the article linked above (even if you don’t have Ableton you can mine the samples :). The main pack in the article is a LinnDrum based pack – however the samples are not recorded out of the LinnDrum directly. Krikor has a modified Casio RZ-1 drum machine that has custom samples loaded on to it’s Eproms. Which give the LinnDrum samples some crunch from the 8-bit sampling of the RZ1. This sounds immense to me!
Also the article links to his TR-808, TR-606 and DR-110 packs. Which all come with their own lo-fi effects racks that give his samples a speaker destroying rawness you would expect from a L.I.E.S. artist.
It is well worth getting all 4 of these Ableton packs if you use Live.
SampleRadar: 275 free retro drum machine samples
Sample Radar “shine a light on some lesser-known drum machines” it’s a good collection of rarer and vintage drum machine samples. It sounds great, I use it myself.
Samples From Mars Free Kits
Samples From Mars specialize in selling drum sample packs, but they also offer some smaller free packs. Try the 808 and 101 Drums downlaods.
Classic Drum Machines For Ableton Live
Download here: Drum Machines.
Ableton Live have a big selection of classic drum sounds, all available as Drum Racks. Including all the big Roland X0X samples: 606, 707, 808, 909. Plus other vintage drum machine samples like the LinnDrum, Oberheim DMX, Sequential Circuits Drumtraks and more.
Machine Drum Sample Packs
(note: these are no longer available – if you know of a good machine drum pack, please let us know!)
The Elektron Machinedrum is a modern classic. Used on so many records. Inner Portal have recorded theirs and made it available for free.
Also worth sharing is Autechre’s, as it is amazing (although it is not technically a sample pack)… above is a link to Autechre’s 2008 tour back files for their Elektron Monomachine and Machinedrum. This a god-send to anyone who’s a fan of that era and that sound (which is pretty much everyone tbh!). While this is not strictly a sample pack it is a sysex dump for use with a Machinedrum – get one second hand off ebay and get involved!
Loads of classic drum machine samples
And last but not least there is a mega-resource for classic drum machine samples on Reverb here. A big collection of classic, dry drum machine samples, more than you could ever need!
Hope you found this useful 🙂 Please let us know any feedback or more samples that you recommend.
For more articles like this see: Best free VSTs for techno, and Free techno kick sample pack.
Before You Go…
- Get on the email list for free kick drum samples every week, plus you get all the past ones as soon as you subscribe: you can do that HERE.
- You can find our paid packs at our Shopify store HERE ( use this code for 60% off anything or everything: SBCOM60STWD ) .
- Follow us on Youtube for hardware workouts and Ableton tutorials… Studio Brootle Youtube.
- If you’re looking for 1 to 1 online Ableton lessons get in contact to get the most out of your studio time, email: studiobrootle@gmail.com.