Firstly thanks to all of you who have read my blog (c296,000 up from 228,000 last year) and followed me on social media.
#Rant
I'd been seriously drinking whisky for 10 years before I discovered the whisky community on twitter back in December 2009, since then I've made loads of friends, many of which I've also met in person. I started my blog in January 2017 on the back of a conversation with a twitter friend. Twitter has always been a bit difficult: adverts (which really piss me off!), bots, porn, politics and some very dodgy people. Since Musk took it over and renamed it X all of these things have got much worse, he's using it to push his own agenda and whilst it doesn't directly involve the whisky community there are too many people talking shit, abusing friends and making it a much worse place. When he made tweetdeck a paid for add-on it made following online tasting much more difficult.
For these reasons I've decide that at the end of this year I will stop tweeting, or whatever you are supposed to call it now. I'm not alone, a lot of the whisky community have already moved over to BlueSky and if you haven't yet then why not? Some distilleries and indie bottlers have also made the move, some haven't so I'll keep my account open so I can continue DMs with them. My hope is they'll all move over sooner rather than later. BlueSky even has a tweetdeck alternative - great for online tastings!
OK rant over - let's get on to the good stuff!
#BlindDrams with the Blind Tasting Consortium
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#Finally...
In to the 5th year of the Blind Tasting Consortium and we held a further 11 tastings! As usual this took the format of one member of the group spending our £830 on 10 bottles of whisky (5 sets of 2) bottling them up and sending them to the other 27 people for a Blind Tasting - opinions are then shared before the bottles are revealed!
We've now tried 244 different whiskies from all over the world, some very good, some not so good, the benefits of blind tasting is that we don't get to see the packaging, the bottle or any marketing so there's to preconceived ideas as to what the whisky is like - we taste it blind and give honest opinions. We've now had over 130 people take part in our tastings - sometimes our regulars can't make it so we pull in reserves. More info here! Huge thanks to John @jwbassman_ for all the great ads.
#SadTimes
It was a huge shock in August when we were told that Kate @kccjf had suddenly died. A friend, member of the #BlindDrams Blind Tasting Consortium and a huge personality loved by all in the whisky community. We attended an amazing funeral and wake and send our love to Callum and their children.
It was a huge shock in August when we were told that Kate @kccjf had suddenly died. A friend, member of the #BlindDrams Blind Tasting Consortium and a huge personality loved by all in the whisky community. We attended an amazing funeral and wake and send our love to Callum and their children.
#DrivenByDramsTour
Highlight of the year was the #DrivenByDrams gang visiting Glasgow and Arran. We visited a number distilleries, most for Warehouse Tastings, read all about it here!
Highlight of the year was the #DrivenByDrams gang visiting Glasgow and Arran. We visited a number distilleries, most for Warehouse Tastings, read all about it here!
Huge thanks to @jwbassman_, @mgilberties, @andy_watkinson & @mentaldrams for a great time and some of the photos below!
#WhiskySpreadsheet
There are now over 550 users of my whisky spreadsheet with new ideas and suggestions being embodies all the time. An updated version will be out soon for 2025 with a few more stats! More info here!
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#TweetTasting
I've been lucky enough to be selected to take part in a few @TweetTastings organised by the brilliant Steve Rush.
These have been a brilliant way to try new drams and more importantly share your thoughts about them in real time with others - it's like sitting in a room of 20 people enjoying a dram or two and talking about them - but you can hear what everyone else is saying and join in every conversation!
#KendalWhiskyFestival
The 4th year of the best festival in England, this time I went for the weekend again helping setup, welcome visitors, supporting masterclasses and of course tidying up afterwards! There's nothing better than meeting up with friends old and new, draming with some of my favourite distilleries.
