What Are MIDI Drum Grooves?

What Are MIDI Drum Grooves? A Complete Guide to MIDI Drums

If you want realistic drum parts for your music without recording a live drummer or programming every drum hit yourself, MIDI drum grooves are one of the easiest ways to get started.

MIDI drum grooves are ready-made drum performances that can be used with drum software such as Superior Drummer 3, EZdrummer 3, Steven Slate Drums 5, GetGood Drums and other virtual drum instruments.

The basic idea is simple:

Choose a groove. Drag and drop it into your project. Load your drum sounds. Start making music.

At Necro Grooves, we create ready-to-use MIDI drum grooves and fills specifically for metal musicians, with packs covering Black Metal, Death Metal, Deathcore, Thrash Metal, Doom Metal and other extreme-metal styles.

What Is a MIDI Drum Groove?

A MIDI drum groove is essentially a digital drum performance.

Unlike an audio recording, a MIDI file doesn't contain the actual sound of a drum kit. Instead, it contains information that tells your drum software which drums and cymbals to play and when to play them.

Your drum sampler provides the sounds.

For example, you can load a Necro Grooves MIDI drum groove into your project and play it through Superior Drummer 3, EZdrummer 3, Steven Slate Drums 5 or another compatible drum sampler.

This means you get the drum performance from Necro Grooves while still using the drum sounds and libraries you prefer.

MIDI Drum Grooves Are Easy to Use

One of the biggest advantages of MIDI drum grooves is how quickly you can go from a guitar riff to a complete song idea.

Instead of opening a piano roll and programming every kick, snare, tom and cymbal individually, you can audition ready-made grooves until you find one that works with your music.

Then simply drag and drop the MIDI groove into your project and keep writing.

Necro Grooves MIDI drum packs include collections of grooves and fills designed to work together, making it easy to find different drum parts for riffs, verses, choruses, breakdowns, transitions and other sections of a song.

For many musicians, it really can be as simple as:

Choose → Drag → Drop → Play.

What Do You Need to Use MIDI Drum Grooves?

You don't need a complicated setup.

You'll generally need a DAW, such as Logic Pro, Studio One, Cubase, Reaper, Ableton Live or Pro Tools.

You'll also need a virtual drum instrument or drum sampler. Popular choices include Superior Drummer 3, EZdrummer 3, Steven Slate Drums 5 and GetGood Drums.

Finally, you need the MIDI drum grooves themselves.

That's where Necro Grooves comes in.

Choose the Necro Grooves MIDI pack that fits your style, load your preferred drum sounds and start building your song.

MIDI Drums vs. Audio Drum Loops

MIDI drum grooves and audio drum loops may seem similar, but there is an important difference.

An audio drum loop contains recorded drum sounds. Those sounds are already part of the audio file.

A MIDI drum groove contains the performance, while your drum sampler provides the sounds.

That gives you the freedom to use the drum kit and samples you want.

The same Necro Grooves MIDI drum performance could be played through one drum library for a raw, old-school sound or another library for a polished modern-metal production.

You don't have to change the groove itself. Simply changing the drum library can give the same performance a completely different sound.

Can MIDI Drum Grooves Follow the Tempo of My Song?

Yes.

MIDI drum grooves follow the tempo of your project, making them particularly convenient for songwriting.

If your song is running at 120 BPM, the MIDI follows 120 BPM. If your project is at 180 BPM, it follows 180 BPM.

This makes it easy to audition different Necro Grooves drum performances while you're developing a song and experimenting with tempo.

What Are MIDI Drum Fills?

MIDI drum fills work much like MIDI drum grooves, but they're generally used to connect different parts of a song.

For example:

Verse → Fill → Chorus

or:

Riff → Fill → New Riff

Necro Grooves packs include both MIDI drum grooves and MIDI drum fills, giving you more of the building blocks needed to put together complete drum arrangements.

Simply choose a fill that works, drag it into place and continue building your song.

Why Use MIDI Drum Grooves for Metal?

Metal can demand a huge variety of drum parts.

Blast beats, double-bass patterns, skank beats, breakdowns, slower grooves, unusual rhythms, fills and rapid transitions can all appear within the same song.

Programming these performances one note at a time can interrupt the songwriting process.

Necro Grooves metal MIDI drum packs are designed to make this much faster.

Instead of starting from an empty drum editor, you can browse performances created specifically for the style of metal you're writing.

Find something that works with your riff, drag and drop it into your project, and keep making music.

