Bitcrush turns clean into retro grit

Transcript

Bitcrushing lowers an audio signal’s bit depth and sample rate, so the sound loses resolution and gains gritty, lo-fi artifacts, much like a smooth picture turning pixelated. In plain language, bit depth is how many steps audio has for loudness, while sample rate is how many snapshots it takes each second; more of both means a clearer, smoother recording. On a drum loop, the first change is a touch of bite, then the transients get rougher, the highs start to alias, and the groove begins to sound like old hardware or a vintage game console. A synth chord follows the same path, from silky and bright to cold, crunchy, and broken, until the whole track feels like modern music remembering the past.