Show HN: I built a website for sharing drum patterns

wesz | 495 points

This kinda reminds me of Funklet[0] that Jack Stratton (Vulfpeck) + Rob Stenson made a long time ago... A true gem if you're into funk + like midi drums.

[0] - https://goodhertz.com/funklet/

sarreph | a month ago

I would be happy to port some patterns to Glicol (https://glicol.org/)

only suggestion: support https...

chaosprint | a month ago

Please allow triplets! You're missing out big without a basic shuffle! I also second the other comments about ordering. Cymbals on top, snare and toms in middle, bass and other pedals on the bottom. e.g.

   hh |x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-|
   S  |----o-------o---|
   B  |o-------o-o-----|
flakes | a month ago

Nice work! It might be nice to hint to iOS users that they should disable silent mode via the little side toggle if they want to hear anything. Just a quirk of iOS that took me literally years to figure out -- I assumed it just didn't support the Web Audio API and went on with my life.

bqmjjx0kac | a month ago

Very cool! Reminds me a bit of this visualizer I built a few years ago.

https://michaelmior.github.io/rhythm-wheel/

michaelmior | a month ago

This is amazing! Please consider adding PWA support so it can be installed as a mobile app.

It’s super easy, just a manifest.json file to add which you can generate here [0].

Also are you considering adding more drumkits? Or maybe allow a user to set their own samples (stored locally, just for themselves) like you can change the header color in HN.

0: http://pwabuilder.com/

omneity | a month ago

Heres a stand alone android drum machine with some good sounds, dont know if its the patterns are portable. Drum On, tiny apk.

https://f-droid.org/en/packages/se.tube42.drum.android/

metalman | a month ago

Nice site!

One bit of feedback I don’t see mentioned. This may be an iPhone thing, but my experience is that the visuals are about a quarter beat ahead of the audio (at 60 BPM, so about 200-250ms off).

Not a big deal, but definitely enough to make it feel a bit off.

Again, could be just the nature of audio in Safari on iPhone.

jader201 | a month ago

Nice enjoyed playing with it. How long did it take you to write it? I have been involved in a couple of simmilar projects and I was surprised how much It took us, (we used TypeScript) on Next.js

tttym | a month ago

I hate such sites. You open it to play for a minute and hours get lost.

Also, when creating a new variation, a blank pattern is created. It would be cool if I could copy one of previous patterns and modify it instead of recreating it from scratch.

Also, drums seem to not be balanced perfectly - in some patterns, when several sounds are playing simultaneously I cannot hear all of them. Are some drums too loud or is it a problem with me maybe?

codedokode | a month ago

very cool.

i would suggest maybe the instruments vertical order should be reversed. i think it is more usual to have the bass drum at the bottom, thru snare up to hh etc.

i think this maps more like a piano roll with typical midi key/drum assignments.

wigster | a month ago

New stuff!

- Fixed another thing with desync between audio and visual

- Hi-Hat choking - when open and closed hat are placed on the same beat, the open hat is ignored and closed one is played on two channels as shorter note

- You can now hold mouse down to paint pattern

- Clicking on instrument label besides changing some instruments should also play a sound

- Fixed cymbal spelling

- Added clear and delete pattern buttons in "Create" mode

- Ability to paste text (CTRL+V) representation in "Create" mode, it doesn't have to be the full list of instruments, but the pasted pattern should have 16 beats, here is the example:

CH X-X-X-XXX-XXX-XX

SD ---X-XX-----XXX-

BD XX------XX------

AC X-XX--X-X-X-X-X-

wesz | a month ago

I had built something similar (but much less refined) for greek rhythms https://boombox-agw.pages.dev/

spapas82 | a month ago

Anyone here doing rhythm work without sequencers?

I've been noodling with a side project for a couple years trying to figure out how to replicate folk drumming patterns by adding LFOs together and doing beats at the zero crossing. My aim is to create drumming patterns that can flow and evolve. Results are so-so. I cant seem to find much info on other doing this sort of thing.

https://youtu.be/yVlgPoTpL94

_spduchamp | a month ago

This is awesome. I'm no drummer but have always loved percussion in general, so just had a lot of fun playing around.

My only tip would probably be a way to click (right-click since left-click is used?) the abbreviation for each instrument to hear it play once, or when you place a beat have it play that instrument once. The guide for which abbreviation is which instrument is above the fold when actually placing notes, so it's lots of scroll back/forth checking what's what again.

sen | a month ago

I loved xoxo pattern based drum machines as a teen in the early 80s. Was never able to afford a 808 back in the day, but bought a DR110 back then. However I've always been mostly a hard / prog rock guy, so I see 16 beats pattern based drum machines as extremely limiting: no flams, no triplets, no effective rolls, no ghost notes, etc. The day I could buy a R8 was liberating, but in the end nothing beats real drumming on a real drum set.

squarefoot | a month ago

Not the same but reminds me of noisecraft vibes - https://noisecraft.app/532

boguscoder | a month ago

Can't open the link, no https

lasarkolja | a month ago

Great stuff. Feature requests: non-wp login, accents, Bar lines, support for non-4/4, swung meter, search by pattern (e.g. write a kick snare pattern, find beats with same kick snare pattern to e.g. find inspiration for hat patterns)

timoxley | 25 days ago

Don't think it does justice to "when the levee breaks"

Quantizing John Bonham is a sacrilege https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=hT4fFolyZYUDl

331c8c71 | a month ago

So, i've reversed the order of the instruments. Let me know what do you think.

