Black Lion Audio Bluey: Everything You Need To Know: Shootout/Demo/Review

To purchase the Black Lion Audio Bluey: https://amzn.to/46nCxic
To purchase the Black Lion Audio Bluey 500 Series Module: https://amzn.to/3Qdc7Kx

Decided to get on reviewing this thing after owning it for close to a year. While I wish I could say I used this way more than I hoped to. It mostly sat in my rack for the majority of the time I had it. There's no doubt my love for Audioscape hails supreme in all of my mix choices when given the chance. However, the Audioscape Rev A is just the perfect amount of everything and therefore it's not just my baby and one of my favorite compressors I own. It's pretty my go-to choice when it comes to needing just a little bit extra. While I did have fun with the Black Lion Audio Bluey, at the end of the day it was just fun, and nothing more. I couldn't justify needing something with this much umph and color.

The grit, girth, gain, saturation, and color of over a million greek gods and all the horsepower to make the Daytona 500 feel like a snail race. It just didn't fit into my workflow as well as I wanted it to. Having the other compressors, and being at the price point that it was at. It just made more sense for me to sell it. I don't think it's a bad compressor by any means, this thing is certainly a heavy hitter if you want to make your vocals, guitars, kick, snare, or bass realllllllly upfront in a mix. It was just a bit too much.

I've seen reviews online where people said this thing can be "sweet and soft", "the voice of an angel", and "forgiving, kind, lush, and beautiful". That's simply just not true, honestly, it can't. The mix knob helps for sure, absolutely. You can 100% dial it back. It won't be as aggressive, but the bite and tone are still there. If I wanted to use this on an airy soft vocal, the vocal would have grit on it, volume and push, and a good stroke of color for added measure pretty much changing the overall vibe of the vocal itself. Once again, it's fun, it certainly can be practical if your mixes want to be front and center. Using this thing on a female vocalist to bring out oomph and power for some sort of ballad or pop masterpiece (think Celine Dion or Whitney Huston), would be awesome. Using this thing on a singer-songwriter whose whole vibe is to relay sadness, probably not so much.

A couple of things I didn't mention in the video in regards to very specifics. From my own personal experience, this is the best-built, and best-sounding Black Lion Audio product that they make that's not a mod. As far as I know, it's one of the very few things Black Lion Audio actually makes fully in the USA. I didn't mention my customer service experience with Black Lion Audio. As I have no comment on that. When my BLA Bluey arrived from Guitar Center used, the VU Meter bulb was dead, and when I reached out for customer service to get it looked at under warranty or even out of warranty. Take that how you want.

I did have fun with this and was very very cool to use and very neat to see the end result on a lot of stuff. I was shocked by the comparison to the Waves plugins. Honestly, it's really hard to justify spending that extra money unless you have it to blow for something that'll get you about 85% of the way there.

If you're a Chris Lord Alge fan then obviously, you're going to want this. You'll absolutely get his tone, his larger-than-life sound, and feel behind every one of your mixes with it. It most certainly is CLA in a box.

0:00 Intro
0:18 A Little Bit About The Bluey
2:05 Black Lion Audio As A Company
2:15 Built In The USA
2:40 Build Quality
3:15 VU Meter Replacement
3:56 Price
4:30 Other Options In Comparison
5:30 Explaining My Demo Process Wet/Dry Bypassing
6:00 Explaining My Demo Process Hardware/Software Comparison
7:47 Front Of The Unit Knobs/Features
10:00 Back Of The Unit Features/Outputs
10:26 Guitar No Compression
11:10 Guitar BLA Bluey
11:56 Guitar CLA-76 By Waves
12:40 On/Off BLA Bluey Comparison
13:31 Snare Drum No Compression
14:05 Snare BLA Bluey
14:38 Snare CLA-76 By Waves
15:13 Snare NUKED BLA Bluey
15:47 On/Off BLA Bluey Comparison
16:23 Kick Drum No Compression
17:28 Kick Drum BLA Bluey
18:34 Kick Drum CLA-76 By Waves
19:39 Kick Drum NUKED BLA Bluey
20:45 Kick Drum On/Off BLA Bluey Comparison
21:50 Bass Guitar No Compression
22:24 Bass Guitar BLA Bluey
22:56 Bass Guitar CLA-76 By Waves
23:27 Bass Guitar On/Off BLA Bluey Comparison
24:30 Aggressive Vocals No Compression
25:31 Aggressive Vocals BLA Bluey
26:32 Aggressive Vocals CLA-76 By Waves
27:33 Aggresive Vocals On/Off BLA Bluey Comparison
28:30 Final Thoughts And Collective Thoughts And Opinions
31:44 ITS FUN!!! More Collective Thoughts
35:12 Outro