All-Pedal's super versatile and smoothly textured Slamurai Bushido Drive is even more appealing in Limited Parlor Stealth Black Edition

There are so many Overdrives out there in the world that it is all to easy for us to miss and overlook an exceptional candidate - and that is exactly what happened to me for the Slamurai. It doesn’t give away too much about its provenance - what circuit it is based on and does it have discrete components and / or an opamp or two as its key tone generators?

All-Pedal describe the Slamurai as a particularly Dynamic Overdrive with unparalleled touch-sensitivity and an amp-like output across an enormous range - which actually turns about to be entirely accurate!

The output is beautifully harmonically textured, but silky smooth too, and the 3-Band EQ is very much perfectly calibrated for guitar as they promise. You get full usability across the whole range of the dials - and never does the pedal sound choked, overly compressed, spiky or flabby. It maintains its articulation throughout the range and just sounds revelatory every which way.

I never know what I’m going to get when I check out a new pedal - I always set my expectations fairly low and hope to be pleasantly surprised. Which happened in spades here - there is a huge range of gain and tones on-tap here and it’s wholly effortless to dial in. It moreover has a wonderful smooth and even character which still has some beautiful harmonics in the mix - which always stay on the right side of supremely tasteful.

I think that should be the label for this Overdrive - ’Supremely Tasteful’ it’s just so easily usable that you can’t fail to be impressed. I personally was more than a little pleasantly surprised - this is a proper find - and should rank with my favourite overdrives of all time. It doesn’t quite have the crunch of my special modded BD-2 but it takes you everywhere from clean boost to beyond mid-level gain - in style!

The stock version in amber and red is incredibly beautiful, while the Parlor (Root Beer brand) Stealth Edition is really special - the photography doesn’t quite convey how elegant this pedal looks up close - it’s a pin-up for sure.

The nature of the All-Pedal designs is that the PCB’s are typically reversed - and you need to unscrew all the knobs and sockets to get at the components - which it too much of a palaver for me! I only typically share gut-shots when they are easily accessed, or when the builder provides me with that reference shot.

I would love to know exactly what topology this is based upon as it doesn’t obviously neatly fit into any of the key categories that I can discern - possibly JFET or MOSFET based - would be cool if someone could share some insights on its provenance!

Definitely one of my favourites to date - and I own a lot! Expect to see this in fairly liberal rotation!

Are there any Slamurai fans among you?