Audio and visual should sync better now, also fixed small issue pointed out by @badmintonbaseba. Creating new variation no longer creates empty pattern, it copies the previous one.

wesz | a month ago

If anybody still looks here i just added song links in the comments. Write in your comment @[comma separated list of patterns] to create song trigger, e.g @[1,1,1,2,3,4,3,4]

wesz | 25 days ago

This is fantastic — simple, fun, and with just the right vibe for exploring ideas quickly. I love how focused it is: no clutter, just straight into the groove.

Do you see this staying as a passion project, or are you considering a business model at some point ?

stosssik | a month ago

I’m not a music producer or drummer (just a beginner guitarist interested in how other music is made) but I think this is great. I noticed a typo when you mouse-over the CY, cymbal is mis-spelled with an extra ‘l’).

Anthony-G | a month ago

There are categories (genres), and I thought if I click on one, it will insert that particular "dot" as such (same colors somehow, or some form of indication or visual feedback of the genre placed).

Pretty cool nevertheless.

johnisgood | a month ago

Nice site, a few things:

1.youre missing the 808 clap!? 2.nice to have: beat one of each bar to be slighly darker than the others.

3.And obviously in true feature creep style: pls implement some random feature i use in my daw

an_aparallel | a month ago

EDIT: nevermind, it's my stupid work proxy blocking the .WAV filetype :(

On both Edge and Chrome on Windows 11 I hear nothing. No "sound" icon in the tab either to indicate that it's muted.

taco_emoji | a month ago

Love this idea and the execution. Would it make sense to make this for synth patches or some other musical idea? I'm wondering if that's something you plan on exploring in the future?

greenwhite | a month ago

I love how half the links in the comments dont work on Safari

tobyhinloopen | a month ago

i love this! i wish i could use both MA and CP at the same time though for a particular beat im making here http://drumpatterns.onether.com/beat-2/

i cant wait for more samples to be added and triplets, had fun doing this on my lunch :) im not really a musician but i live with 2 producers so playing with them rubs off on me

motes | a month ago

Nice work left a few patterns under the cloudseer moniker

pacifika | a month ago

Please please work with hydrogen to provide premade drum patterns. It’s a great sequencer but no one has any premade patterns for it

grepfru_it | a month ago

This is useful, I think this will help me actually learn drum stuff for my electronic music production that I'm learning now.

ElijahLynn | a month ago

This is beautiful, thank you for creating and sharing.

I like the colors and interface for making a beat especially, great ergonomics.

james_marks | a month ago

This is cool–can you make it so the closed hat chokes the hi hat closed? I really like that feature in drum machines!

dbalatero | a month ago

Awesome! Some filters in the list views would be nice, and a way to change the playback BPM, samples etc. Keep goin!

albinekb | a month ago

I've tried unsuccessfully to get Rebirth running (on either Windows or Wine). Any modern re-implementations?

askvictor | a month ago

Very cool, and great selection of tracks.

It would help a lot if a track had breaks and fills as well as the main rhythm.

throwaway2562 | a month ago

Great stuff! You're missing a few bass drum notes in "When the levee breaks"

cdiamand | a month ago

Very nice. I'd suggest adding a metronome option, so that we know where the 1 is.

bbx | a month ago

Hi! Great work! Could you add support for other amounts of measures such as 3/4?

FranchuFranchu | a month ago

Great work and nice site. Add generic midi so patterns can be mapped to any voice!

desertmonad | a month ago

Love this. Bookmarked - going to import some of the patterns into Ableton later.

IAmGraydon | a month ago

Really cool! Bookmarked for inspiration when programming drums

OhHiMarkos | a month ago

bug: when playing back an Nx16 pattern, and switching, then when rolling to the next pattern the very first beat is played from the previously played pattern instead of the current one.

badmintonbaseba | a month ago

Very cool! Similar to the drum sequencer at drumloopai.com

fryingneurons | a month ago

Great work; focus down on the patterns, no distractions. Nice!

rossjudson | a month ago

Doesn't work on FF on iPhone. Very nice otherwise!

frantzmiccoli | a month ago

Change your favicon, at least make that a dot.

todotask | a month ago

Nice! Gonna try some of these on my TR8S

tacker2000 | a month ago

This is great, thanks for sharing.

rajangdavis | a month ago

This is very cool and fun

andrewrn | a month ago

hi, would it be possible to parametrize the length of the loop ?

aamorel25 | a month ago

this is really creative! would be fun to train on

captradeoff | a month ago

Really nice work!

mattjhall | a month ago

I really like it!

blackdorn | a month ago

this is super cool

badmonster | 24 days ago

iPhone + Firefox, can't hear anything, moving along, sorry ...

taikahessu | a month ago

Is everything based on a division of the measure into 16 equally spaced beats?

There is so much more to rhythm.

Like, for starters, oh, triplet eighths?

They come up often, and with them, you can have a heavy form of swing (triple 8 swing).

Oh, never mind, I see this is geared toward a piece of drum machine hardware from 1980.

kazinator | a month ago

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4wayfreedom | a month ago

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4wayfreedom | a month ago

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ProfessorPixels | a month ago

[dead]

fatih-erikli-cg | a month ago