In natural environments complex and continuous auditory stimulation is virtually ubiquitous. The human auditory system has evolved to efficiently process an infinitude of everyday sounds, which range from short, simple bursts of noise to signals with a much higher order of information such as speech. Investigation of temporal processing in this system using the ERP technique has led to great advances in our knowledge. However, this method is restricted by the need to present simple, discrete, repeated stimuli in order to obtain a useful response. Alternatively the continuous auditory steady-state response (ASSR) is employed but this method reduces the evoked response to its fundamental frequency component at the expense of useful information on the timing of response transmission through the auditory system. In this paper, we describe a method for eliciting a novel ERP, which circumvents these limitations, known as the AESPA (Auditory Evoked Spread Spectrum Analysis). This method uses rapid amplitude modulation of audio carrier signals to estimate the impulse response of the auditory system. We show AESPA responses with high signal to noise ratios which were obtained using two types of carrier wave: a 1 kHz tone and broadband noise (BBN). In order to characterize these responses, they are compared to AEPs elicited using standard techniques. A number of similarities and differences between the responses are noted and these are discussed in light of the differing stimulation and analysis methods used. Data is presented which demonstrates the generalizability of the AESPA method and a number of applications are proposed.