Minimal House

The tight kick: short, dry, soft click

A short, punchy kick with a soft click, almost no tail, no distortion. The sub does the low-end work; the kick's job is the downbeat and a small "thump". Tune it to the root and keep it under a 16th long.

1. Drum Sampler (12.1) on a dry, short kick sample (a 909 or a soft acoustic-ish one). Pitch to the track root; Decay so the sample dies by 180–220 ms at 125 BPM (a 16th is 120 ms).
2. Drum Sampler effect: Punch 20–30% for the attack, Sub 0% — you do not want a long sub tail here, the bass covers it.
3. EQ Eight: HP 35 Hz 24 dB/oct, gentle cut around 250 Hz to clear the bass harmonics, a tiny high shelf cut so the click is not sharp.
4. Compressor: 4:1, attack 10 ms (lets the transient through), release 60 ms, 2 dB of gain reduction — evens out the sample, nothing more.
5. Operator alternative: Osc A sine, Pitch env +24 st decay 35 ms, Amp decay 150 ms, Tone 30%, a hint of Saturator Soft Sine 2 dB. Very tight, very controllable.

The off-beat rubber sub

A short, round sub note on every off-beat 8th (sometimes with a 16th pickup), slightly glided, slightly late. This is the engine of the genre: the kick pushes, the bass pulls.

1. Operator, algorithm B→A. Osc A sine level 0 dB; Osc B sine, Coarse 2 (ratio 2), level −24 dB — a hint of 2nd harmonic so the sub reads on small speakers without a separate layer.
2. Amp envelope: Attack 3 ms, Decay 200–260 ms, Sustain 0.3, Release 60 ms. Mono voice, Glide on at 30–50 ms so repeated notes "rub".
3. Write 8th-note off-beats (steps 3, 7, 11, 15 in a 16-step grid), note length ~70% of a 16th. Root at F0 (43.7 Hz) or G0 (49 Hz). Add a 16th pickup before beat 1 every 2 bars.
4. Nudge the whole clip 10–15 ms late (clip Start offset, or Groove Pool Timing). The lateness is the "rubber".
5. Saturator Soft Sine 2–4 dB, Soft Clip on; EQ Eight HP 32 Hz and LP 200 Hz; light sidechain from the kick (3:1, 3–5 dB GR, release 80 ms) only to clean the overlap at the pickup notes.

Variations: Drift, Osc 1 Sine + Shark Tooth Osc 2 at −20 dB, MS2 LP at 150 Hz with 10% drive — slightly warmer. For a TD-3 feel, record the 303 with resonance at 0, cutoff fully closed, accent off, then LP it at 180 Hz: a surprisingly good minimal sub with real analog glide.

Hat and shaker cloud: four layers, four swings

The swing in minimal house comes from stacking several quiet hat/shaker layers that each have a different swing amount and velocity cycle. Solo'd they sound like nothing; together they are the groove.

1. Pad 1: closed hat (808/909 or a real stick-on-stick click), Drum Sampler Decay 40 ms. Plays 16ths with velocities cycling 90-50-70-40. Groove: MPC 16 Swing-62, Timing 70%.
2. Pad 2: open hat or short white-noise burst (Drum Sampler on a noise sample, Decay 90 ms, filter LP 9 kHz), off-beat 8ths only. Groove: MPC 16 Swing-58, Timing 50% — less swing than the closed hat so the two drift against each other.
3. Pad 3: shaker, every 16th at low velocity (30–50) with the Velocity MIDI tool Random 20%. Groove: MPC 16 Swing-60, Timing 100%, Random 10%.
4. Pad 4: a "tick" — a wood block or tongue-click sample, Drum Sampler Pitch +5 st, Decay 25 ms — on one or two odd 16ths per bar, straight (no groove) so there is an anchor.
5. Group → Auto Filter HP 900 Hz (nothing here needs mids), Erosion for a shared "grain", Glue Compressor just touching 1 dB to fuse the layers. Pan: CH 10% L, OH 15% R, shaker 20% L, tick centre.

Rimshot, click and wood: the mid-perc skeleton

Minimal house rarely has a real snare or clap. Beat 2 and 4 are a rimshot, a wood click or a short filtered noise burst, often with a second "answer" click on an off 16th. Dry, centred, with a tiny room on a send.

1. Drum Sampler on an 808 rimshot or a wood block. Pitch −3 to +4 st to taste, Decay 80–120 ms, Ring effect 10–20% for a slight metallic tone.
2. Compressor with 0.5 ms attack and 6:1 ratio squashes the transient flat — in minimal that "clipped" rim sound is a feature, it sits in the mix without poking out.
3. Synth alternative: Operator Osc A Square at Coarse 8 (~440 Hz on A0), Osc B noise −12 dB, amp decay 50 ms, Filter BP 1.5 kHz res 40%. Instant "DX7 rim".
4. Collision alternative: Mallet, Resonator Marimba/Beam, decay 0.15 s, played at C5–G5 with the Random MIDI tool ±2 semitones for pitched wood clicks that vary every hit.
5. Place the main rim on beats 2 and 4; an answer click (different pad, −6 dB) on the "a" of 2 every 2 bars and the "e" of 4 every 4 bars.

The hook: one vocal chop or bleep, filtered

Minimal tracks have one memorable thing: a 200 ms vocal syllable, a cut-up word, a pitched bleep. It plays on a fixed rhythmic position, filtered, and the arrangement is mostly automating how much of it you hear.

