Captain Pikant

Radiohead - Videotape (Scotch Mist Version, Drum Pattern No. 146)

This is my drum pattern transcription in the style of "Radiohead - Videotape" as performed by Jonny Greenwood in their Scotch Mist version with a Roland TR-909. This is actually a nice opportunity to practice a live performance with your drum machine including modulation, variation and building up and tearing down layers. Just fire off a loop with the chords and have a go :)

The transcription features lots of building blocks with the variations in chronological order as they are introdu...

Radiohead - Burn the Witch (Drum Pattern No. 145)

This is my drum pattern transcription in the style of "Radiohead - Burn the Witch". It sounds to me like the drum track was made on an Elektron Analog Rytm, so I had a go at the pattern on my Syntakt which has some of the same sound engines. If you're into stop motion then be sure to take a look at the music video below :)

By the way we also recently updated our transcription of Radiohead's "The Nu...

Cliff Richard & The Shadows - Do You Wanna Dance Intro (Drum Pattern No. 144)

This is my drum pattern transcription in the style of the intro for "Cliff Richard & The Shadows - Do You Wanna Dance" as shown in the "Frankenstein It" segment of our 7 Drum Secrets video. According to Karl Bartos this beat was the inspiration for Kraftwerk's "Numbers".

Difficulty rating: 🐇
Listen to the original 🎧 2025-02-15 09:58:16 +0000 UTC View Post

Captain Sky - Super Sporm Break (Drum Pattern No. 143)

This is my drum pattern transcription in the style of the break part in "Captain Sky - Super Sporm". It's one of the two puzzle pieces used in the "Frankenstein It" segment of our 7 Drum Secrets video.

Difficulty rating: 🐇
Listen to the original 🎧

7 Drum Secrets

Our newest episode - hot from the oven onto your plate :) Everytime we discover a neat idea or an interesting trick while transcribing drum patterns, we throw it on our pile of notes. And for this video we decided to take a deep dive into our collection, presenting you with seven of our favourites, sourced from 20 different songs. We hope this gives you some ideas and motivation for your own beats and also some appreciation for the beats featured in the video.

Also: For the first time w...

Status Update

Hello everyone! The new video is in the oven and almost done :) Today we finished filming the final scenes and now we're moving on to post-production and mixing. This episode is not going to be about one particular artist or drum machine, it's more of an inspirational video showcasing some very interesting tips and tricks we've collected over the years. More fuel for any New Year's resolutions about trying new things with your drum tracks :)

All the best
Captain Pikant & The Inte...

Kraftwerk - Numbers (Drum Pattern No. 142)

This is my drum pattern transcription in the style of "Kraftwerk - Numbers". This influential classic didn't make it into our Kraftwerk episode, but it might make an appearance in an upcoming video ;)

Difficulty rating: 🐇
Listen to the original 🎧

Radiohead - Myxomatosis (Drum Pattern No. 141)

This is my drum pattern transcription in the style of "Radiohead - Myxomatosis". One hell of a rhythm - it's in 4/4 but it has a very polyrhythmic feeling. We had to google what "Myxomatosis" means though. Can't recommend. Especially not for Beatbunnies. We took the risk anyway and made an 808 version out of it :)

Difficulty rating: 🐇🐇
Listen to the original 🎧

Sir Mix-A-Lot - Posse On Broadway (Drum Pattern No. 140)

This is my drum pattern transcription in the style of "Sir Mix-A-Lot - Posse On Broadway". This 808 classic was one of the most requested tracks in the comments of our 808 history video :)

Difficulty rating: 🐇
Listen to the original 🎧

hubbabubbaklubb - Mopedbart (Drum Pattern No. 139)

This is my drum pattern transcription in the style of "hubbabubbaklubb - Mopedbart". Thanks to Steven Andrews for recommending the track! This funky Scandinavian synth tune is definitely worth a listen. The drum pattern has varying levels of swing - even inside of a single pattern (which can be done with microtiming). Be sure to check out the video as well ;)

Difficulty rating: 🐇🐇🐇 (and a half)
Listen to the or...

Captain Pikant Recap 2024

Hello everyone! We hope you're all enjoying the last hours of 2024 :) We're currently preparing the new episode for January and we're already pretty excited for next year. We've got a few things planned, but if you happen to have any ideas we're always open to suggestions :)

Things we crossed off our list in 2024:

• Thanks to you we've been able to put quality over quantity again and devote more time to making exactly the videos we want to make ❤️

• Rebuilt ...

