Chase Bliss Big Time Automatone Analog/Digital Echo

The Chase Bliss Big Time Automatone Analog/Digital Echo is a stereo delay pedal in the Automatone format, the slider-based enclosure Chase Bliss uses for its larger designs. It was developed with John Snyder of Electronic Audio Experiments (EAE), and Chase Bliss describes it as "a hybrid echo that blends the best of analog and digital"¹².

The hybrid claim comes from where the analog parts sit. The delay engine itself is digital, but the signal passes through a stereo analog preamp at the input and a stereo analog compressor/limiter inside the feedback loop. Guitar Pedal X called it "a largely digital delay with stereo analog preamp and compressor/limiter sections," and noted that the Hybrid Echo label might be read as somewhat misleading from a pure delay-circuit standpoint³. Chase Bliss frames the design as a revisit of the mixed-up circuitry found in rackmount delays from the early 80s².

A hybrid analog/digital echo

The pedal has two separate sources of analog coloration. Pedal of the Day explains that an analog preamp sits at the front of the circuit, and a clipping limiter sits within the feedback loop: "When COLOR or FEEDBACK (or both) are turned up, your signal will begin to bump into it"⁴. The result, in that reviewer's words, is "a big, swirling, ever-changing mass of saturated space"⁴.

All of this is true stereo. Chase Bliss says each channel has its own dedicated analog preamp and limiter, rather than one shared stage². Gearnews notes the pedal can handle both balanced and unbalanced signals on its two stereo inputs and outputs⁵.

The delay engine covers a wide range of ground. Its voicings span chorus, flanger, vibrato, slapback, double tracking, and Short and Long delays, with a Loop mode, across HiFi, Focus, Warm and Analog filter voicings³. On the That Pedal Show demo, it also covered 32-bit and 12-bit modes and could produce oscillation sounds⁶.

The controls

The Automatone format puts the main parameters on sliders. The controls, with the secondary functions Guitar Pedal X listed in brackets, are³:

The STATE button sets how the limiter behaves, with four modes: Digital, Compressed, Saturated and #!&%, plus a +12dB option⁴³. How the analog clipping sounds when the signal bumps into the limiter depends on which state is selected⁴.

Presets, MIDI and connections

Big Time stores 10 presets internally and 127 via MIDI¹. On the That Pedal Show demo, user presets were made and saved to different slots, including a Preset 2 Dual Head and a Preset 3 Slapback⁶.

Connections include:

• Two stereo inputs and two stereo outputs, balanced or unbalanced⁵
• MIDI In and MIDI Out/Thru³
• AUX and EXP connections³
• 9V DC power at 1000mA³

MIDI supports Clock, Program Change and Control Change messages, and Chase Bliss says the pedal can also be controlled with CV, expression pedals and external footswitches¹. The dry signal stays analog throughout, via an Analog Dry Thru path¹.

What reviewers said

Pedal of the Day's verdict was strong: "I think the [Big Time Automatone™ Analog/Digital Echo] will go down as one of the greatest delay pedals ever created"⁴. The same review noted the true stereo operation and concluded "there's not a lot this thing can't do"⁴.

Delicious Audio framed the pedal's appeal for a particular kind of player:

Delicious Audio, September 2026⁷. The reviewer described the Automatone Big Time Delay as expensive, but framed the cost against what it offers: "For players who want the anything-is-possible of digital and the everything-sounds-good of analog, this is the one."⁷

That Pedal Show devoted a full demo to it, covering the Tilt EQ slider, the 32-bit and 12-bit modes, saving presets, oscillation sounds and stereo operation in a wet-dry rig, while also acknowledging it as an expensive choice⁶.

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