Providence FDR-1F Flame Drive

The Providence FDR-1F Flame Drive is an overdrive pedal from the Japanese maker Providence, and it opened the company's upmarket F Series range¹. It sits among Providence's gain pedals as a drive with its own character: MusicRadar's reviewers found it softer around the edges than the rock-rhythm-oriented Sonic Drive, and less mid-heavy than the Stampede OD while giving the impression of more gain, retaining what they called a sizzly, Marshall-like edge¹.

What It Does

The Flame Drive's job is overdrive with rich harmonics and clarity, and MusicRadar's overall verdict called it "a superb overdrive, but only the truly tone obsessed will justify the extra outlay over the S Series for the extra sonic" quality¹. In a 2012 Guitar Techniques roundup on MusicRadar, the pedal was described as reminiscent of the SOV-2 Overdrive but with more gain and low-end power, and as "a very musical pedal, ideal for emotive soloing"².

Two features do work beyond the drive itself:

• Vitalizer circuit: a buffer that prevents signal degradation when chaining many pedals together, and it stays active even when the pedal is off². MusicRadar called it "a super-plush buffer"¹.
• VNS (vitalized noiseless switching): eliminates pops when turning the pedal on and off¹.

The bass boost switch is the one tonal extra. MusicRadar found it useful for fattening single coils, or for adding extra low-end resonance when using a little amp and cab bass boost¹. The 2012 roundup likewise noted the pedal's low-end power came with that bass boost switch on board².

Build and Design

The pedal was designed by Yuki Hayashi¹. Inside, everything is soldered directly to custom PCBs, with metal fixings and a switch protector to minimize the risk of damage, and the IC chip is disguised with plastic¹. At the time of the 2012 UK review the Flame Drive FDR-1F carried a list price of £316 GBP².

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