A hard grain’s a-gonna pour
How does Bob Dylan’s new whiskey rank alongside his other creative endeavours?
It’s been six years since his last selection of new songs. His last creative venture was an exhibition of ironwork sculptures, mostly gates (“Gates appeal to me,” Bob said. “they can shut you out or shut you in. And in some ways there is no difference”). It’s enough to drive a Dylan fan to drink, frankly. And that’s exactly how you can enjoy brand-new Bob product: the great man has just released Heaven’s Door, a collection of three American whiskeys – a collection, we’re told, that “in their own way, tell a story”.
Bob’s partner in the venture, drinks industry veteran Marc Bushala, recalls being instructed after one distillation that the whiskey should “feel more like a wood structure”, but admits: “We were nodding like we understood, but we didn’t really.”
so in an attempt to see the woodiness for the trees, we invited Andrew Watson, founder of the British Bourbon Appreciation society, to help assess Dylan’s latest creative offering. He tasted all three of Bob’s beverages – a tennessee straight bourbon, a ‘double barrel’ whiskey and a straight rye whiskey.
“Every single whiskey claims to ‘tell a story’,” notes Watson, on spotting Heaven’s Door’s tagline. “One story I’d like to hear is why he’s calling it ‘tennessee bourbon’. that’s almost a contradiction, like saying ‘Champagne cava’.”
Watson explains that most bourbon is from Kentucky, while tennessee whiskey such as Jack Daniel’s differentiates itself by use of the ‘Lincoln County method’ of charcoal filtration. still, it tastes agreeable enough. “It’s quite sweet, isn’t it? All the usual flavours are there: corn, caramel, vanilla, slight apple notes in there. It’s very easy to drink – it’s 90 proof but tastes lower. It’s designed to appeal to everybody, and I think it does that.”
the double barrel, meanwhile – a blend of three different whiskeys, using “new American oak barrels for a secondary ageing” – is a more potent customer, and the pick of the bunch for our connoisseur. “You get a lot more flavour around the palate; it’s a bit harsher around the mouth because of the oakiness and the toasted barrels. It’s 100 proof, so it’s gonna be a bit punchier, but it has a nice long finish.”
the last bottle we try is a the straight rye whiskey, finished in air-dried barrels in Vosges, France. Although a quaffable enough little number, for Watson it lacks depth: “It doesn’t linger long on the palate, and it’s lowproof – it’s 92, an odd number, and that’s not explained. And why that part of France? How long for? How did you get them all the way back to tennessee? If you’re asking 50-80 dollars a bottle, this stuff matters.”
If there is indeed a story to be told, Watson’s view is that you can’t leave it up to the consumer’s interpretation as you might do a song lyric. Whiskey drinkers spending top dollar want it spelled out to them in terms of details about the distillation process, ageing and so forth. His conclusion: “the drinks are decent enough, but you’re paying double the price you should because it has Dylan’s name on it.”
that hasn’t stopped the initial Us batch, released in six states, selling out. It seems that Bob Dylan’s artistic essence is still a draw for many, even in liquid form.
“Calling it ‘Tennessee bourbon’ is almost a contradiction, like saying ‘Champagne cava’” ANDREw wATSoN