And because it's MIDI, you still have the option of changing something later if you want to. Editing is available when you need it — it isn't a requirement.

Black Metal MIDI Drum Grooves

Black Metal has a distinctive drumming style that can include blast beats, fast double bass, traditional beats, atmospheric passages and slower sections.

Necro Grooves offers several dedicated Black Metal MIDI drum groove packs, each approaching the genre from a different direction.

Summoning Evil focuses on Second Wave Black Metal MIDI drums, while Obsidian Arcana takes a more modern Black Metal approach.

Imperium Noctis is built around Symphonic Black Metal drumming.

For a larger collection spanning these different styles, the Black Metal Trinity combines all three Necro Grooves Black Metal MIDI drum packs into one bundle.

Death Metal MIDI Drum Grooves

Death Metal drumming can range from old-school grooves and skank beats to relentless double bass, blast beats and extremely fast fills.

Necro Grooves offers Death Metal MIDI drum packs built around different branches of the genre.

Grave Rituals focuses on Old School Death Metal MIDI drums, while Blunt Force Extermination delivers a more aggressive collection of Brutal Death Metal MIDI drum grooves and fills.

The Death Metal Trinity provides a larger collection for musicians looking for a wider range of extreme Death Metal drum performances.

Deathcore MIDI Drum Grooves

Deathcore combines elements of extreme metal with breakdown-focused grooves, rapid double bass, blast beats and dramatic rhythmic changes.

Abyssmal Architect is the dedicated Necro Grooves Deathcore MIDI drum groove pack, designed for modern, technical and breakdown-heavy metal songwriting.

Like other Necro Grooves MIDI packs, the grooves and fills are ready to drag and drop into your project and use with your preferred compatible drum sampler.

Thrash Metal MIDI Drum Grooves

Thrash Metal requires a different rhythmic approach, with aggressive beats, driving double bass, fast tempos and drum parts built to complement rapid guitar riffs.

United Aggression is the Necro Grooves Thrash Metal MIDI drum groove pack, with ready-to-use grooves and fills designed specifically for Thrash Metal songwriting.

Find the groove that works with your riff, drag it into your song and you're ready to go.

Doom Metal MIDI Drum Grooves

At the other end of the tempo spectrum, Doom Metal often relies on slower, heavier grooves where the relationship between the drums and guitar riff becomes especially important.

Eternal Omen is the Necro Grooves Doom Metal MIDI drum groove pack, offering grooves and fills for slower and heavier metal songwriting.

The workflow remains just as simple: choose your groove, drag and drop it into your project, select your drum sounds and start writing.

Can You Edit MIDI Drum Grooves?

Yes — but you don't have to.

Necro Grooves MIDI drum grooves and fills are designed to provide ready-to-use drum performances.

If you find a groove that works with your song, you can simply use it.

If you eventually decide you want to change a kick, snare, cymbal, velocity or another part of the performance, MIDI gives you the freedom to do that as well.

Think of editability as an added benefit rather than an extra step.

Do MIDI Drum Grooves Sound Realistic?

MIDI doesn't have a sound of its own.

The final sound comes from the drum software and sample library playing the MIDI performance, along with your production and mixing choices.

Modern virtual drum instruments such as Superior Drummer, EZdrummer, Steven Slate Drums and GetGood Drums use professionally recorded drum samples, allowing MIDI drum performances to be used in highly realistic productions.

Necro Grooves provides the drum performance, while you choose the drum sounds that best fit your music.

Are MIDI Drum Grooves Only for Guitarists?

Not at all.

MIDI drum grooves can be useful for guitarists, bassists, songwriters, producers, composers and even drummers.

They're particularly useful for solo musicians and home-recording artists who want complete drum performances without having to record an acoustic drum kit or program every drum hit manually.

For a guitarist writing metal at home, the workflow can be incredibly simple:

Record a riff → find a Necro Grooves drum groove → drag and drop → keep writing.

Start Writing With Necro Grooves MIDI Drum Grooves

Necro Grooves creates MIDI drum grooves and fills specifically for metal musicians.

Rather than offering a generic collection of beats, Necro Grooves packs focus on individual metal genres and subgenres, including Black Metal, Death Metal, Brutal Death Metal, Deathcore, Thrash Metal, Doom Metal and more.

The goal is simple:

Spend less time programming drums and more time making music.

Choose a Necro Grooves MIDI drum pack for your style, find a groove that works with your riff, drag and drop it into your project and start building your song.