Official Bottling | 46% ABV

I’m Tempted To Low-Ball This Score

I’m not really, but, full disclosure, I’m a fan of this whisky and it’s a staple here. But I’m worried it might not hang around forever.

I remember my first ever sip from my first ever bottle of Clynelish 14yo. I remember where I was, how much I paid and who I was with. Most memorable though, was the sensation of it. It was love at first sip. Cheesy I know. Well, this is the whisky that taught me about texture, and I didn’t know a thing about that famous ‘waxiness’ back then.

I was enjoying whisky with pals and we’d simply pick up new bottles that we hadn’t previously tried and share them. That bottle was purchased at the Oban distillery shop for £34. I remember that well. Strange I’m having to guess the year, but I’m pretty certain it was 2012. I sat at my breakfast bar in the early evening and opened it while my buddy opened his Oban 14yo. We’d tried the Oban before and knew we needed another, but this was our first from Sutherland. The mouthfeel was thick and full and coated the palate like nothing I had enjoyed before, helping the fruit and spices to pop. If I remember well there was a lovely grassy edge to it too, like cut hay. It gets better with each recollection, as these things do.

So impactful was this introduction, it had me searching the texture profiles in other malts. I was always drawn to go back to this 14yo. Back then I was too scattergun to consider a cabinet of ‘staples’ but since then it’s always been around. However, recently I’ve been staring at it as if it were a fickle partner in a precarious relationship, suspicious they are ready to jump ship at any moment. I think there's a good reason for that.

In these days of insane inflation and rising prices our cynicism is fuelled daily by news of something else creeping out of our reach. Recently Diageo, the owner of this particular release, has been one of the most clumsy. Wild rumours of horrific increases on their Talisker and Lagavulin official releases were widely spread over winter and while, at the point of writing, this remains to be realised on the shelf, it has been confirmed through retailers that it’s coming. This level of price hike, in any context, is putridly cynical and unjustifiable.

Talisker and Lagavulin are fan favourites and have been for a long time. The only way I can fathom such behaviour is the thought that they need to suddenly pivot and position as a luxury brand. Exclusivity is profit these days and they’ve possibly ripped a page or two from The Macallan book of Luxury Goods Placement.

Every business has the right to set their pricing, of course, but we get to decide if it suits us. This doesn’t. It’s the jarring triple-figure percentage increases that steals the wind from us. You can’t tell me that a behemoth with the scale and resource of Diageo have only now realised they don’t have enough stock to fulfil demand and the hikes are a direct result of short supply? Nor can you tell me it’s because their peer products are selling for the same price at that age statement. Because they are not. Only one brand is doing that. The already mentioned Macallan.

You know who built Macallan’s reputation? Well, actually Macallan did, but the word was spread by the drinkers, make no mistake. I’ll never forget the disappearance of the 10 and later the 12 from our shelves in the 2000s, replaced by their NAS 1824 Series which was unforgivably led by their very poor Gold release at the 12yo price point. Worse still, Asia and North America kept the age stated range. That fickle partner turned, gave me two fingers and hopped upon the back of a motorbike to join someone else with more money than me.

C’est la vie, je suppose.

So this Diageo price hikes feel uncomfortably familiar. And so, as I stare at this tall and slender bottle of this 14yo Highlander that does an unintelligible trick of being somehow full-bodied, robust and yet simultaneously complex and elegant, my paranoid eyes narrow with jealousy and suspicion once more. When will this one up and leave?

We bond with our whisky. Even more so than something you might consider intimate; like a brand we choose to wear or precious tech that we come to rely upon. Whisky is emotional. When it’s taken from us and given to someone else, someone with more money, it smarts.

If you look at Clynelish with a good age statement, stock from the 1990s say, it has already tripled in value in the last five years alone. It is dearly loved by many. Including me. Only my own promiscuity with whisky in the intervening years has made me realise I don’t need to follow those prices. There are alternatives. It’s just that those releases, you know, I loved them. I really did.

So is it inevitable that this one is on its way out? Maybe, maybe not. Because I bought two of these recently, for £35 each. On offer, I’ll admit, but even at retail it’s less than £50. Now, I know, I know - it’s Diageo. They treat their official bottles badly. Well, they do, but they’re also capable of putting out stonkingly good vattings of official releases at great value prices, so you can occasionally argue a defence case. Well, this one’s bottled at the enthusiast’s minimum bid of 46% and while I can pretty much guarantee E150a is present (but not heavily dosed), I think it’s non-chill filtered; I’ve poured a second measure into a tumbler over ice and it’s clouded up a storm.

A word of caution though. These hikes in price make no sense and predicting patterns is folly. Until they ran out of stock, Royal Mile Whiskies had their Talisker 18 on sale for £79, down from £90. That was in the knowledge that a price increase greater than 150% was incoming in the New Year.

Review

Clynelish 14yo, Official Bottling, 46% ABV
£45 widely available.

So, what to do? Well, spoilers, but buy it while it’s priced fairly and if rumours start to circulate about an imminent price rise, leave it on the shelf. Walk away. You’re worth more than that. You’re money’s worth more than that. There are whiskies worth more than that. Don’t stock up. Don’t reward their greedy practises with demand spikes. There’s great whisky coming on-stream every day, lots of it, and it doesn’t need to be sold alongside a Rolex or a Bugatti to be desirable. It just needs you to be in the know. I hope we can help with that.

At the point of writing, this is still worthy. But Diageo remains on the naughty step.

Nose

Apples. Sweet red apples, like Macintosh. Then richer, more ripe fruits swirl; peach melba and apricot. Lightly floral, a garden; Lily of the Valley and a faint suggestion of earth in a wet cloth sack. Searching for smoke, nope. Some biscuity notes maybe; crushed Digestives. Searching for that Clynelish signature waxiness, not much. A wee bit. Perhaps those red apples are waxed?

Palate

Okay, good. Beautifully oily, better than the last bottle I had of this which was a thinner batch. This is thick and coating. Butterscotch, rich sweet sugars, a little oaky but in check. There is waxiness here but not like the white candle wax I find sometimes, but a richer, oily wax. A little linseed oil. A hint of agriculture, maybe mulched leaves. On the finish it lingers. Water helps the fruit and even brings a wood spice, but dims the impact of the texture. The empty glass brings new notes of tobacco, sandalwood and - boom - the idea you’re nosing a box of Crayola.

The Dregs

This is a good batch. The bottle code for those who can decipher such things is L1082CM006. I’m struggling to think of a longer finish at the price point, it’s that texture holding it on the palate. This has been nudged a point higher at this price, but I’ll refer you to the title and the topic. This remains one of those bottles that, should it disappear (no need to panic - it’s been around for almost two decades) I will certainly feel the pain of separation. I do love it. But I’d do well to remember there are always other, less fickle, fish in the sea and to catch them, I don’t need to buy a motorbike.

Score: 7/10

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