Drill

What it is

Chicago, 2011 to 2013, in and around Englewood. Young Chop, DJ L and Chief Keef built a local variant of trap that took out most of what trap had put in: the keys got sparser, the 808 stopped sliding and started thudding, and the hi-hats moved from a constant sixteenth pulse to eighths punctuated by short bursts. What is left is unusually empty for something this fast. The style went global rather than fading, first to London and then back to New York, and this entry is the Chicago original; the UK and New York branch has its own page because its snare sits somewhere else.

What it sounds like

Cold and hollow. A short, hard 808 that does not glide, a bright snare landing once a bar with a second hit answering it, and hi-hats that mark eighths and then stutter for half a beat before falling silent again. The harmony is often a single minor triad or just a two note figure on a dark bell or a detuned string patch, with a lot of reverb and nothing filling the mids. Chicago drill mixes are noticeably drier and rougher than their London descendants, because most of them were made quickly on cracked software.

Key elements

• Eighth-note hats with burstsThe hat marks eighths for most of the bar and then fires three or four fast hits before stopping. The silence around the burst is what makes it register.
• A non-sliding 808Short, hard, unpitched movement. Where trap slides between notes, Chicago drill thuds on two or three pitches and lets the gaps stay empty.
• The answering snareA second snare a beat or two after the backbeat, usually quieter, which turns a single backbeat into a short phrase. It is the main rhythmic decoration in the style.
• Minimal harmonyOne dark bell or string figure, often two notes, sometimes just a held bass note. The emptiness above the drums is deliberate and it is unusual for the tempo.
• The double kick before the snareTwo 808 hits a sixteenth apart leading into the backbeat. It is the closest drill gets to a fill and it appears in most bars of most tracks.

How to get them

• 808Decay around 400 milliseconds, no glide, distorted with a waveshaper rather than a clipper so the harmonics are gritty. Layer a short punchy kick on top for the attack, high-passed at 100Hz.
• SnareOne bright electric snare, high-passed at 300Hz, with a short room under 0.5 seconds. Put the answering hit 20 to 25 velocity below the backbeat so it reads as a response and not a second downbeat.
• HatsEighths at 74 and 52 for three beats, then a burst of three or four sixteenths in the last beat. Do not fill the whole bar; the contrast between empty and busy is the pattern.
• KeysTwo notes on a bell or a detuned string patch, reverb at three seconds or more, high-passed at 500Hz. If you find yourself writing a chord progression you have drifted into something else.
• SpaceLeave 200Hz to 2kHz almost empty. Chicago drill vocals are delivered low and flat, and the beat has to leave a wide corridor for that rather than for a sung hook.

Reference points

Chief Keef, Young Chop, DJ L, Lil Durk, King Louie, Fredo Santana and Lil Reese. Named as reference points for the sound, not as endorsements or as anyone to imitate.