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DOUBLE RUSSIAN RIVER WHALE REVIEW: Toronado 20 and Deviation, At the same damn time

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In honor of everyone rubbing their yeastclits on their bedposts over Plineyyy the Yerngerrrr, I figured I would finally knock out reviews for two of the white whale Russian River bangers: T20 and Deviation. One was a one off brewed in 2007 for Toronado, another was a one off brewed in 2009 for Bottleworks. One is still delicious, another one tastes like if you left Consecration in a Toyota Corolla in Tucson for 3 months. WHICH IS WHICH? We find out in today’s whaley review.

Oh shit, if you feel like reading about other SUPER RUSSIEN RIVER RARIEITIES, check out this Russian River Depuration review or if you just joined the beer game in 2012, here is a review of Pliney the Younger for you to stroke it to, since you are probably still in your hophead phase

That is Depuration, I just left it in the cooler next to some silver bullets for a couple months.

That is Depuration, I just left it in the cooler next to some silver bullets for a couple months.

Russian River Brewing Company
California, United States
Style | ABV
American Wild Ale | 6.83% ABV (dat hundredths place value hnnnggg)

In celebration of Bottleworks 9th Anniversary, we are proud to present Deviation – a beer unique in every sense. This remarkable blend combines the oak aged diversity of PHI, Orphan Ale, and Sonambic Ale with 100% Brettanomyces Ale (Sanctification) and is bottle conditioned with additional Brettanomyces. Thanks Vinnie. Your beer is a testament to the art of deviation. 6.83%

Your buddy probably opened a T25 at one of your tastings and thought he was hard as fuck, putting up 8 plates, flexing wild ale lats on offshelf zumba tickers.

Your buddy probably opened a T25 at one of your tastings and thought he was hard as fuck, putting up 8 plates, flexing wild ale lats on offshelf zumba tickers.

Toronado 20th anniversary
abv 10.4%

The Toronado blend was 5 different beers blended together disproportionately:

1. Belgian style Quadruple aged in Firestone Walker (used) Double Barrel Ale barrels
2. Belgian style Strong Dark Ale – batch A in red wine barrels
3. Belgian style Strong Dark Ale – batch B in red wine barrels
4. Belgian style Pale Ale aged in wine barrels with Brett
5. Sonambic 100% spontaneously fermented ale – this was used to add acidity to the beer.

A: Let’s just get this out of the way right now, T20 is starting to get those oxy stretch marks on its thighs, looking a bit turbid and muddy in its old age, that wispy carb still holding up, albeit oldman strong. The robey tones are still intact over all these years, but it has seen better days. Deviation still looks fucking beautiful and has a certain grace and coquettish radiance that makes it more lustworthy than even fresh bottles of Temptation. The carb held up beatuifully and there was light lacing at the edges showing its virile life still pumping deep in those acidic veins. These pics suck shit because I didn’t feel like setting up a lightbox for some neckbeard enjoyment. I do this site as a favor to the boring ass beer world and tickers should be thankful I haven’t moved on to POV porn at this point.

Pictured above, the last 21 person tasting T20 was opened at

Pictured above, the last 21 person tasting T20 was opened at

S: The t20 is still intensely acidic with cranberry, currant, red wine tannins, merlot, huge acidic blackberry cab and a oaky musk. The musk is delivered in equal parts with a touch of oxygenation that is mildly cloying, but its too fucking big to be held down, like trying to spot your buddy who presses more than you squat, them tannic shreds throb hard and move weight. Deviation is a fucking intensely bright acid flashbang to the face. Take Zomer and ramp up the acidity, that lemon rind, cantaloupe, pears, musky brett, intense Slush Puppy acidity like a lemon lime detonation to the senses. It smells phenomenal albeit completely overboard, not in an acetic fashion, just aggressive in every aspect, zero hint of oxy or age on this. S.S. Indefatigable just sailing them seas with a proud ph2 stern.

sometimes things from the past return only to fuck your world up

sometimes things from the past return only to fuck your world up

T: T20 is a fucking disappointment top to bottom. That is not to say that it isn’t worth drinking, I mean, it is still a competent and well blended beer. It’s more like seeing that late 30s bartender who is all salty and jaded and you can imagine what a Kelly Kapowski dime piece she used to be. This was probably a complex decadent treat, now the oxy sets in like crows feet making it seem like a dysfunctional Consecration. There is currant and tart cherry but again, it is like a coovie of some old ass bottles of Rodenbach. Deviation is a vast departure from this model and holds up like those 1960’s Ferraris that are still graceful and will land you knee deep in the vaj. The lemon and intense oak, chardonnay, anjou pear, hay, old storage locker, and amped up Goozie notes. One of the best American Wild Ales that I have ever tasted this side of DDG and Cable Car 09.

bragging about drinking rare bottles of sugar water? Alpha detected.

bragging about drinking rare bottles of sugar water? Alpha detected.

M: T20 is still a massive beast, drying with an intense dryness that gushes like that fourth week of Lilith Fair. It is both hefty in mouthfeel and closing, but has a sort of dry depth to it that makes it incredibly drinkable. The ABV slides up behind your palate with a prison shank and puts in work on the bitter zones. Deviation is intensely dry, no reparations are given, antebellum south destruction to your gumline and tart zones. Go watch a Ken Burns documentary and eat an entire bag of Shocktarts and you will know the depths of the cankersores this can cause. Despite the rampant abuse, I come back for more, it’s like when I got all into cock fingering that one summer, all stretched out in self effacing pleasure.

