does the rytm have recordable mutes via its mute mode and if so is there a quick way to erase them all so you can then record some new ones again?
Yes, true. My reply was directly to the OP’s story and questions.
What I meant is not to be stuck in a style and/or a bpm range when starting out into the groove realm.
Fur sure if you make & play dub techno only then do the dub techno thing (with a personal sauce), same for other genres and sub genres.
Also: IMHO nothing wrong with making an album with a techno track, a pop song, a lofi trap tune and an indie rock song. Art is freedom.
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I had never watched the vids! Hilarious!!!
My respect for Jack Dangers’ work still increased, thanks @phaelam and @Skypainter!
I love that term. 
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Very much agree with this, and I’d say my stuff is pretty varied - I definitely don’t have a genre in mind when writing music. In my first post in this thread I was just dropping AFX’s name as a reference of what I’m going for right now in the rhythm section of a couple of tracks I’m working on. The last thing I want to do after 20 years of making music is lose my own voice and become a copycat. And I don’t see that happening anyway, although I wouldn’t mind being able to create something like Drukqs (an early PIANO influence for me, funnily enough). BUT, like many have said, it would probably be very educative to try do something in the vein of, say, AFX. And since that’s bound to fail in a good way, I would come up with something of my own in the process.
Having said all that, I think what I have to do is start VERY simple. The same way everyone starts with one-finger melodies with the piano. Learn to create a basic groove and go from there. Otherwise it’ll just be chaos for chaos’ sake.
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I don’t really know how much this helps, but when I program drums I usually imagine a physical kit as far as panning goes. My brother was/is a drummer and he always had the snare and hat on his left, toms and kick mostly centered, and crash on the right.
A good tip for sequencing I heard once (that I forget more than I want to admit) is to not trigger the hat at the same time as the snare. Imagine only having two hands and your own two feet as far as how a drum track would actually sound in a live setting. Then again, the perks of electronic music is doing whatever possible limited by only your imagination.
Not completely sure this all makes sense. It’s the weekend and I’m tired from work and imbibing a bit.
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Hi!
I’m just putting some thoughts here:
1st you need to decide: do I want to make genre or do I want to make what I want?
If you want to make genre just get samples from them and analyse.
If you want to do what ever you want (it’s me!) here some things I do:
I have the kick always on a separate mix channel. It’s easier to sidechain.
I have drumsounds that can live with reverb on a separate channel.
I have drumsounds that can live with delay on a separate channel.
So i can use fx easier in performing.
If I want to pan some sounds with lfo or fixed: another channel…
It’s a good idea to experiment with panning if you can make it more roomey.
A beat grooves with bass.
That could be a subby 808 or a bassline or lets say toms (why not?).
A groove without bass always sucks in my opinion.
Repetition works well. Don’t think if you put everywhere random trigs and polyrythms your groove will work.
Yes, it can make things interesting, but if the groove does not work without, it will not work with.
Make your groove loops, save it, and listen to them next day sober.
Learn how compressor works.
That’s it.
Edit: I forgot: Dance to your own groove. You will know if it’s shit.
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Indeed … and I would additionally suggest to learn some of them playing with real sticks. No joking 
Some years ago I had gear lust to get a real drum set, just because of the fun of it, and started to learn drumming, very basic of course. After some months I recognized that my drum programming had become much better, more natural, more human touch, more logical.
Two sticks and a practice pad can do the job as well. I use this, if I don’t want to or cant’t work on the real kit: https://www.drumeo.com/drumshop/practice-pad-full/
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This!
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…so what makes a groove groove…
groove is the way of an overall movement, an inner tension that keeps a track moviing, walking, behave and breathe the way it does…
some grooves move u within a second…the other needs one round or two…some need a moment to make out the pattern first because there’s a lot to sort out…and some just don’t groove…no matter what or how many elements fight for their right to shine…
end of the day…it’s a bum…a tschak…a counterpoint in bass and the shizzel shake hat that holds it all together…
if u “only” need these FOUR basic elements to groove already u groove for real…
how bum and bass and shizzel and tschak work together are essentially shaped with constallation to each other, their individual decays!!! AND eq’s and comperessors…
while lfo’s can mock a lot…
the individual spaces of silence inbetween, the individual stoplength of all of them while working TOGETHER…is essential…
no real need for further, additional elements in first place before THAT is not sorted for real…
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Best to make them sober too!
Sure, but this is nothing we should discuss here. It would be way ot.
…if it grooves sober…it grooves stoned for sure…
…if it grooves stoned…also grooving sober is not guaranteed at all…
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Yeah for sure. Thats why I sayed it’s essential to listen to it the next day sober.
- when you are stoned you can find all things better than they are. We all know this, so can we agree and say this point is done?
- sober or not, sometimes you can get in a state where you are locked into a groove. that’s why I sayed listen to it the next day.
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As someone who loves using an extremely wide palette of acoustic and synthesized samples for drums/percussion I’ve discovered something that works quite well for injecting natural “feel” into atypical kits for electronic music. First, utilize a “natural” kit to create as “human” a groove as possible. I find that using the acoustic samples lends itself much more to my ability to think in terms of dynamics. Then, immediately start swapping the samples out with “electronic” kits. Usually it’s pretty cool how much life gets breathed into the resulting synthesized kit.
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Doesn’t quite groove, but good point anyways
keep it on the one.
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I’ve been programming drums since the early 2000’s (had a very long break frm music so i dont have 20 yrs of experience exactly) and there arent many secrets really. I would advice to listen to the likes of Jazzanova a lot. Listen a lot and practice. At some point you start seeing every rhythm on a grid when listening to music. Good excercise is to make full drum tracks. Just loads of percussion tracks. I’ve used the OT for a while and while it is certainly capable, a computer is way more efficient (Logic, Maschine, a tracker,…) because of the visual element, quick nudging and velocity adjustments. But most importantly because you can quickly switch between 8th’s, 16ths and triplets without beeing confused by the “fixed 16 steps” on a X0X type step sequencer. And changing meter and all that is kind of tricky on a X0X.
All of the complex stuff from Aphex Twin is done on a tracker for example. You can clearly hear from his drums when he used a pc/tracker. (‘96-‘01).
Other than that compiling a kit is obviously super important. Maybe start with chopping “open” breaks into single hits and program those. Because naturally they’ll be more consistant.
And experiment with different styles. Think of yourself as a beginner drummer who needs to practice rhythm-style.
Also maybe learn/experiment on a computer and transfer the knowledge to your Digitakt.
Good Drums can make a good track into a brilliant track and vice versa. It is arguably the most important element.
Also: stay away from compressors. Try to get them good without any kind of compression
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So if you advise against compressors…
Like I’m my case, my drums have NO punch. And on red tracks I like, the drums are SO crisp punchy and defined. Stand on their own. What kinda mixing tips can you offer
Mine come off all washy…and it just kills the vibe.
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To achieve the crisp, punchy, defined drums you are after, I’ve always had the best results at the mixing stage with subtractive EQ and multi band compression applied to each drum track where appropriate. Compression as an effect is a different story. Even if/when I were to use it, I would still feel the drums need to be mixed well. Otherwise, compression is really just another word for overdrive/clipping/distortion. It can make things sound meaner, bigger, etc, but something is still missing.
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