Earlier this week, I went to visit my friend Clutch at his home in the seaside village of Burntisland in Fife, Scotland. We have a whisky blog together (called, unsurprisingly, Dubber and Clutch), we’re co-writing a book about whisky (along with a bunch of other authors), and we’d arranged to visit a couple of distilleries [...]
Had an amazing time on the island of Jura with Clutch, who was there writing a song to raise money for the ferry, which is under threat from funding cuts. The song’s nearly done (just some vocals, real strings and maybe a bit of guitar to go) – and you can hear the rough mix [...]
Categories: Travel
Clutch and I went to the Isle of Jura over the long weekend on a bit of a adventure. All the details are over at the Dubber & Clutch blog, complete with videos and interviews, tasting notes and stories. But I thought you might be interested in some holiday snaps. They look quite good if [...]
After the relatively slow start to 2009, and the lovely, restful Christmas break, I’ve started organising things for the year, and as I start booking things in, it looks like a pretty busy one. In fact… the past week or so has meant a rapid takeoff in the amount of work and travel I’ve been [...]
Categories: Book,Business,Music,New Zealand,Whisky
Tagged: Book, Business, Internet, Music, New Zealand, Seminar, Whisky
David McInerney, Tom Arnott, Adam Regan and me – after a spectacularly successful DJ gig at the Hare and Hounds, Kings Heath I often do top 10 or 20 lists (and sometimes even top 100 lists) of music from the year gone by. I generally spend quite a bit of time over this, and then [...]
Categories: Birmingham,Business,Music,New Zealand,Travel,Whisky
Tagged: 2008, Birmingham, Business, Internet, Music, New Zealand, Personal, research, review, Seminar, Travel, University, web, Whisky
Clutch came over this afternoon for a couple of whiskies and to play musical join the dots – a game in which I play a song from my collection, then he plays another from his that is connected in some way (the rules are a bit vague). Bobbie was upstairs with the laptop watching something [...]
Categories: Whisky
Clutch and I made our way to Stourbridge by train yesterday evening. There was a tasting of Springbank Distillery whiskies happening at a specialist shop there called Nickolls and Perks. I happen to have bought a bottle of Springbank’s 10 Year Old Longrow 100 Proof when last in Edinburgh and had loved it to bits, [...]
Tagged: Birmingham, Springbank Distillery, Travel, Whisky
I had the distinct privelege of being with Clutch when he opened a 40 year-old bottle of Longmorn. He’s following this up with a trip to London to watch his fiancee run the Marathon, then his wedding in Scotland, his birthday, and a month in New Zealand on honeymoon. It’s sad to think they’ll all [...]
Categories: Whisky
Tagged: Whisky
I played a Game of Go with my friend Dan last night. He’s slightly better at it than I am, so although he kindly made a few silly mistakes that allowed me to gain some advantage around the edges, he pretty much took out the centre of the board and ran away with the game. [...]
Categories: Birmingham,Games,Whisky
Tagged: Birmingham, Games, Whisky
I had to show you this. If nothing else, this was the highlight of my trip to Edinburgh last weekend. Of course, I met great people and had interesting conversations. Even bought records and did a lot of sightseeing around the city. But the Port Ellen was the bit I got most excited about, I [...]