#My Top Ten Whiskies of the Year
I've been lucky enough to be selected to take part in a few @TweetTastings organised by the brilliant Steve Rush.
| Brave New Spirits Speyside Distillery Glasgow 1770 Jura | Saltaire Rare Malt Whisky White Peak Wire Works Cù Bòcan |
These have been a brilliant way to try new drams and more importantly share your thoughts about them in real time with others - it's like sitting in a room of 20 people enjoying a dram or two and talking about them - but you can hear what everyone else is saying and join in every conversation!
#SouthportWinterFestival
A great little festival with the chance to meet up with friends and distillery reps for probably the first show of the season!
A great little festival with the chance to meet up with friends and distillery reps for probably the first show of the season!
#GlasgowWhiskyFestival
My first visit to the Glasgow Whisky Festival, great to meet up with loads of new people, I even dragged Mrs MaltMusings along!
My first visit to the Glasgow Whisky Festival, great to meet up with loads of new people, I even dragged Mrs MaltMusings along!
The 4th year of the best festival in England, this time I went for the weekend again helping setup, welcome visitors, supporting masterclasses and of course tidying up afterwards! There's nothing better than meeting up with friends old and new, draming with some of my favourite distilleries.
#My Top Ten Whiskies of the Year
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How do you pick your top whiskies? It's really difficult! But as I've said before I use a scoring method from @TomsWhisky But #EveryPalateIsDifferent and whisky is very subjective so my scoring is private - I don't usually publish my scores except as part of #BlindDrams. For my top ten list I've picked those which I rated 5.
These are the top ten drams of the 524 I tried for the first time in 2024:
- White Peak 2019 5yo Single Cask #STR AO 19-146 (Petites Eaux Proofing)
- Loch Lomond 2014 10yo Distillery Edition #7
- White Peak 2019 4yo Single Cask #2019-052 Down'ards
- Dumbarton 2000 20yo Single Cask [WIN] (Red Wine)
- Annandale 2017 6yo Single Cask #1036 Man O'Words (Oloroso) BYO
- Caol Ila 2007 17yo Single Cask #313181 [Saltaire]
- Glen Scotia 2014 9yo Campbeltown Malts Festival 2024 (Fino)
- Loch Lomond 2015 8yo Distillery Edition #5
- Ardmore 2008 13yo [SMWS] 66.225
- Scottish Blended Grain Act One [SHC]
Some others worthy of mention include:
- Ardnahoe Society 2024
- Glasgow 1770 2018 5yo Single Cask #18/981 (Triple D Tequila)
- Cooper King Transatlantic
- Edradour 10yo [SV]
- Blair Athol 2006 17yo Single Cask #314746B [BNSp] (Wine)
- Glenmorangie 1996 17yo Single Cask #7025 [CWC]
These are the drams which rated a 0 this year :
- Brennerei L. Psenner eRètico 2017 5yo
- Arbikie 1794 Highland Single Grain
- Lagg 2020 3yo Single Cask #20/1154 (Sauternes)
- Speyside Blend Cadenhead [CA]
- Springbank 2016 7yo Single Cask #W5R312 (Cage)
Finally a huge thanks to my best mate John @jwbassman_ for our regular online tastings, tours and his work creating the ads for #BlindDrams. Looking forward to more of the same next year and the Southport Whisky Festival in a few weeks!
#GeekyStuff
Whisky Stats
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Visitor locations in 2024
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Sláinte!
- 524 new drams tried this year, my total is now over 3,341 different whiskies
- I've now tried whiskies from 32 different counties and 334 different distilleries
Worldwide Distilleries tried
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| Top distilleries tried |
Blog stats
- 76 articles published on the blog this year, total now of 759!
- over 296,000 page reads of this blog
Top 10 blog posts in 2024
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Visitor locations in 2024
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#2025
Well - goodbye to 2024 and hello to 2025 - I'm sure it will be even better - some plans:
- Trip to Campbeltown with the #DrivenByDrams gang
- More Blind Tasting Consortium #BlindDrams including our 505th outing!
- Get to a few more whisky festivals
- More discussions with you!
Sláinte!
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