bucket brigade

Bucket brigade refers to analog delay line technology, often abbreviated BBD, used in delay and chorus pedals¹. The signal degrades as it passes down the capacitor line, losing high frequencies, which produces a darker, more organic tone with warm repeats²³. The BBD also generates losses of information that add white noise and prevent bright, clean repetitions, a characteristic sound that can recall the saturation of vintage analog tape delay⁴. This filtered high-end character suits repeats that sit behind the playing⁵, and the sound is largely shaped by the compander and filtering around the buckets rather than the buckets themselves⁶.