Opinion: Why Negative Reviews Matter

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Jun 202017
 
Opinion: Why Negative Reviews Matter

Two comments I came across in my reading last week stuck in my mind and dovetailed into conversations I’ve had with others over many years.  The first was from a reviewing website which stated (paraphrased) that they don’t review what they have nothing good to say about.  The other, from a high-end watch-review site called Hodinkee, quoted a journalism professor as saying “If you’re going to write about something bad, it needs to be bad in an important way. Just being bad isn’t enough.” Which got me thinking.  Why write negative reviews at all?  They’re often depressing experiences, however easily [Click here for the full review…]


Secret Treasures St. Lucia 2005 9 Year Old (Vendome Pot Still) Rum – Review

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Jun 192017
 
Secret Treasures St. Lucia 2005 9 Year Old (Vendome Pot Still) Rum - Review

#373 In recent years, St Lucia and its eponymous distillery has been inching towards its own understated cult status: pot still rums, no additives, a finish-variation here or there, good barrel strategy, all round good stuff, and somehow (don’t ask me why) still lacks the cachet of the big four (Trini Caronis, Guyana’s DDL, Bajan FourSquare and, of course, dem Jamaicans).  Many of my rum chums swear by their rums, however, whether made by independents or issued on the island, and I can tell you, they deserve the plaudits, because they’re good. Assuming you’ve already gone through various batches of [Click here for the full review…]


Rhum des Plantations St. James 1932

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Jun 182017
 
Rhum des Plantations St. James 1932

Rumaniacs Review #050 | 0450 St. James has taken its place as the source of the most ancient rhum I’ve tried in my life (the 1885), and to this day they continue to make some very good agricoles.  But you’ll forgive me for yearning for their old, out-of-production rhums, made in times that predate my own grandfather; and I like trying them not just because they’re so old and so appeal to the collector in me, but because I find it fascinating how different they are to what’s made nowadays with the appurtenances of modern technology and skill.  Such dinosaurs [Click here for the full review…]


Compagnie des Indes Guadeloupe 1998 18 Year Old Rum (Denmark) – Review

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Jun 142017
 
Compagnie des Indes Guadeloupe 1998 18 Year Old Rum (Denmark) - Review

#372 It’s always a pleasure to circle back to the now-established independent bottlers, especially those with which one has more than a glancing familiarity; they are the outfits who have carved themselves a niche in the rumiverse which for us consumers is composed of one part recognition, one part curiosity and eight parts cool rum.  The Compagnie des Indes is one of these for me, and while everyone is now aware they have started to issue the cask strength series of rums alongside lesser proofed ones (much like L’Esprit does), there will always remain a soft and envious green spot [Click here for the full review…]


Berry Bros. & Rudd 1977 36 Year Old Jamaica Rum “Overproof”

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Jun 132017
 
Berry Bros. & Rudd 1977 36 Year Old Jamaica Rum "Overproof"

Rumaniacs Review #049 | 0449 Even now, years after I acquired one of the 220 bottles of this phenomenal 36 year old rum, it retains its power to amaze and, yes, even awe. It still retails in the UK for over six hundred quid, reviews are rare as sugar in a Velier rum, and to this day it is unclear whether it is a blend — or if not, from which estate or distillery it hails.  Whatever the case, it is a great bit of Jamaican rum history and should be tried by any who get the opportunity. Colour – [Click here for the full review…]


Borgoe 15 Year Old Single Barrel Blended Rum – Review

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Jun 112017
 
Borgoe 15 Year Old Single Barrel Blended Rum - Review

#371 While SAB, the only real commercial rum producer in Suriname, makes competent blends and some very nice aged work (like the 8 year old from last week), it suffers, if the word can be used, from the following: a competitor to up the ante and push them harder within their own country; higher proof offerings as part of a connoisseur’s cabinet; a range of true single cask rums that highlights a particular point of interest in an overall oevre; and most of all, as I noted way back in the Extra Gold, that particular note of terroire that would [Click here for the full review…]


Borgoe Grand Reserve 8 Year Old Rum – Review

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Jun 082017
 
Borgoe Grand Reserve 8 Year Old Rum - Review

  #370 SAB is a Surinamese conglomerate that is very much like Banks DIH and DDL in Guyana – they have several different kinds of businesses in the portfolio, including various spirits, mostly sold on the local market.  Rums are among the few of its offerings which are exported, primarily to Holland, which comes as no surprise given their historical affiliation with the Netherlands.  At the time when I bought these bottles I was unaware of their availablity in Europe (which says rather more about my miserable googling skills than their advertising) and bought the entire line straight out of [Click here for the full review…]


