Resample in your DAW

While we love bit-reduction and ‘degrader’ plugins for taking that hi-def, glossy sheen away from digital softsynth signals and samples, they can sometimes sound too obvious or heavy-handed. As an alternative, why not try bouncing the audio you’re looking to process out of your DAW at a low bit depth and/or sample rate before reimporting? If you do this without applying dithering, you’ll get an authentic, low-quality 80s or 90s digital sound with all the rounding errors and noise that old digi gear has in spades. Plus, when all your audio is bounced, you can go in and fine-tune the ending of reverb tails, add fadeins and outs, and generally tighten everything up to your own taste.