Sample and Hold: Making a Lo-Fi Beat With AI

Welcome to Sample and Hold, the series on the LANDR Blog where we highlight one unique crate-digging session and the digger’s gold we came back with using Selector—the world’s first AI sample recommendation tool.

Starter Loop: Lo-fi Melodics from Skifonix

I’ll kick off this Sample and Hold session with a jazzy guitar lick from a sample pack called Lo-fi Melodics.

I discovered this sample during my research for an article I wrote about the best lo-fi sample packs.

This one stuck out to me for its quick runs and jazzy chords.

The lo-fi texture of the sample inspired me, I think it’s a good place to start building a beat.

So, for this edition of Sample and Hold I’ll use Selector to help me find the loops I need to construct a lo-fi beat that complements this starter loop.

We’ll put Selector to the test and see what loops AI suggests I use in my beat.

At the end of the article you can hear the final product!

We’ll put Selector to the test and see what loops AI suggests I use in my beat.

Selection 1: Top 06 from Apex Audio

Since I started with a guitar loop, the next thing I think the track needs is a percussive element to drive the beat along.

To complement the higher frequencies in the guitar loops I’ll find a hi-hat loop to get the high end of the percussive elements in my beat started.

I put a hi-hats only filter on the Selector results from my starter loop and wound up with about two pages of samples.

I put a hi-hats only filter on the Selector results from my starter loop and wound up with about two pages of samples.

After going through pretty much all of them I finally settled on this washy sounding loop that seems to incorporate sidechaining and reversing effects.

It’s not your typical hi-hat sound, but that’s kind of what I like about it!

The hi-hat loop has enough rhythm to drive the track along and I think the sound complements the lo-fi elements in the starter loop.

Alright, I have half a drum kit and a guitar loop to play with in my DAW.

Now it’s time to add kick and snare.

Selection 2: Kick and Snare 04 from Apex Audio

I hit the Selector button on my hi-hat loop but this time I filtered the results pages for just kick and snare.

Again, Selector returns about two pages of kick and snare loops.

Sifting through the loops I settled on this bottom loop because it really leans into that classic lo-fi sound.

Aside from the crunchy and subdued sound of the kick and snare, I really like the rhythm itself.

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The loop uses that classic minimal R&B rhythm inspired micro delayed MPC style quantization that was pioneered by beat-making legends like J Dilla.

You hear in a lot of lo-fi beats today too.

The result is pretty satisfying once I put it in my DAW.

Alright, I have a full kit going and I think it complements my loop pretty well.

Now it’s time to roll the dice a little bit and try to find something in the low end to complement my guitar track.

Selection 3: OL1 Bass from Opium Lounge

To complement my guitar loop I put a bass guitar filter on my Selector results.

To complement my guitar loop I put a bass guitar filter on my Selector results.

Nice, I get about 26 bass loops on my Selector session.

I’m looking for something that matches both the melodic and rhythmic elements of my guitar loop and I think two of these samples from Opium Lounge works best.

The bass guitar loops are both in the same key and they seem to use the same tone.

I like how the bass in these loops have funky long and short notes that might line up with the chord hits and runs in my guitar loop once I chop them up in Ableton.

What drew me to the loops in the first place is their tone. Somehow they both remind me of funk and jazz bass legend Jaco Pastorius’ tone.

Jaco’s track A Portrait of Tracy comes to mind in particular.

The bass loops come in A# minor, so once I throw it in my DAW I’ll have to transpose them down a couple of steps to match the guitar in D minor.

They fit okay but I’ll have to spend some time tweaking the bass loops to make them suit the guitar track a little bit better.

Putting it all together

It might sound counterintuitive, but sometimes putting limitations on yourself can actually help with sparking creativity in your songwriting.

I this case I limited myself to using only the suggestions that an AI tool gave.

It was pretty fun to work with these limitations and I think it produced an interesting result.

To finish my beat I’ll do a little bit of arranging, EQ, and sidechaining in my DAW.

Plus I’ll master my track once I bounce the final version.

Here’s what the final mastered track sounds like.

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Alex Lavoie works as a staff writer at LANDR by day and writes indie post-punk tunes in his band UTILS while moonlighting as drummer for folk-rock outfit The Painters.

@Alex Lavoie