Thinking about landing one of these? Prepare to deal with some shit and shit accessories

Thinking about landing one of these? Prepare to deal with some shit and shit accessories

D: T20 is incredibly drinkable, albeit slightly lackluster. I can’t really condone trading for this other than showing your thick meaty trader labias, dropping meat curtains on your tasting crew, those rare 2007 folds all weathered and undesirable. Tickers gonna tick. Deviation however, holy hell it is intensely delicious, amazing top to bottom, well worth the cost of entry and, most importantly, I cannot think of any readily available analog to this unique beast. Seek this out if you can, rally all those bottles of Backyard and Petit Mutant you can rally and cast them upon the funeral pyre with calm suttee to join your tastebuds in the afterlife. It is dro as fuck, red hairs, no stems no seeds, yayo weighed dry without being stepped on.

Narrative: read the foregoing 1000 words and finger your butthole in the shower with an Axe loofa.

reviewing them nostalgic old whale ticks, high off that juice

reviewing them nostalgic old whale ticks, high off that juice

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O’So/Funk Factory, Dweller on the Threshold, Staying Turnt up Don’t Turn Down for Nothing

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Alright full disclosure: Funk Factory owner, Levi Funk, is my roll dog. Notwithstanding, in true DDB form, I will still give him triple digit penetration on a trill 900 word banger review. This is a collaboration between FF and O’So of that Goldilocks fame. That 450 (?) bottle swagger, staying on like Porsche lights in the hood.

Yah trick YAH.

Yah trick YAH.

Funk Factor/ O’so Brewing Company & Tap House
Wisconsin, United States
Style | ABV
American Wild Ale | 5.25% ABV

Lol first and foremost, I want to point the differences between the Ratebeer and BA descriptions of this beer:

FF

A: This pours a deep burnt orange and light amber like that fossilized sap that them Jurassic Park bugs be layin in. There is a light carb that wisps and crackles like a ground bloomer and dissipates quickly. The lacing is insubstantial and settles to a gentle ring sitting on those 808 sour drums, bouncing hard. There is a light turbid aspect to it, not sick clarity, but not out of place in the current American Wild game. More gold than Trinidad James posted up on Rosecrans.

Lovin that cheesiness, plus this beer isn't even racist at all.

Lovin that cheesiness, plus this beer isn’t even racist at all.

S: This is my favorite aspect of this beer and the olfactory is outright phenomenal. There is a light musk, orange rind, wet bicycle seat on that Brooks trill, there is a some oak and lemon zest with crush yard trimmings left in the rain and a subtle tannic finish. I could sit under a railway underpass and huff this hard, all day long just musking it. It is one of the most Belgianesque waft I have encountered on this side of the Atlantic, straight Doesjel flows.

Sometimes the homage mirrors the source material in awesome new iterations.

Sometimes the homage mirrors the source material in awesome new iterations.

T: This opens with a sharp acidity with a grapefruit dryness that comes across as slightly acetic at low temps. Let me qualify that, I don’t mean acetic like excoriating Small Animal Big Machine, I mean a light sharpness akin to Grand Funk Aleroad or a balanced Oud Bruin, if you know how it gets throwed. This tastes like a a coovee of Cable Car 2010 and Doesjel. There is one foot on the American Wild side of the argument but a compelling musk and leathery goodness that you could sip up in the attic just breathing in that funky particulate matter. The cheesy closer is a perfect compliment to the acidic body and contributes to sky high drinkability.

M: The mouthfeel is a bit disappointing due to carb levels that don’t have that Pop Rocks crackle along the gumline, however, this Killer Instinct combos up the drinkability. So it takes with one hand and jerks you off with the other, so not a bad deal altogether. The chardonnay oak is restrained and, unlike many other American wilds with that apeshit ph2 shit, this is restrained and exhibits balance in this regard and you don’t want away with GERD after drilling a 750ml. Chopper in the bushes, goozie in the tree, this wild wont light up your chest like E.T.

D: As noted above, the gentle carb and judicious distribution of acidity makes this exceptionally crushable. I killed the entire 750ml in 2 rounds of Battlefield 4 and I don’t even die that much SO IMAGINE HOW FAST THAT IS SRS. Highly croosh, soft and prickly like some Koosh.

supes croosh ultra amber koosh

supes croosh ultra amber koosh

Narrative: The trains to Brussels clipped along the railway gently, providing a slight rock to the interior cabin. The passing telephone poles passed with metronomic rhythm. Angel Walters pulled the chamber back on his .45 Desert Eagle and examined the chrome inner workings, dropping the gilded clip into his palm. The forthcoming mission would not change the world, but it was a daring initiative. Agent Walters, also known as Ph3, was charged with obtaining the microfiche from the Belgian Embassy of Internal Compliance. Belgian exports usually surrounded gourmand items of old world decadence, but these schematics held the nuclear cellular makeup of an intensely powerful microbe: The Sennebug. The United States needed to obtain the biodata on this local fauna as all synthetic attempts to recreate it in a lab had failed. If the Sennebug were unleashed on a crowd of Pittsburgh tailgaters, the effects could be devastating. Lowered pilsner consumption, introspection, sores along the gumline, reduced birth rates, and increased literacy levels. Agent Ph3 needed to prevent this at all costs, but for now, chocolate and a gentle snooze while riding the rails.