Single Cask vs Heritage Grain Release | Various ABV

Rebellion

I have never been a rebellious man. I don’t think it’s in my nature. But our nature has limits and sometimes, when ideals or common sense are challenged, rebellion - however tame or quiet - is the only option.

Growing up I wasn’t the sort of child that disagreed too much with authority or those more experienced in life. I don’t think I resisted set bed times too much and I almost always ate the supper that was put in front of me without complaining, whether mouth-watering or barely palatable. Arguments and fights with other kids weren’t common, except with my baby brother whose character and temperament differed from mine in such a way that we found ourselves polar opposites in nearly every aspect of life.

In the years that followed, as hair started to grow in places I didn’t necessarily want it to and acne turned my face into an ever-evolving map of seismic activity, my braces-clad mouth wasn’t big or loud and it didn’t oppose forms of authority out of pubescent recalcitrance.

Being bullied to the point of having to change schools and therefore lacking even the slightest hint of self-confidence surely contributed to this, but even if it hadn’t been for that, I probably still wouldn’t have been a contumacious teenager. I have always been a fairly go-with-the-flow, happy-go-lucky type.

These days though I do feel a need for outspoken rebellion because, by the pricking of my thumbs, something wicked this way comes: Artificial Intelligence.

I don’t think any technological advancement has set off my alarm bells quite as much as this creepy hellscape of software. I should probably explain.

We’ve all seen the first sort of pictures and videos that AI programs were able to create. Or the plainly wrong answers to simple questions. Outcomes of visual prompts ranged from downright impressive to worthy of a laugh.

Then came the pictures and videos of politicians and celebrities saying or doing things they never said or did, with people they weren’t with, in places where they were not. Then came the fabricated historical accounts and pictures. And the scenes of war and disasters that never happened.

Then came the ability to render and alter human bodies in pictures at a pace and an ease never seen before, resulting in the faces of prominent people edited onto nude models and pornographic actors. Or, perhaps worse; to be undressed in their own pictures. It’s being used for sexual exploitation, blackmail, slander, reputation destruction and other purposes, by those motivated by malice.

It also became painfully obvious that some of these AI chatbots were and still are coded to give answers that are anything but impartial and factual. Results of prompts will sometimes be heavily influenced by one or the other political ideologies, thereby steering users into whatever direction deemed correct by the people behind the software.

All of this nastiness continues to spread. In the news or when browsing online, you can’t miss it. It’s been going on for long enough now. And what happened? Massive outrage? A temporary withdrawal of these AI tools? Their creators being held responsible for releasing potentially uncontrollable and wildly unpredictable technology into the world without any sense of responsibility?

Of course not. Barely any of that. People, companies, governments all jumped aboard the ship, throwing caution to the wind. Interested not in the blatantly obvious dangers and problems, but only in what they could gain from it. Whether it was for personal ease, accumulation of wealth, or for darker reasons such as a hunger for power, or revenge.

Here in The Netherlands, one of our biggest public transportation apps has started using AI images of people for publicity purposes. My gym, part of the big Basic-Fit chain, has big televisions in numerous places across the gym showing guidelines using blatantly obvious AI models and a ton of commercials from companies like Zalando, DHL, and others. Most of them are fully AI.

Our own government is using fully AI generated video imagery in recruitment commercials on Facebook for enforcement officers. And companies big and small are bombarding my feed with AI generated commercials, promo shots, and copy. I’m sick of seeing slightly creepy ‘not-people’ everywhere I look, moving in slightly uncanny ways, like I’m in a sci-fi thriller.

For the past two years nineteen of the apps on my phone, ranging from productivity programs and search engines to social media and messaging apps, have been stuffing their new AI bots and functions down my throat whether I want them or not. And I have been disabling them in any way I can, wherever I can, but it’s relentless. An onslaught which is sometimes unavoidable. I feel it spreading its shadow everywhere.

While writing my dissertation during my Master’s degree a few months ago, I was encouraged to find ways to use AI for my experiments and writing. I refused point blank. I just couldn’t bring myself to do it.

Don’t get me wrong, I don’t wish to be a completely ignorant pessimist; I know there are potential benefits and hopeful prospects to the use and development of AI - in the medical field, as an example. But I have a really hard time finding enough positives which, in my opinion, weigh up to the remarkable dangers of manipulation, fraud, criminality, and warfare that are or will soon be enabled.

Recently, for example, when spending time on social media during the war between Iran, Israel, and the US, I was bombarded with AI generated videos of skies filled with missiles, cities exploding, and other war-related imagery. All of them were fairly easily identifiable as AI… for now.

