Pop & soul drum patterns.

1. 1960s

   1. 1963
      

      Pop

      Be My Baby

      The Ronettes

      Hal Blaine's two-bar intro, snare only on beat 4 until the chorus, became one of the most copied drum phrases in pop
   2. 1965
      

      R&B

      I Can't Help Myself (Sugar Pie Honey Bunch)

      Four Tops

      Benny Benjamin and James Jamerson lock the driving Motown dance beat; producers would not cut sessions without Benjamin
   3. 1965
      

      R&B

      In the Midnight Hour

      Wilson Pickett

      Al Jackson Jr.'s delayed backbeat, reworked from the Jerk dance Jerry Wexler showed the band; a defining Stax feel
   4. 1967
      

      Funk

      Cold Sweat

      James Brown

      Root: often called the first funk record; all weight on the one, a late snare in bar one, and the first give-the-drummer-some
   5. 1969
      

      Funk

      Cissy Strut

      The Meters

      Zigaboo Modeliste's syncopated New Orleans second-line funk; critics heard his drums as the lead voice

2. 1970s

   1. 1970
      

      Funk

      Funky Drummer

      James Brown

      Root: Clyde Stubblefield's improvised ghost-note groove and eight-bar break, one of the most sampled recordings ever
   2. 1971
      

      Disco

      Theme from Shaft

      Isaac Hayes

      Root: Willie Hall's constant 16th-note hi-hat, taken from a Stax break; counted among the first disco singles
   3. 1972
      

      Disco

      Love Train

      The O'Jays

      Philadelphia's MFSB rhythm section; called one of the first disco songs and MFSB's first Hot 100 No. 1
   4. 1973
      

      Funk

      What Is Hip?

      Tower of Power

      Co-written by drummer David Garibaldi: a tight, busy sixteenth-note groove under Tower of Power's horns
   5. 1977
      

      Disco

      Stayin' Alive

      Bee Gees

      With the drummer away, two bars of Night Fever's drums were tape-looped: a played beat used like a drum machine
   6. 1979
      

      Disco

      Good Times

      Chic

      Tony Thompson and Bernard Edwards's tight, syncopated groove; its bassline became Rapper's Delight
   7. 1979
      

      Disco

      Ring My Bell

      Anita Ward

      A Synare electronic drum's falling tom on beat one of every bar is the hook: electronic drums as disco's signature

3. 1980s

   1. 1981
      

      Pop

      In the Air Tonight

      Phil Collins

      A CR-78 preset ticks for minutes, then the gated-reverb tom fill explodes: the best-known moment of the 80s drum sound
   2. 1982
      

      Pop

      Rosanna

      Toto

      Jeff Porcaro's half-time shuffle with ghost notes, mixing Purdie and Bonham shuffles; now a standard of drum repertoire
   3. 1982
      

      Pop

      Billie Jean

      Michael Jackson

      Dry, tightly isolated kick, snare and hat (Swedien built a special drum riser): a groove recognisable from its first bar
   4. 1984
      

      Pop

      When Doves Cry

      Prince and the Revolution

      Linn LM-1 drums carry a No. 1 single with no bass line at all; drum-machine pop at its most stripped and bold
   5. 1986
      

      Funk

      Kiss

      Prince and the Revolution

      Skeletal drum-machine funk with no bass: the kick runs through a non-linear reverb to fill the low end
   6. 1987
      

      R&B

      I Want Her

      Keith Sweat

      Co-produced by Teddy Riley and considered the first new jack swing hit: swung, hard-hitting machine drums under R&B

4. 1990s

   1. 1998
      

      R&B

      Are You That Somebody?

      Aaliyah

      Timbaland's stuttering programmed kicks, beatbox and baby samples: off-kilter, syncopated R&B drums go mainstream

5. 2000s

   1. 2000
      

      R&B

      Untitled (How Does It Feel)

      D'Angelo

      Live kit with machine-like evenness, cross-stick on 2 and 4 and a loose kick: the dragged Voodoo-era neo-soul pocket

Press play to loop each record's busiest two bars. Patterns are machine-detected from the recordings, not verified transcriptions.