Starting a groove
All of the fun clicky bits are in the hi-hat.
Tilt the left stick Left stick in any direction and a closed hi-hat starts up, locked to the tempo. Tilt the right stick Right stick to bring the kick in beside it. Let go of the stick to stop it.
The direction you point the stick sets the rhythm, and how far you push it sets the velocity. It's quite simple, really. But it's a lot of fun.
| Left stick Left stick | The hi-hat plays |
|---|---|
| Left | Quarters |
| Up | Eighths |
| Right | Sixteenths |
| Down | The &s - the offbeats on their own |
The right stick's covered in Playing the kick.
Open the hat with the left trigger
Squeeze L2 with the left stick held and it starts introducing open hi-hats into the rhythm. The more you squeeze, the more open hats, in three steps: the pickup before each beat, then every &, then everything.
Click a stick to double it
Click and hold L3 and a hit lands between every pair of hi-hat hits, with an adjusted velocity curve to account for the shift - in most cases it'll come out as a sort of ratchety fill.
R3 does the same kind of thing for the kick: hold it for a busier kick. On quarters and the two-step it plays a fill pattern. On eighths and sixteenths it doubles the rate.
This works best when used in short bursts, for accents and flavour. Try combining it with L1 holds and taps to create new rhythms.