It took three pedals to realize I don’t like the Blues Driver
I know how much love the Blues Driver gets on Reddit, forums, and YouTube. The distinguished tone connoisseur and boutique cork sniffer loves this pedal.
I started with the Keeley Super Fat Mod, which was okay. Then I tried the TC Cinders, which was much less expensive, but also just okay. Finally, I bit the bullet and bought the platonic ideal, which is to say the Boss Waza Craft BD-2 Blues Driver, the OG.
I just don’t think it sounds very good.
Certainly not as an overdrive. Probably owing to the cascading gain structure or whatever, it does clean up more or less perfectly, which is to say you can’t hear any clipping at lower gain levels. But in that edge-of-breakup territory, it has this kind of fizziness that just sounds gross to me.
It does sound cool more as a distortion circuit, but it has this woolliness that just doesn’t work with my playing.
It’s also surprising how much distortion it kicks out. It’s probably often said that this should have been marketed as a distortion pedal, and I think part of its enduring legacy maybe is due to the surprise when it subverts expectations.
But yeah, not for me. Apparently, for a lot of other people, though.