  2024-12-31 10:48:20 +0000 UTC View Post

Portishead - Roads (Drum Pattern No. 138)

This is my drum pattern transcription in the style of "Portishead - Roads". This trip hop classic got suggested by a few people :) It's just one bar but we made three versions for you: An easy to program quantized version that approximates the human timing with swing, a medium version with additional Hi-Hat dynamics and a hard version that tries to capture the rhythm of the human drummer with microtiming.

Difficulty rating: 🐇🐇-🐇🐇🐇🐇 (choose your own adventure)
2024-12-27 15:02:45 +0000 UTC View Post

Róisín Murphy - Overpowered (Drum Pattern No. 137)

This is my drum pattern transcription in the style of "Róisín Murphy - Overpowered" as heard in our Short History of the 303 video. This one truly deserves the one bunny difficulty rating ;) But it's a great minimal pattern with a souped-up CR-78 sound that surprisingly carries on through the entire song. The 303 pattern doesn't change either, but the knob modulation and the rest of the composition keep it interesting.

The Pump Panel - Confusion (Reconstruction Mix) (Drum Pattern No. 136)

This is my drum pattern transcription in the style of "The Pump Panel - Confusion (Reconstruction Mix)" as heard in our Short History of the 303 video. What better way to start the day than a 303, 808, 909, lots of distortion and blood sprinklers.

Difficulty rating: 🐇
Listen to the original 🎧

A Short History of the 303

Our new video is finally out! If you followed our recent drum pattern and Cheat Sheet releases this might not come as a surprise to you ;) This is the next entry in our little "Short History" series - but it's not about a drum machine this time. Instead we treat you with our favourite basslines from one of the world's most iconic mono synths. And the best thing: All of the 303 transcriptions are already included in the video :)

Our past few months have been filled ...

DinSync RE-303 Cheat Sheet

We currently have a DinSync RE-303 in our studio so we made a Cheat Sheet for it :) It is of course very similar to that of the TD-3 (which we also updated today), but there are enough differences that warrant a separate Cheat Sheet. If you're interested here's an overview of their key differences regarding features and operation:

• While reviewing note pitches the TD-3 can replace pitches and also wedg...

  2024-11-28 15:05:42 +0000 UTC View Post

Josh Wink - Higher State Of Consciousness (Drum Pattern No. 135)

Update 2025/01/20: Added BPM

This is my drum pattern transcription in the style of "Josh Wink - Higher State Of Consciousness". A true 90s Acid House / Rave classic with a few tricks up its sleeve like Microtiming on a single step and Hi-Hats that don't choke each other. There are non-909 sounds in the original, but we went all in and limited ourselves to the beloved beige box (OK and a 727 Tambourine, but that doesn't really count). We included a one minute sound example so yo...

Status Update

Never a dull moment. This week a heavy wall-mounted shelf in our studio crashed down, dragging lots of stuff including the entire camera and light setup down with it. It didn't happen while we were filming, so at least the painted background and the machines were safely stowed away. But the sight of our entire workspace being buried underneath fallen objects and debris from the wall wasn't exactly thrilling...

After clearing the dust and checking for casualties it appears that the only ...

Phuture - Acid Tracks (Drum Pattern No. 134)

This is my drum pattern transcription in the style of "Phuture - Acid Tracks". It is widely regarded as the track from which the entire "Acid House" genre took its name. On drums it features a 707 with latin percussion support coming from the 727. Just add a 303 🙂

Difficulty rating: 🐇🐇
Listen to the original 🎧

Roy of the Ravers - Emotinium (Drum Pattern No. 133)

This is my drum pattern transcription in the style of "Roy of the Ravers - Emotinium". It's one of the songs that will make an appearance in our next video ;)

The drum track consists of a very classic 606/707/727 combo. I believe the Agogo might actually be from the Yamaha RX-120 drum machine though (which you might remember from the "Adamski - Killer" segment of our 909 video). It seems like a perfect match...

acidlab Bassline 3 Cheat Sheet

Apparently you can never have enough 303s and this is the most recent newcomer in our studio. We won't make a review, but I'm very happy with the purchase and it might make an appearance or two in an upcoming video ;) It sounds pretty much like a 303 should but with a more user-friendly sequencer. Let us know if you have any questions on the machine :)

If anything in the Cheat Sheet should be unclear, if you find an error or you feel like something is missing just drop us a line - eithe...

