Walrus Audio Drops the Ages Five-State Overdrive

June 1, 2020 · 10 sources

Walrus Audio announced the Ages Five-State Overdrive, a compact overdrive pedal that marked the company's return to the format for the first time since 2016¹. The maker positioned it as a drive that works both alone and stacked with other pedals, describing it in its own words:

The pedal's centerpiece is a five-position rotary mode switch offering five internal gain and clipping combinations, from low-gain soft clipping to high-gain hard clipping¹:

A dry knob blends in the clean signal to fine-tune each gain state, which the maker says gives "a near infinite supply of gain options"⁴. The full control set:

The pedal later appeared in additional editions, including a Craftsman Series version wrapped in hand-stitched dark green leather made in collaboration with Simpleton Goods of Oklahoma City⁸, and blemished units offered at $212.49 against a standard price of $249.99, where the blemish is cosmetic only, such as scratches or dents in the finish⁹.

At launch the Ages carried a US price of $199⁶. Guitar World's reviewer Trevor Curwen found it "capable of low-level transparent boost through to hard-hitting saturation," crediting its versatility across a wide range of guitars and amps, and noting that modes I and II work as a clean boost with the gain at minimum and the volume knob around one o'clock⁶. MusicRadar's review team called it "a space-saver with an epic range of drive tones" and a practical pedalboard option for everything from clean transparent boost to hot saturated gain¹⁰.