7.8 Musical examples

Daft Punk - Short Circuit (2001)

Around the two-minute mark the track leans into deliberate digital degradation: audible aliasing and bit-crushing turn the synth line harsh and metallic. It is a demonstration that the artifacts this chapter warns about can be used as an aesthetic rather than avoided as a flaw.

Billie Eilish - Happier Than Ever (2021)

The song’s heavy outro ends by running through heavy bit-crushing, coarsely re-quantizing the mix so that the crunch of a shrinking bit depth becomes part of the sound.