Dunno but maybe this dude [http://www.uberproaudio.com/who-plays-what/155-rushs-alex-lifeson-guitar-gear-rig-and-equipment] used it for that very application..?

Overdrive was when you drive past the limits of analog componentry. As this was analog, you tend to get soft clipping rather than a more digital hard clip. I.e. overdrive /soft clipping is where the top / bottom of the waveforms are compressed -> some crazing = overdrive.

Though the wonders of science, you can hard clip things, so rather than compress the waveform over a certain limit you just chop it off = distortion.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/2a/Clipping_compared_to_limiting.svg

Shows, 2nd one down being hard clipping, the wave forms are just chopped off, the last one being soft clipping, the tops are compressed.

So what does this all mean? An overdrive with soft clipping retains some shape / character of the waveform, so its likely to be less crazy and muddy. I.e. when you play things like chords when the waveforms interfere which each other, overdrive sounds good. Distortion on the other hand with the hard clip takes alot of the character of the wave form is lost, in turn gives a higher, flatter distortion and more importantly since the wave forms loose alot of their character multiple waves do not interact well -> chords sounding horrible. Look at the amount of clipping -> distortions give you more “compression” than overdrives (= flatter / smoother)

So if I want to enhance the sound of my guitar and let its sound shine, play chords etc then an overdrive ftw. If I want to flatten my sound a bit (lead), have some higher gain or something along those lines, then distortion ftw (or extreme overdrive which will be the same).

Unfortunately some pedal manufacturers are using either for whatever is more marketable.

With respect to overdrive vs. distortion, remember, in the strict sense, overdrive or over-powering causes distortion. The two terms really aren’t interchangeable as far as I understand.

I think a lot of the confusion comes from people describing the distortion they hear; for instance, “It sounds like an overdriven amp.” Unfortunately, a lot of people mistake the “overdrive” term when it’s used that way as distortion. Overdrive relates to input gain, whereas distortion is purely output and the result of input gain exceeding output capacity.