Exploring Hip Hop Drumming

So now we're moving on to hip hop. Hip hop's a really interesting style of music to play on the drums, largely because when it started in the 1980s and developed in the 90s, the hip hop artists were using samples from old funk and soul tracks.

The Roots of Hip Hop

• You'd get some of the greatest funk and soul drummers playing these grooves.
• The rappers would then take two or four bars, loop that, and then rap on top.

I used to practice with hip hop a lot, and I worked with an English rapper called Roots Maneuver for a couple of years. I really enjoyed it because it was great just to dig into those grooves.

Time Feel in Hip Hop

Sometimes the time feel stretches a little bit more than in, say, pop, which can be very precise. In hip hop, there can be a kind of dragging feel.

Notable Drummers:

• Someone like Questlove (Amir Thompson is his real name) is a master of stretching the time feel.
• Chris Dave, who plays with D'Angelo, is great at that.

Recommendations for Inspiration

I would recommend checking out:

• Some of the old hip hop
• Some of the newer stuff

Personally, productions by Timbaland were really interesting to me because rather than using drummers, he did a lot of beatboxing and used his mouth. He incorporated very percussive styles that Michael Jackson used to do on some of his recordings way back.

Also, Pharrell Williams from the Neptunes is a really good drummer, and his productions feature some great drum parts.

So, enjoy listening to all of that for inspiration!