Borgoe Vintage 5 Year Old Surinamese Rum – Review

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Jun 052017
 
Borgoe Vintage 5 Year Old Surinamese Rum - Review

#369 Agricoles and pot still rums aside, one does not usually expect too much from a three year old blended rum such as is the Borgoe Extra Gold we looked at earlier– although they retain their capacity to surprise — and so I had higher hopes for the five, since such lightly aged rums are often the solid pillars upon which many rum makers support the edifice of all their older (and sometimes even younger) rums.  When well made, they may even edge into sipping territory, serve as the first firm introduction to the ethos of the company and can [Click here for the full review…]


Gordon & MacPhail Long Pond 1941 Jamaican Rum

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Jun 032017
 
Gordon & MacPhail Long Pond 1941 Jamaican Rum

Rumaniacs Review #048 | 0448 For this writer, the Long Pond 1941 remains, after maybe ten separate tastings (including a Rumaniacs sample), three purchased bottles and numerous sharings, one the most spectacular Jamaican rums ever made and not simply because of the titanic age — 58 years old (beat that if you can, Appleton).  It takes the passage of years, and many other Jamaican rums to be tried alongside, for the rum to snap properly into focus and be seen for its true quality.  And unlike the earlier Velier rums which sometimes sell for €4000-5000 a bottle, if they can even [Click here for the full review…]


Borgoe Extra: Aged Suriname Golden Rum – Review

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Jun 012017
 
Borgoe Extra: Aged Suriname Golden Rum - Review

#368 There is no shortage of agricoles, independent bottlers and flavour-of-the-month rums in my notebooks — but in late 2016, and again in early 2017, I tried the Borgoe line from Suriname – all 40% rums – back to front, front to back and side by side, twice, and it’s time to see what they’re all about.  After all, we all know of the big guns in the rum world but the lesser-known operators deserve their moment in the sun as well. So let’s start at the bottom and work our way up to the top, young to old, beginning [Click here for the full review…]


J. Bally Rhum Vieux Agricole Millésime 1960

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May 302017
 
J. Bally Rhum Vieux Agricole Millésime 1960

Rumaniacs Review #047 | 0447 Unless I start springing a few grand for ancient rums from the 1920s and 1930s, this is likely to be the oldest Bally rum I’ll ever see, or try.  I suppose I could take a stab a guessing how truly old it is – who knows, maybe it’s in the fifteen year range too? – but for the moment I think I’ll just revel in the fact that it was made almost sixty years ago, way before I was born, by Jacques Bally’s boys before the estate shut down in the late 1980s and the [Click here for the full review…]


J. Bally Rhum Vieux Agricole Millésime 1975

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May 292017
 
J. Bally Rhum Vieux Agricole Millésime 1975

Rumaniacs Review #046 | 0446 We’re going back down memory lane now, to a point where the AOC designation is a dream on the horizon, and for once we have an age: this rum is sixteen years old (based on the bottom of the bottle where it says “Bottled February 1991” in French).  This of course leads us to puzzle our way through all the others we’ve looked at already, because if here they can call a 16YO a “rhum vieux” then the other Bally rhums are in all likelihood similarly aged – we just have no proof of the matter. In [Click here for the full review…]


J. Bally Rhum Vieux Agricole Millésime 1979

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May 282017
 
J. Bally Rhum Vieux Agricole Millésime 1979

Rumaniacs Review #045 | 0445 By now two things are clear about these older Bally rhums – aside from some educated guesswork, we don’t know how old they are, and by this time, 1979, the AOC noted on the label is somewhat of a puzzler, unless the thing is seventeen years old, in which case it would hardly be labelled a mere “rhum vieux” but an “XO”.  So maybe after the initial ageing they stored it in tanks or flagons and only bottled it after 1996…or, more likely, it came under a previous version of the official 1996 AOC designation.  At [Click here for the full review…]