Here I stand, in the middle of the crowd. Blinders off, fists clenched, holding my breath. As I look around it seems only a few also hear the knell of a requiem bell.

In my professional life, people are becoming desperate for action and revolt. I’m in the classical music field, which is remarkably old-school and inefficient. We use orchestras ranging from 15 up to 100 people instead of a track or a small band. Classical singers, when the opera houses have a sense of integrity, use no amplification to fill the auditorium. Neither does that orchestra by the way. Being able to do so takes years upon years of practice and experience.

Together we aim for the impossible ideal of musical perfection, resulting in perfectly imperfect humanity making up the soul of all we present to the public. It’s the musical equivalent to Springbank: deliberately old fashioned, hand-made, inefficient, time-consuming, and often immeasurably rewarding.

We watch with weary eyes as AI-generated singers, singing AI-generated lyrics to the tune of AI-generated instruments in AI-generated music videos, are starting to climb the hit lists and flood social media. People seem to either not care or be blissfully unaware.

You’ll find the same sentiment with painters, cartoonists, photographers, videographers, designers, writers, actors, models, and composers. The future is looking a bit grim at the moment.

It’s entering the whisky scene too, it seems. I was quite taken aback recently when I found out that the German independent bottler Malts of Scotland was launching three new blends that featured blatantly obvious AI-generated labels.

Now, from big corporate producers we might expect such shenanigans. But from an independent bottler who’s in the market of original, natural, honest, and integrity-presented malts focused on those who go beyond the corporate, fabricated, contrived stuff? Ouch. That is some bad reading of the room if you ask me. Shouldn’t independent companies support others? In this case - illustrators or graphic designers?

I hope it was a toe dip in the water and not much more than that. If you’d like to save some money on design, why not hand-write the label and scan it, then take it to the printer? There’s some cheap, original authenticity for you! You’re catering to a market that could appreciate that sort of stunt. The labels would make the bottles look like blending room samples, and I think that’d be quite cool.

Thankfully happiness can be found, even in the darkest of times, if one only remembers to turn on the light (yes, that is a Dumbledore quote).

That light, that solace, might be the light of your phone or laptop screen as you browse Dramface. Many of you are probably drawn to these pages because we are the opposite of an AI generated promotional piece of copy or images.

We are (for the most part) non-professional writers. We aren’t ‘whisky experts’ - much less an AI bot. We are merely enthusiasts, just like yourself, who happen to love whisky and can’t seem to shut up about it. We channel that pent up enthusiasm by banging away on our keyboards, tapping into our own experiences, and jotting them down - warts and all (the copy that is, not the writers… I think).

The only time our copy sees AI applied to it might be the automatic spelling and grammar checker embedded in whatever program we like to write on, if at all. I know this because we have in the past discussed the use of AI in our writer’s chat and, at least when it comes to writing for Dramface, our noses seem to be pointing in the same direction.

Hopefully you notice that we have different writing styles, different wits, and different ways of contemplating life and drams. You might know that some of us, including yours truly, are not native English speakers.

That reminds me to give a big shout out to our editors who continually manage to make whatever us continentals and some colonials jot down to read like fluent English. They do so not by the use of AI, but with their own brains, in their own time, often late at night. Just because they want to bring you regular articles and reviews.

I find comfort in the fact that even these days, even online, we can still find places that bring us content made by people, for people. I’m honoured to be part of one, and relish in the proof of hands-on humanity that fills our pages.

Right then. Rant over, anxious mind emptied. I need some drams that are as far away from AI as you can get. Lively, hands-on and old school in nature.

Review 1/2

Ardnamurchan Single Cask, Golden Promise, 7 Years Old, Vintage 2018. Bottled for Whisky Import Nederland, 58.9% ABV
€100 paid (£88), local availability only

This single cask Ardnamurchan, bottled for their Dutch importer, popped up not that long after their larger batch Heritage Barley Golden Promise Release hit the shelves. I had managed to obtain one of those and figured that if I bought this it would provide me with the perfect opportunity to experience the singularity of a single cask compared to a larger batch product of the same specification.

Both of these whiskies were distilled in 2018 using Golden Promise barley. Both were matured in first fill bourbon barrels for seven years before being bottled at cask strength. These two cask strengths are even within 0,3% ABV of one another. Ardnamurchan being one of my favourite distilleries only added to the excitement.

Now, the Heritage Barley Release was already reviewed extensively by my fellow writers, but I’m taking it along for the ride here to see how it stands up to a single cask, coming in at €32 more.

