Dubstep Drum Patterns

Welcome to our guide to dubstep drum patterns with free Ableton file to download. I’m a big fan of artists like Kode9, Mala, Loefah et al. Here’s my guide to a few dubstep patterns you can use a a starting point for your own tracks, with full step by step instructions on how to make them from scratch.

I’m a big fan of the early UK sound with huge subs, sparse half-time steppy beats with double up percussive rushes with delayed and reverbed percussion.

Here’s a preview of one of the beats we’re making:

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What Is Dubstep?

Dubstep grew out of the burning embers of the UK garage scene, and came back with a new, stripped back, dub influenced offspring with sparse half time drums, huge subs and dub-delay and reverbed echo chains.

What BPM Is Dubstep?

1400bpm is default for dubstep.

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Ableton Drum Patterns Download

You can get the file used for all these drum patterns by entering your email here and it’ll be sent out automatically and immediately. It includes all the midi clips and Drum Rack and effects settings for Ableton 12:

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Tips For Programming Dubstep Drum Patterns

Here’s some tips for programming dubstep drum patterns:

• Go for a 70bpm beat but use a 140bpm grid so it is half time. But occasional quick successive drum hits at 140bpm give it that rushing feel.
• Leave plenty of space in the drum programming – keep it sparse.
• Use delay and reverb to create the feeling of space.
• It is a half time beat so you want a kick on 1 and snare on 3 at 70bpm with the hats at 140bpm. Keep it minimal.
• Like drum n bass, you want a 2 bar loop where the second bar is a variation of the first.
• Add fills towards the end of the second bar for a rushing double up feel.

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Dubstep Drum Patterns

In these three dubstep beats I’ll be using the same drum kit for every loop which comprises of an 808 kick, an 808 snare, and a 707 snare (it’s a good idea to have 2 or more different snares in dubstep so you can process them differently), an 808 maraca (for that shaker sound), an 808 closed hat, an 808 open hat and a rim shot.

These are all from my own free 808 and 707 sample packs which are a little bit distorted and saturated already as they were recorded through a desk.

I’m keeping it minimal and not adding loads of different drum sounds because you don’t need to overcomplicate things you can make a really good dubstep beat with two snares a kick and some hats.

As far as the processing goes I have added an echo unit and a reverb together as one send, for a big dub effect… The echo unit has a 2/16th note delay on it which is really good in dubstep as it has a rhythmic delay that accentuates the halftime beat. You especially want to use it on the snares. I have given them a little bit of error: the left and right channels are off a bit which is what you would have in a dub studio if you were using a real tape echo. Then there’s a reverb with quite a big decay (over 5 seconds).

I send nearly all the drums to this send but I do it in different amounts. The 707 snare is sent to it the most so I have a huge big snare whenever I want to use it, on top of the 808 one.

The kick has an overdrive unit on it to give it some nice harmonic distortion.

The maracas have their own processing in the channel as well: an echo unit which is a 3/16th note delay and an overdrive unit after the delay to bring out the effects chain.

After the drum rack there is a drum bus with only 16% wet/dry, just to add a tiny little bit of saturation. It will bring out the delays and reverbs.

You can see all the processing in the file in the free downloads section below.

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Dubstep Drum Pattern 1

The first pattern is really simple, it is just a closed hat, a snare and a kick and one open hat. It just goes to show how a simple pattern can be really effective. It is a halftime beat, at about 145 bpm so the kick pattern is like a 72.5 bpm, almost a hip hop beat, and then the high hats double up at the end of the bar to suddenly convert it into a double time pattern.

You can see the midi drum pattern below we used, for a dubstep pattern like this I’ve used a 2 bar loop with the second bar similar to the first but with a slight variation and double speed hats at the end of the bar:

I processed the kick with Overdrive to bring it out in the mix:

Here’s the Echo and Reverb sends as well as the Drum Buss processing.0

The processing is important – the reverb and delay give the beat a lot of feeling.

You can get this file in the Downloads section and use it as a starting point for your tracks.

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The Studio Brootle Packs

Download our free and paid Ableton racks and sample packs here:

See also: Studio Brootle Dub Techno Chord Rack, Ableton Operator Sub Bass Rack, Techno Tom Sub Bass Ableton Rack.

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Dubstep Drum Pattern 2 – Swung

This dubstep beat has loads of shuffle – like UK Garage – to give it that skippy and funky feel.
I have used the groove ‘Swing 16ths 64’ and set the Timing right up to 75%.

Because of the shuffle, wherever you have two notes next to each other they will feel really skippy as they’ll be unnaturally closer to each other, so I used a double up rim shot at the end of the bar to exaggerate this, they work with the closed hats to give a really skippy feel as one comes after the other quickly. The same happens with the closed hats whenever there’s two next to each other it will give a really skippy feel.

Other than that this is a fairly simple beat but I’ve added in that massive 707 snare that is sent to loads of reverb and echo to really punctuate every other snare.

And there’s a couple of sparse open hats and a couple of rim shots. The funk is in the simplicity, you want plenty of space in the groove and then just let the skippy hi hats do their work in creating that funky feel.

Here’s the drum pattern:

It has a lot of swing, here’s the settings:

The effects are set up as per the setting below:

You can get the Ableton file for this in the Downloads section.

Buy our packs at our Shopify store, use this code for 60% off: SBCOM60STWD

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Dubstep Drum Pattern 3 – triplet

Here I’ve used triplet rhythms which are really popular in trap. They are achieved by using a triplet grid and it gives a really sort of winding feel to to the beats.
You can right-click and change the grid to ‘Triplet Grid’, and you’ll get a grid of 24 instead of 16. You want to make most of your beats on the normal grid and then make a few hi hats and drums roll on the triplet grid. It gives it this sort of weird glitchy feel.

At the end of the bar I switch to the triplet grid and add some little hat rolls. I add them in while the beat is playing to hear what sounds good.

Here’s the drum pattern for the dubstep triplet pattern:

And here’s the effects send and drum rack for this loop:

The key for beats like this is to keep it minimal and only make a few notes on the triplet grid, and towards the end of the bar.

You can get the Ableton file for this in the Downloads section.

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Dubstep Drum Pattern Video:

Here’s a video tutorial and run down of the rack on our Youtube channel….

(video coming soon)

Please subscribe to the youtube if you haven’t yet: youtube.com/@studiobrootle 

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