Using audio for visual effects

In short, I want to be able to create visual effects based on the audio of the current music playing, e.g. in a drum and bass track, I would like to create a ripple effect for every 'beat'.

How would I use Unity to obtain relevant audio data to do such a thing? What methods, or algorithms would I have to use?

In long, I've searched previous answers about calculating Beats Per Minute (BPM), but honestly, they either lead to a dead-end or something way over the top that I can't make sense of. I haven't done any audio programming before, (let alone know how music works), so this isn't exactly my field. Even if I could just get some direction to look in would be great enough.