Neisson L’Esprit 70⁰ Blanc Rum – Review

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May 252017
 
Neisson L'Esprit 70⁰ Blanc Rum - Review

#367 In my own limited experience, Neisson has been one of the most distinctive Martinique agricole makers I’ve come across.  There’s something salty, oily, tequila-ish and musky in those of their rums I’ve tried, and while this might not always be to my liking, the quality of their work could never be denied.  To date, I’ve stuck with their aged rums, but back in 2016 L’homme à la Poussette (I’m thinking his poussette should be retired soon as his kids grow up but I hope he never changes the name of his site) passed along this ferocious white rhino, perhaps [Click here for the full review…]


J. Bally Rhum Vieux Agricole Millésime 1982

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May 242017
 
J. Bally Rhum Vieux Agricole Millésime 1982

Rumaniacs Review #044 | 0444 We’re slowly moving past the more recent vintages of the Bally rums and into something not necessarily older, but bottled from longer ago.  Hopefully they’ll throw some light into the development of the profile over the years.  The quality of the older expressions is not necessarily or always better just because it was made thirty five years ago…but yeah, perhaps in this case it is. The 1982 is certainly one fine piece of work, made at the original Bally site before the distillery closed in 1989 and production was shifted over to Simon. Colour – Dark Amber [Click here for the full review…]


J. Bally Rhum Vieux Agricole Millésime 1992

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May 232017
 
J. Bally Rhum Vieux Agricole Millésime 1992

Rumaniacs Review #043 | 0443 Leaving aside the independent bottlers, the agricolistas from Guadeloupe and Martinique seem to like producing a specific year’s output with much more enthusiasm than most molasses based rum producers, who (until recently) preferred to release specific “recipe-style” blends that changed little from year to year.  There’s something to say for both ideas – consistency of taste over time, versus the individualism of specific date points – which just supports my thesis that even in writing about a social spirit, larger philosophical issues about our world can be discussed using them as an example. In this case, we’re [Click here for the full review…]


Nine Leaves “Almost Spring” (Cabernet Sauvignon) Rum – Review

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May 232017
 
Nine Leaves "Almost Spring" (Cabernet Sauvignon) Rum - Review

#366 Nine Leaves, for whose intriguing rums I have always retained a real fondness, remains a one man operation in Japan, and while I have not written much about them of late, they continue their regular six month release regimen without pause, and have become must-stop booths at the various festivals they exhibit at on the Circuit.  Every now and then they issue an expression somewhat at right angles to their regular “six-month-aged” line, such as the Velier 70th Anniversary edition from 2017, the two-year-old “Encrypted” from 2016 and this one-year-old from 2015, which was the commercial 48% variation of [Click here for the full review…]


J. Bally Rhum Vieux Agricole Millésime 1993

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May 212017
 
J. Bally Rhum Vieux Agricole Millésime 1993

Rumaniacs Review #042 | 0442 The first of six Bally rums (no relation to me), which we’ll also post faster than usual, since they are, again, part of a series.  Let’s start with the most recent. For those who are interested in agricoles (which these assuredly are), J. Bally from Martinique has been around since 1917 or so (land prices after the 1902 eruption of Mount Pelee were low), but the sugar estate of Lajus goes back even further, to the mid-1600s.  Alas, Bally has been closed since 1989, but their stills continue.  The Simon distillery now owns them, and supposedly the original [Click here for the full review…]


Hamilton St. Lucia 2004 Pot Still 9 Year Old Rum – Review

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May 182017
 
Hamilton St. Lucia 2004 Pot Still 9 Year Old Rum - Review

#365 Just about everyone in the rum world knows the name of Ed Hamilton. He was the first person to set up a website devoted to rum (way back in 1995), and many of us writers who began our own blogs in the 2000s or early ‘teens — Tiare, Tatu, Chip, myself and others — started our online lives writing in and debating on the forums of the Ministry of Rum. He has written books about rum, ran tasting sessions for years, and is now a distributor for several brands around the USA.  A few years ago, he decided to [Click here for the full review…]


Appleton Estate 50 Year Old Rum (2012)

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May 162017
 
Appleton Estate 50 Year Old Rum (2012)

Rumaniacs Review #041 | 0441 Note: The initial full length review can be found in the main reviews section. Everyone knows about the 50 year old rum which Appleton pushed out the door a few years ago.  Not only because of the age, which they touted as “the oldest rum ever” even though that was patently untrue, but because of the stratospheric price, which even now hovers around the US$4500 mark (give or take).  I’m not sure if they still make it — it was specifically commissioned for Jamaica’s 50th anniversary of Independence in 1962, so I suspect it was [Click here for the full review…]


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