A line against a four-on-the-floor kick

This guide writes an eight-bar house line that sits off a four-on-the-floor kick, then takes it to your host as MIDI.

The kick you draw here is a reference for writing. It does not play and is not exported, so keep your real kick in your host.

1. Pick the line preset

On the Pattern tab, pick House: Driving and set the length to 8 bars. At 4 bars the line is one group: three bars and an answer. Eight gives a second group that restates the figure changed.

2. Draw the kick

In the kick row under bar 1, click the first step of each beat: four hits. Then press Copy kick to all. Kick lines now run through every bar's lanes.

3. Hold the line to the kick

The preset sets Lock to 1.00 and Groove to 0.80: the line holds to the kick and sits on its offbeats. Both take hold only past 0.50, so Lock at 0.50 or below leaves the kick as reference only. Turn Groove all the way down and the notes move onto the kick itself. Each writes a new line when you let go.

4. Choose how busy it is

The preset sets Energy to 0.75. At 0.40 the bars thin out and the accents soften; at 1.00 notes are added, bars stray further from the figure and accents hit harder.

5. Find a line you like

Press Generate, or type a new number into Seed, until a line fits. Write the seed down: the same seed with these settings, this key and this kick gives the same line again.

6. Loosen the timing

Set Swing to 0.15 steps. At 0.08 it is barely there; at 0.30 the offbeat sixteenths lean well back. Nudge single notes from the selected-note row if one should push or drag on its own.

7. Take it to your host

Export MIDI from the kiwibass menu and load the file into the track that holds the Kiwibass plugin. Overlapping notes stay overlapping, so they glide in the plugin when Legato is on.