Anheuser Busch - Shadow's Wild Black

                                                           Wild Black in the glass...

                                                ...and in a more natural setting.   


Nearly two years ago, I tried a beer that changed my ideas on how bad beer can really be. If memory serves me right, it was the night of the national championship game for college football and the beer was called Wild Blue. I thought I had tried the worst of the worst with beers like Pizza Beer and Kennebunkport IPA. Wild Blue laughs in the face of beers like that. With the first sip, I could feel years taken off my life and my esophagus. It was sweeter than a Nicholas Sparks novel (and more syrupy). It would be hours before my taste buds would regain consciousness and start to work again.

Since then, I've had two beers that were somehow worse: A beer called Zorg and the infamous Sam Adams Triple Bock. The Sam Adams is never going to be topped. It's the bad beer equivalent of Michael Jordan, Wayne Gretzky and Muhammad Ali all wrapped into one cobalt blue bottle with a disintegrating cork. That beer remains (and most likely, forever will remain) the worst thing I have ever put in my mouth. But Wild Blue will always hold a special place in my heart as my first truly bad beer.

A few months after the Wild Blue fiasco, I was perusing the shelves when I found another version of Wild Blue called Shadow's Wild Black. It looked identical: Same dark and menacing liquid behind the bottle, same pissed off looking dog kicking fruit. I honestly don't know what I was thinking, but for some reason, I thought to myself, "I have GOT to try that!" I walked out of the store a few minutes later with it, only then remembering the torturous experience Wild Blue had been. But it was too late. I was the proud owner of a beer I never wanted to drink. And so it sat in solitary confinement in the back of my fridge for over a year and a half.

We're moving in a few weeks, so it's time to cut down on things we don't want to move. One of these things is the large inventory of beer I've acquired in our time here. So I've been trying to drink the beers that I have no intention of aging. Unfortunately, it was Wild Black's turn yesterday. For science!

Wild Black pours a deep purple color, almost more like a Welch's Grape Juice, with just a faint purple tinge to the head. The color was strange, but I've had some oddly colored beers in the past that ended up just fine. Who knew, maybe it would even be good. I took a whiff... Nope, it was going to suck. A sickeningly sweet artificial blackberry monster latches onto your nostrils the second they're in range and will not let go. If you can get past that, there are enticing notes of chlorine, concord grape concentrate, artificial blueberry, wet cardboard, and what I can only imagine what dog vomit would smell like if that dog had just scarfed a TON of Starbursts.

The taste opens with a faint dash of faded hop sourness, but it's quickly turned into Alderaan by the Death Star of huge sticky and sweet notes of grape jelly, pureed raisin and blackberry Robitussin (if that's a thing). There's a strange and brief wine-like note that reminds me of those fruity Arbor Mist things that they used to have those commercials for when I was a kid with dudes jumping on trampolines. There's a lingering note on the finish that reminds me of what the result of a Will It Blend? would taste like if the experiment was blackberries and tar.

Someway, somehow, this beer is better than Wild Blue. Now that's not saying much, but it's the truth. If this and Wild Blue were the only two beers in existence, would I choose this? No, I would choose life. Stay thirsty, my friends. For better beer than this.

Final Grade: F+

Top 250 Beers Tasted: 132

Boston Beer Company - Samuel Adams Triple Bock (1997)

Jack the Ripper. Joseph Stalin. Kris Jenner. Whoever the writer was of the song, "Who Let the Dogs Out." Throughout the history of the world, evil has appeared in many forms. But perhaps never have I come face to face with evil so ruthless as that which reared its head from an innocuous looking cobalt blue bottle a few days ago. I guess I shouldn't have been surprised, really. It had been trapped in there since 1997. And it was very ready to be set free.

 Before we get into the beer itself, let's think about how old a beer that was bottled in 1997 is. Simple math tells us that the beer is 16 years old, but do you remember where you were 16 years ago? I don't know about you, but 16 years ago, I was an awkward pre-teen puttering around Paul Revere Middle School with my wingman, a penguin Beanie Baby named Pengy, trying unsuccessfully (to your surprise, I'm sure) to get girls to talk to me. Actually, you know what... let's NOT go back 16 years. Who wants to relive ancient history? Let's talk about Sam Adams Triple Bock!

 Sam Adams Triple Bock was first bottled in 1994 and, at the time, was one of the strongest beers in existence. For Sam Adams, it was the gateway to bigger, crazier beers like their famed Utopias beer (which I lovingly call, "Out of my price range"). Sam Adams bottled Triple Bock in '94, '95 and finally in '97, after which they decided to stop making it. From what I've heard, it wasn't bad when it was fresh. But as years have gone by, Triple Bock has turned into the stuff of legend.

When I was first getting into beer, I spent an obscene amount of time on the forums of beeradvocate. From the talk of Lost Abbey's carbonation issues to the beer-related abbreviations used in forums (PTE= Pliny the Elder, FBS= Founders Breakfast Stout, etc.) to the banter about which state made the best beer, I sat back and watched, filling my brain with beer knowledge I assumed I would need should I ever chance upon a fellow BA (that's Beer Advocate for all you non-BA's). And it was there (well, on the "Worst Beer Ever!" threads, to be exact) that I learned that Triple Bock existed. After reading scores of reviews of the stuff, I knew I had to try it. It took years to obtain, but I finally was able to trade for a bottle with my very generous friend from Pennsylvania, Frank. Thanks, Frank! I think...

 Samuel Adams Triple Bock pours a dense and downright pond-scummy looking brown color with no head whatsoever. I swirled the beer in the glass a bit, only to find that it left my glass horribly stained with what looked to be pure tar. The beer was corked, but the cork was soggy and practically disintegrated into the bottle when I pulled it out. After the pour, bits of cork clung to the surface with what little buoyancy they had left after 16 years of saturation and had to be fished out with a spoon. Huge clumps of muck stayed behind like sulking teens on a family vacation (which makes sense because those clumps really are teens) and took multiple blasts of hot water to be loosened from the bottle. The rumors about this beer's vileness appeared to be true, and I hadn't even taken a smell yet.

My first smell of this beer was...regrettable. A sickeningly sweet aroma jetted down my nostrils and straight into the pit of my gut.

 "Did you just gag?" my friend, Brian, asked.

"No..."

I calmed my stomach the best I could and went back in. Bad idea. Triple Bock smells like a puree of soy sauce, molasses and raisins that's been trapped in a car on a 100 degree day for about six hours. Whatever drinkable matter was in that bottle smells to be about fifteen years deceased. It's really horrific. I don't think I've ever been more terrified to take a sip of beer than I was with this, but it was definitely too late to turn back. Triple Bock opens with a note of slightly sour plum that is sweet. Really sweet. "Port-like" could be a good description, but only if instead of being the byproduct of crushed and fermented grapes, that port was the byproduct of crushed and fermented souls. Prickly booze, heavily fermented raisin, and raisin cake all make nauseating treks across the palate before a finish that's a cross between sewage soaked prune and regret. While the beer is in your mouth it releases savory blasts that I swear taste like straight MSG. The mouthfeel is thick and uneven, almost chowder-like.

While I can't recommend the experience of trying this beer itself, I am glad that I tried it. I don't feel like you can truly appreciate the top beers the world has to offer if you haven't trudged through the bottom of the list as well. And I think it's safe to say, my friends, that Triple Bock is about as low as you can go.

Final Grade: F

Top 250 Beers Tasted: 129