LunaStone Blue Drive 1 review

Kicking boost into overdrive

  • £169
  • €192
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MusicRadar Verdict

A responsive low-to-medium level overdrive with a cutting edge, whatever your musical preference.

Pros

  • +

    Excellent for blues tones, but goes beyond that. Wide-ranging tone control.

Cons

  • -

    May be too bright for some.

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The Blue Drive 1 explores that area where boost turns to overdrive, starting off as a fine clean boost with the drive down, moving on to add grit to a medium-level drive, along with a wide-ranging tone control, which can get strident in the top end if ice-pick tone is called for. 

Nicely responsive, this is a pedal that reacts whether you are gently caressing the strings or digging in with aggression. LunaStone states the inspiration for the pedal comes from the blues genre and the marketing of the name reflects that. 

However, we believe that an overdrive is an overdrive and shouldn’t be limited to a particular musical ghetto. This is a particularly good one and while it - justifiably - might be right up a blues player’s street, it’s really for anyone who wants to extend the range of their clean amp into something a little grittier with more top-end bite. 

Trevor Curwen

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.