Drum Machine 101 - The Book (October Update)

Hello everyone! While we're still very busy working on the upcoming video I took some time off to write the next chapter of our Drum Machine 101 book. It's about microtiming or step nudging - one of the most underappreciated tools available on many drum machines. You can use it for a wide range of purposes from humanizing to dynamic pattern scale hopping and even selective swing.

If anything should be unclear, if you find an error or you feel like something is missing just drop us a lin...

Captain Pikant Korg Monologue Presets

Hello everyone! A few of you asked about how we made certain sounds on the Korg Monologue so we thought we'd make a tiny preset pack with the various sounds we created for our videos. You can load the presets onto your Monologue with the Monologue Sound Librarian (that app also requires the Korg USB Driver).

• Da Funk 4
  https://youtu.be/2OtzVcNUyIo?t=220
  The classic MS-20 lead ad...

  2024-10-10 10:44:48 +0000 UTC View Post

Depeche Mode - Personal Jesus (Drum Pattern No. 132)

This is my drum pattern transcription in the style of "Depeche Mode - Personal Jesus". According to various credible sources the original was made by either stomping on a piece of metal, flight cases or a stairwell. Our version works with more accessible everyday drum sounds. For a complete walkthrough take a look at our Depeche Mode video.

Difficulty rating: 🐇🐇🐇🐇
2024-10-06 12:33:02 +0000 UTC View Post

Depeche Mode - Enjoy the Silence (Drum Pattern No. 131)

This is my drum pattern transcription in the style of "Depeche Mode - Enjoy the Silence". For our version we used DMX sounds because of the three distinct Hi-Hats (and of course the very punchy sound). There are a few nice stackable extras in the pattern. The percussion break required the most detective work - take a look at our Depeche Mode video to see how we recreated it with 909/707/727 sounds and how we layer...

Drum Patterns Explained: Depeche Mode

Our new video is out! Get yourself a good dose of Depeche Mode and join us as we escalate quickly from a simple yet functional drum pattern to a full-fledged layering nightmare. We had so much fun with the jams again and this time I even got to dust off my electric guitar! We're very happy with the results and there are a lot of useful techniques in the video :)

We also got an indirect compliment from the YouTube algorithm: Apparently at least one of our jams was mistaken for the origin...

Drum Machine 101 - The Book (September Update)

Hello everyone! While we're in the post-production phase of the newest episode here is another update to the book with a new chapter: "909 Guidelines" (and a smaller one "808 Guidelines"). This is the summary of the technical research we've been doing for our "Short History of the 909" video. It was essential for us to be able to authentically program the patterns on an external sequencer and we thought it might be interesting to you as well!

We also updated the tempo multiplier table w...

Status Update

Hello everyone! We just wanted to let you know that we're currently in the midst of filming the newest episode of "Drum Patterns Explained" :) This time it's going to be a longer video again (surprise) with multiple jams and it will be centered around the greatest hits of a single band.

We're having a lot of fun with the songs and we're experimenting with different styles so you can hear the drums in context. The episode also contains one of our trickiest drum patterns yet...

And ...

Kraftwerk - The Man Machine (Drum Pattern No. 130)

This is my drum pattern transcription in the style of "Kraftwerk - The Man Machine", another classic from the eponymous album. It was a close contender for our Kraftwerk video last year. It's short, but it has a few nice extras in store like 40th note repeats over two steps.

We used CR-78 instruments for the sound example, but feel free to experiment and go full Zap Boom Tschak ;)

Difficulty rating: 🐇🐇🐇
2024-09-03 08:04:00 +0000 UTC View Post

Your favourite 303 basslines?

Hello everyone! Since we always get such great drum pattern recommendations from all of you we wanted to ask this time what your favourite 303 basslines are. These might or might not be for a video about the 303 ;) There are of course already a few ones on our radar that we also featured in our videos (Raga Bhairav, Da Funk, Confusion, Brain Tool, Problèmes D'Amour). Leave us your favourites in the comments!