The Barge VFB-2 is an incredibly useful pedal. I currently use mine to make to tame my octave pedals a little, in which I run a Digitech Whammy and MXR Bass Octave. I've always found that I much prefer the sound of the MXR Bass Octave in the VFB-2 loop, it just sounds much nicer to my ears - less boomy and a clearer sound. But more to the point, the VFB-2 is great for taming fuzz and drive pedals in particular.
Another +1 on the Fulltone Bassdrive too. I haven't tried many drive pedals of this kind of price, but I honestly don't feel like I need to as this pedal has done very well for me in pretty much every band I've played with over the past 4 years. It does old school grunt very well and it also screams like an evil thing if you need it to! I think for a lot of people the appeal of this pedal is that it doesn't mess with your low end too much, I don't find that I'm having to compensate for the amount of bass this pedal produces.