Winnipeg Electrical Co. Puts Their Best Foot Forward With A Fuzzy Blues Driver

From smoother BD-2 flavored overdrive to fuzz, the Homework Series Blues pedal brings Canadian flavor to my board.

Fresh off my first trip to Canada to spend New Years in Montreal, we have our first Canadian pedal review of 2024. There are a ton of great builders from up north, and sometimes I fail to talk about them enough, but Winnipeg Electrical Co. surely deserves some attention. And today, Winnipeg Electrical Co. brings us their Homework Series Blues pedal, a heavily modified take on the Boss BD-2.

I’ve been especially looking forward to this one ever since last year’s Electric Love FX Aquatone review. That modified Blues Driver-style pedal made my top 10 pedals of 2023 list at Ultimate Guitar, and has been on my board ever since. So to get another take on the totally underappreciated circuit has me stoked.

The Blues has a smoother sound than the sometimes bristly BD-2, with low and mid EQ controls added alongside the standard tone knob. These allow for precise control over the width of those frequencies within the distorted sound, while the tone serves as more of a high end filter. Volume and gain are pretty self explanatory, while the toggle lets you choose between an overdrive mode and a fuzz mode, a common mod to many BD-2 circuits. For $147 USD ($199 CAD), I’m pretty interested.

Let’s Dive In

Alright, this pedal is loud and packs a lot of gain. We’re off to a good start. While I’m not going to directly compare it to my beloved Aquatone overdrive throughout the article, it’s definitely packing a brighter and louder punch than the Aquatone. I really love how it interacted with the P90s in my Little Wing guitar, as it really kept their unique feel throughout. That’s likely because the Blues (and Boss BD-2) is a transparent overdrive at heart, until you touch the 3-band EQ.

These controls are also quite powerful on the Homework Series Blues pedal, and I really liked the scooped mids sounds I could dial in. Boss’s Blues Driver is basically my favorite overdrive pedal of all time, so connecting with this boutique version was easy. But what also contributed to my strong feelings was the price, a respectable $129 USD. That’s affordable by boutique standards, and almost the same price as a new Boss BD-2, while packing a lot more features.

So what it comes down to is what kind of guitarist you are. Do you want the simpler, original Blues Driver package? Nothing wrong with that certainly. But if you value the ability to shape your frequency to match different guitar or amp combinations, it’s kind of a no brainer to consider this. The Homework Series Blues may not be groundbreaking or revolutionary, but it’s a highly useful overdrive pedal for many out there. And it’s really not an egregious price for all that function either.

All of that comes before we’ve even discussed the fuzz mode, which was LOUD. Hard not to enjoy the sound of a ton of transistors slamming together in fuzzy warm goodness. Again, this isn’t a groundbreaking approach to fuzz, or a particularly versatile fuzz the way the Fuzz Lands was, but it’s a great sounding classic fuzz nonetheless. And you get that alongside a very popular and widely effective overdrive sound.

So as you can see, the Winnipeg Electrical Co Blues pedal is a relatively easy one to enjoy. It’s not going to be the sexiest new pedal you find this year, but it may end up as one of your most used new pedals. And it’s going to cost you a lot less than most boutique drives. So that’s a quality combination in my book. I do think this pedal could be overly complicated for some, not because it’s hard to use though. I just fear that some people want a pure Blues Driver, but will get this and endlessly twiddle the knobs searching for something that they already own. But if you already own a BD-2 or are curious about one, but it hasn’t quite meshed with your rig yet, the Homework Series Blues is a problem solver. Go check out their store and peruse their many cool pedals!