1. Simpler, Classic or One-Shot, on a vocal recording. Trim a 100–250 ms fragment — a consonant plus vowel ("ka", "tsh", "oh") rather than a whole word. Fade in/out 3–5 ms so it clicks only when you want it to.
2. Warp mode Complex Pro, pitch −2 to +5 st; try Texture mode with Grain Size large for a smeared version.
3. Auto Filter band-pass around 700 Hz–1.2 kHz, 12 dB/oct, resonance 15–25%, Envelope section 25% so harder hits open the filter a bit.
4. Redux (12-bit, sample rate ~22 kHz, Jitter 5%) for the classic early-2000s "crispy" micro-sample tone.
5. Echo at a short, odd division (1/16 and 3/16) with feedback 30–40% to produce the stuttering tail. Place the hook on one or two 16ths per bar and let the delay fill around it.

Variations: a bleep — Operator Osc A sine, Coarse 4, amp decay 90 ms, pitch env +2 st 20 ms, through the same Echo. A filtered stab — Electric (Rhodes), one minor 7th chord, Auto Filter LP 600 Hz, decay 150 ms.

Dub-ish chord bed: filtered, barely there

Many minimal tracks carry a single sustained or lightly pulsing chord under the groove, low-passed to the point of being felt rather than heard. It gives the track a key without announcing a harmony.

1. Analog: Osc 1 Saw, Osc 2 Saw +5 cents, Filter 1 LP 24 dB cutoff 300–400 Hz, no resonance. Amp A 400 ms, D 0, S 1, R 600 ms. Play a minor 7th or a sus2 voicing in the F2–A3 range, one note per 4–8 bars.
2. Auto Pan-Tremolo (12.3) in Tremolo mode synced to 1/8 at 30–40% depth: the chord pulses with the groove instead of sitting on top of it. Try the Off-beat phase so it swells between kicks.
3. Chorus-Ensemble lightly for width; Compressor sidechained from the kick, gentle (3 dB GR) and slow release so it breathes.
4. EQ Eight HP 160 Hz — the chord must not touch the bass. Level: −18 to −24 dB relative to the kick. If you can clearly hear it solo-style in the mix, it is too loud.

Variations: Wavetable with Harmonics category table, Unison Shimmer 3 voices, Filter OSR LP 400 Hz for a glassier bed; Meld Chord engine (12.2) on a single note with the voicing set to m7 for one-finger chords on Push.

Micro-textures: the "what was that?" layer

Tiny, quiet, non-repeating sounds — a vinyl crackle, a bit of fridge hum, a granular smear of the hook — sprinkled every few bars. They give the loop the illusion of being alive.

1. Granulator III loaded with the hook (vocal chop) or any short found-sound recording. Grain Size 30–60 ms, Spray 50–70%, Pitch −12 with ±5 st random, scan the file position slowly with its LFO.
2. Beat Repeat in Gate mode, Chance 10–20%, Grid 1/32, Variation high, Decay 30%: the repeat engine fires briefly and unpredictably.
3. Auto Filter band-pass 1.5–3 kHz with the LFO set to Sample-and-Hold at 1/4: every beat the texture jumps to a new colour.
4. Echo ping-pong at 1/16, Utility width 150% and level −18 to −22 dB. Resample 16 bars to an audio track, then cut it up and place fragments at bar 7, 15, 23 — not on a loop.

Latin / tribal perc loop: the Cadenza move

A conga/bongo/cajón phrase, played quietly on a 2-bar loop with a lot of swing, is what pushes "minimal" into "groovy minimal". Keep it filtered and low in the mix; it should be felt in the hips not heard in the head.

1. Record a hand-drum phrase (or a found-sound equivalent: tapping a box) at the song tempo for 2 bars. Simpler, Slice mode, Transient sensitivity high, Slice to new MIDI track.
2. Rearrange the slices: keep the first two beats, shuffle the rest with the Recombine MIDI tool (Rotate 2, Mirror off). Apply MPC 16 Swing-60 at 80% Timing.
3. Velocity MIDI tool, Random 20–30% with the output range capped at 95 so no hit pokes out.
4. EQ Eight HP 200 Hz, LP 5 kHz. Compressor 4:1 fast release for a "squeezed" perc tone. Send a little to the 1/8 dotted Echo.
5. Level: −14 to −18 dB below the kick. Mute it in the breakdown; its return at the drop is the biggest event in the track.

Transitions without risers: filter, delay throw, mute

Minimal house does not use noise risers or impacts. Transitions are made by removing things, by high-passing the drums for 4 bars, or by throwing one hit into a long delay. Here is the standard kit.

1. Auto Filter (12.2) high-pass on the drum group: automate from 20 Hz to 300–500 Hz over the last 8 bars before a breakdown, snap back to 20 Hz on the drop. Use a 24 dB slope and 5–10% resonance; the slight peak at the cutoff gives a "sweep" without a sweep sound.
2. Delay throw: on the hook or rim track, automate the Echo send from 0 to 100% for exactly one hit on the last 8th before the breakdown. Echo feedback 80–90%, Filter LP 2 kHz so the tail darkens as it repeats.
3. Mute drops: the strongest minimal transition is muting the kick for 1 beat, 2 beats or a full bar before the 1. Do it with clip gaps, not automation, so it stays editable.
4. Reverse a single rim hit (audio clip, Reverse) and place it on the "a" of 4 before a section change: a 100 ms "whoosh" that fits the genre.