Modern funk and soul originate from African American music of the 1960s, when older gospel, jazz, blues, and rock made way for more danceable rhythms and grooves. Since then, it’s been revamped, remixed, and reused for popular music the world over.

From gospel soul packs to funky synths

Journey through musical history with Soul Magic, which offers 50 years of genre-defining sounds – from 60s’ funk kits to the neo-soul sounds of the 90s. SOUL MAGIC’s unique drums, bass, guitar, vocal cuts, keys, and instrumentation inject your tracks with the soul that’s been used in popular music for more than half a century. With hundreds of funk loops, drum samples and one-shots to choose from, as well as 66 Battery kits, 52 Maschine kits, and dozens of presets, you’ll have access to decades of iconic sounds at your fingertips.

Tap into a time when drum machines and synthesizers first crept into studios with Midnight Sunset, offering a range of kits to create your perfect vintage sound. Packing in iconic early horns, guitars, bass, synths, and more, this funk and soul pack allows you to capture the sounds and styles of early 1980s America.

As the decade ticked on, the sounds of funk and soul laid the foundations for early hip hop, with producers digging through the record bins and sampling now-iconic beats, hooks, and rhythms to create a whole new genre of music. Crate Cuts honors this classic era, with cuts of soul, jazz, and funk sampled on iconic gear and reel-to-reel tape recordings that are easily accessible and packed with presets, kits, and more than 500 loops.

Funk loops for the future

Funk and soul remain core parts of modern music, and as new generations lean into age-old rhythms, Native Instruments offers the tools to sculpt the future of funk and soul. Backyard Jams pairs the beats-led funk, jazz, soul, and hip hop of the early 2010s with a wide selection of kits, loops, and over 200 one-shots for creating dance floor tracks of the future.

Neo Boogie features funky loops with vintage hardware, but gives it a contemporary edge to add an old-school feel to modern productions. With over 500 samples, dozens of presets, and hundreds of kits, you can inject a classic funk sound into any project – be it modern pop, hip hop, or electronic music.

Specific soul, focused funk

If you’re looking to dive into something more specific, Native Instruments has developed a range of uniquely specialized funk and soul kit expansions to explore. Amplified Funk, for example, brings together hundreds of samples by Amp Fiddler, a prolific and world-famous funk producer. This sound pack includes samples from a baby grand piano, vintage drums, a vintage Roland Jupiter-6, and Memorymoog, as well as drum synths for a truly unique funk kit expansion.

Surf the old-school grooves and contemporary rhythms of the West Coast with Marble Rims. This funk and soul pack offers up 127 sample instruments, as well as Maschine and Battery kits that capture that California hip hop sound through classic synths, bass, poly-synths, pianos, guitar, and more.

Explore our expansions – from vintage soul to future funk

Explore our range of Funk and Soul expansions, from vintage rhythm and blues to contemporary soul kits and visionary funk futurism. Our portfolio of funk and soul expansions work with a wide range of Native Instruments products in almost any DAW, and they offer dozens of one-shots, samples, kits and presets to choose from.