LR Baggs Align Series Session Pedal review

Add some studio shine to your sound

  • £219
  • €218
  • $179

MusicRadar Verdict

Enhancement for your electro-acoustic guitar - once you’ve turned this on you won’t want to turn it off.

Pros

  • +

    Effective yet transparent compression. Easy to use.

Cons

  • -

    Pricey.

MusicRadar's got your back Our team of expert musicians and producers spends hours testing products to help you choose the best music-making gear for you. Find out more about how we test.

This pedal is designed to bring studio tone to your live rig by providing enhancement for your sound in the shape of saturation and compression that’s especially tailored for acoustic guitars. 

The compression is multiband so you have different amounts applied to the low, mid and high frequencies rather than a blanket compression over the whole signal. While that may sound complicated, it’s actually a no-brainer to use with just a single knob, which ushers in natural compression that’s very responsive to how you play. 

Pretty transparent with no obvious squashing or unwanted altering of note transients, this is smooth and silky compression that keeps the sound consistently solid and prevents any spiky frequencies from getting too prominent. 

Saturation, similarly added by a single knob, adds warmth, giving your sound more body. Combine them and you’ll find a sweet spot that improves and enriches. 

Trevor Curwen has played guitar for several decades – he's also mimed it on the UK's Top of the Pops. Much of his working life, though, has been spent behind the mixing desk, during which time he has built up a solid collection of the guitars, amps and pedals needed to cover just about any studio session. He writes pedal reviews for Guitarist and has contributed to Total Guitar, MusicRadar and Future Music among others.