Interestingly, we’ve had at least two Ardna single cask bottlings provided to us in The Netherlands before, and where this one offers a bit more maturity and the coveted Golden Promise barley variety, it comes in at about ten to fifteen quid cheaper than those previous, which seem to be lingering on the shelves even after a year or two of being released.

Score: 8/10

**Very Good Indeed.**
***TL;DR***
*A richly textured, utterly intriguing shapeshifter, worth it!*

Nose

Unpeated. No word on the QR code-web page if it’s peated spirit or not, but I haven’t got a lick of peat on this. Fresh, raw vanilla. Crème brûlée. Fresh vanilla pudding. Coffee roll. Pudding roll. Think of a vanilla dessert or pastry and you’ll find it in this dram. Pine needles. Pine resin. Fir trees. Conifer greenness. There’s a varnish-like workshop note as well. Mineralic. Tooth paste. With water: all of the above, but more measured and initially clouded by dusty chalkiness. Bang! Heavy on the vanilla, but not a sweet, patisserie vanilla. It’s almost raw, pure, unprocessed.

Palate

Texture, texture, texture! A vanilla bomb goes off and lingers. Thick. Coating. My God, the texture is incredible. It’s warming on the palate, after a cool arrival. A trade I find is usually reserved for sherry casks, in my experience. Some heat, depending on how sensitive you are to it that day. This needs quite a bit of water, trust me. Then it’s initially sharper, more zingy. But the depth of the herbaceousness that opens up after a while is fascinating. There’s thyme, basil, oregano. Way more so than in the Heritage Barley Release. Over time it becomes fruitier, with lemons and unripe, tart granny apples. Juicy pears. Dry white wine. Skin of white grapes. Then back to thick, malty vanilla again. And all of it is sewn together by that familiar Ardna coastal minerality we’ve come to adore.

The Dregs

Can you tell I like it? It’s amazing how much of a shapeshifter this thing is. Adding water (of which it’ll take plenty and thrive) makes it go to all sorts of places. Zingy, zesty! Ten minutes later it’s a fruit juice fest. After an hour you’re back to vanilla bomb. And it’ll keep doing that if you give it time and slowly take it down with water. The texture delays the flavour delivery of the arrival so long that you can pick out its complexities one by one. I’m in love.

So how does it fare against the ‘regular’ Golden Promise bottle?

Score: 8/10

Review 2/2

Ardnamurchan Heritage Barley Release, 2025, Golden Promise, 59.2% ABV
€68 paid (£58), still some availability

Score: 7/10

**Very good indeed.**
***TL;DR***
*a ‘promising’ bottle which leaves you excited for the future*

Nose

Oo! Much fruitier initially than the single cask. Juicy. Pears. Spearmint. Passion fruit. The same vanilla maltiness, but slightly subdued here. The difference is almost negligible though.

Palate

Much more fruity tartness on the palate in comparison. Sharper. More lemony! It somehow reminds me of Linkwood in refill barrels - if Linkwood was a coastal, weighty dram. Texture. Shells. Washing detergent. Ardnamurchan. Texture. It’s more coastal than the single cask. Water helps this one along as well. It delivers the details and needs it, in my opinion.

The Dregs

I’m having a bit of a moment here. Both of these are excellent drams and well worth my time. The big ABVs mean they need quite some water to show all their colours, but luckily I am someone who almost always plays around with water in his drams. The more time you give them, the more the experience is increased, and what an experience that is. The single cask takes the win here, but not by as much as the scores might suggest. The Single cask comfortably nudges an 8, but the Heritage Barley Release is a really high 7.

The single cask though offers a singularity, and a herbaceousness that makes it more complex and a deeper experience. Its shapeshifting, borderline chameleon qualities make it one of the most unusual and intelligently delivered drams I’ve had this year. It makes me happy, but also relieved.

You see, three figures is a lot of money. It’s a rarity I spend that kind of money on a bottle, and if it had been a fiver more expensive I probably wouldn’t have pulled the trigger. It’s head grazing the ceiling, this one. That might be why the previous two single cask releases for our Dutch market are still readily available at multiple retailers.

I made an exception. I love Ardnamurchan; it’s Golden Promise barley, and it was my chance at having one of those sexy looking single cask bottles in my collection. It was worth it.

Score: 7/10

The Final Dregs:

A toast to all of you who come here to read our thoughts instead of asking ChatGPT what the top five whiskies to buy right now are. I think I speak for all of Team Dramface when I say we will forever try to make sure you are in good hands. Honest, imperfect, human hands.

To your health, dear reader.

Tried this? Share your thoughts in the comments below. MM

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