Budweiser Budvar. Artesian water, Moravian barley, Saaz hops. This is a really nice beer. A really great malty, lager funky, hoppy smell, it hits all the points. The taste is nicely malty, fantastic Saaz bitterness. Its a real beer compared to US Bud. This is really nice and stands strongly along side any good European Lager and Pilsner. 3/5.
Southern Love from Bad Love Burgers. Crispy, juicy twice fried chicken. Good.
Rocky Ridge – Dirty Desert Pastry Stout. 8% 375ml can. Smells like rich mudcake or brownie, kind of boozy, chocolate, obviously some dark roasty malt. The head doesn’t stick around and the carbonation is very light, but that’s no issue. This tastes like a stout just crammed with super rich dark muddy chocolate cake, brownies, chocolate icing. I cant really detect the marshmallow, and there is some lactose sweetness, but that’s all very submerged in the chocolate. Nice mouthfeel and body, fitting but not viscous. Packaged in July, I’m sure something with actual marshmallows and mudcake in it needs to be drank very fresh but this is still very tasty and big and rich and its pretty damn great. A real sipper that just grows as it warms. 3/5.
Nowhereman – Alpha Ron Stout 2022. 5.6% 375ml can. First off the can art is awesome, its embossed with metallic bits, excellent. Opaque Black. Great super brown head. Smells like a straight up stout, coffee, also burnt toast. Tastes initially like a good straight up stout but as you sip, as it warms, it focuses in on the blacker malts, the darker roasted side, pretty sure all the bitterness comes from the malts, no noticeable hops at all. This is surprisingly bigger than I was expecting. The light body/mouthfeel and carbonation are both deceptive and enhancing of its punch. Another long sipper. Nice. 3.
Kinda surprised this tastes pretty much like a real cider with the kinda funkyness, a bit of sourness, a bit of that stank that comes from a natural fermented cider, a little bit wild/farmhouse, it actually tastes like there’s brettanomyces in this, but after a while the sourness seems more kettle soured, so I’m unsure. The hopping though, I’m not so much of a fan. The hops kinda come through more like a hop tea, like there hasn’t been the bio-transformation or whatever happens when you boil and ferment hops in beer wort with beer yeast. It could just be more-so that a sour beer as light and fruity as a cider would usually have little to no hopping, so comparisons are difficult to make. Its not bad and the actual cider tastes really good. I did not think it would be 8%. The non hopped one is 3.4% and is also very nice, its super dry, very tart, but still some of the same sourness and funky stank etc.
Somewhere slightly above 2.5/5.
Bach Brewing from Auckland New Zealand. A new brewery to me. And my first beer from them is a style I pretty much dislike. West Coast IPA.
Bach Brewing – Throbbing Grist, West Coast IPA. 6.6% 440ml can. Amarillo, Citra, Idaho 7 and Talus hops. Stinks like mango, passionfruit, guava etc.. but theres a bunch of other stuff going on I cant place. The earthy character balanced with the dryness from the really deep pine resin is the best bit. Its not over malty or sweet and cloying from trying to “balance” the malts with the bitterness or anything. Its a good IPA with nice modern hop weirdness, not much else to say. 2.5/5.
Haha! I got the Deluxe box set & Limited blue LP! That blue is looks fantastic and I think same as the limited to Scandinavia version of Eternal Hails (that I obviously missed out on)
Also, probably the best album cover of the last 30 years! for any band!
The Space Donut was sold out by the time I found the Rocky Ridge stand at Froth Fest (I’m sure there were maps but I’m and idiot and was stuck trying the great Artisan Brewing stuff). So I took a bus trip to a liquor store I knew had it in stock and grabbed 2 of them, then I saw the Double Dragonfruit (excellent and first “reviewed” here) and grabbed two of those. And lastly grabbed a Rosé Gose. I didn’t even want to try the Rosé Gose at Froth Fest, because its basically 2 things I’m just not a fan off, I was wrong, kind of.
Rocky Ridge – Rosé Gosé. 9%ABV 375ml can. Smells very Rosé wine, a light lacto funk, and the taste is like a big fucking punch in the mouth, Its basically Rosé grape juice, carbonated and soured, with a bit of Gose saltiness in there. But like 110% amped for all of it. Truly incredible in its just brutal fuck you-ness. Wild stuff. 3 because yes it is good, its, fantastic even and made well, and you do kind of adjust or succumb to it eventually and its actually nice, my personal dislike for Rosé wine put aside.
Rocky Ridge – Space Donuts Maple Bacon Stout. 8%ABV 500ml can. Great big tan head. Nice smoke, burnt sugar, maple syrup maybe? There’s some very roasted black malt smells. The taste is…. smoke and then… just the bottom of hell dark malt flavour’s. Fucking weird. There’s some sweetness to kind of try and level it out in the mouth, but that first sip is just a vertical drop into pure darkness. This needs to be in a bottle and aged for like at least a year or more and I would love to drink the results. Its not maple, or bacon, but its fucking awesome and bizarre. 3.5 stars. Even after it warms more and it gets a bit more sweetness its still just insane dark rich black roasted viscous insane malts. I don’t even know what the name is referencing.
Update 2/9/22: Just had this again and its a bit more boozy this time, more richer? viscous? More cloying, Still extremely dark and bitter, but it has this boozy almost sickly edge to it now.
Rocky Ridge – Double Dragon Imperial Dragonfruit Sour. 8%ABV 375ml can. The thing I missed about this the first time was the a mount of strawberry in it. In all the gaps and bits of sides of your tongue where its not the big lacto sourness, or the more big citrus side stuff, its all just strawberry. The only Dragonfruit could possibly be just the smell. Weird beer, Great beer. Really big and intense and scary drinkable. 3/5.
Didn’t listen to anything new except Crime. Listened to Sodom In the Sign of Evil a bunch of times, mostly.
Sodom – Burst Command til War
Skinny Puppy – Rodent
Crime – Baby You’re So Repulsive
Blackman’s Brewing – Arthur, Smoked Porter. 6%ABV 375ml can. Smell is a good amount of smoke, some caramel malt. Taste has that slight acidity that comes with smoked beers, but also some dark beers. (Marris Otter, Beechwood smoked malt, Carafa T3, Munich). The hops are 100% Cascade, the bitterness is mild but fitting. No real mouthfeel, good carbonation. It’s a real nice porter, and the smoke just makes it better. 2.5/5.
Artisan Brewing – Waffles, Belgian Oatmeal Porter. 4.2%ABV 375ml can. Pretty standard dark roasty malts on the nose, some caramel, nice enough. Not much mouthfeel, its pretty light actually considering oatmeal is in the name. It is 4.2% but still…I let this warm up a bit and it did slightly increase in malt flavour. This is very much a straight up Porter with very light hop bitterness. It tastes fine, is clean and nice, looks lovely. I would like more Belgian and Oatmeal and Porter, though. 2/5
