I’m not convinced. To me, a wine’s finish is pretty important, the length of it and its character. If a taster has exhausted his ability to discern the finish, OK. I guess I wonder about the other attributes too that that taster might observe. But I believe a TN that does not mention long finish/quick finish is pretty incomplete.
FWIW the song came out in 1983. No idea if/how that correlates to the age of the writer of the TN
[video]ZZ Top - Legs - YouTube
Higher viscosity wines, the leggy ones, generally have more flavor and longer finish on my subdued palate. If it’s higher in alcohol, oh well. On the down side, if it’s crappy wine, it has more crappy flavor and you have to suffer through it longer.
I’m with Chris, I tune out when someone mentions a wine’s “legs”, but no one I drink with does. Ditto any mention of points for the wines we’re drinking.
I personally do not like this descriptor at all. But I have a few wine friends who use it. They’re more old school and knowledgable. I think it’s a bit of a relic term and I’m sure I use or will in the future use a term or too that immediately dates me. However, ignore the rest of that taster’s knowledge at your peril. It may grate on me, but astute tasters who still use the term legs are still valuable resources.
+1.
Ian,
In all my travels in Portugal drinking plenty of sweet high alcohol Ports, I have never heard any producer mention anything about the legs. I too am pretty much in the camp of stopping reading when people mention them.
While I notice the legs, and understand what causes them, I never mention them in tasting notes. But let me ask, why are legs any less interesting to note than color? Much of the time color is not a very good indicator of anything about a wine, yet you see people talk about it commonly, often describing how the color fades at the rims (of course, because there is a shorter path for light to be absorbed, so why mention it?).
Legs can refer both to alcohol and glycerine. Reference to Jancis Robinson wine bible.
She may have written that, and actually believe it, but it’s not the case, or at least not an important part of the phenomenon. First, there isn’t enough glycerine in wine to make a difference, and second it’s the alcohol/water mixture that creates the effect. A little glycerine (or other compounds) probably changes the refractive index in such a way that you notice the legs, but glycerine does not cause the legs.
IMO, neither gives much useful information about a wine. Color is perhaps slightly more relevant, but not worth more than a quick glance or two if what you’re concerned with is the wine’s overall quality, aroma, flavor, etc.
I had dinner with some friends recently, people I get together with every few weeks for a not-too-geeky wine dinner. There was one new attendant that evening (an ex-girlfriend of mine) who was fairly new to that kind of event but who’d worked the retail counter at a winery and had recently taken some wine classes; throughout the tasting portion of the dinner she kept tilting her various glasses over a white piece of paper and peering intently at the wine. I was tempted to ask her what she was looking for, what she hoped to find with such extended visual examination, but kept my trap shut.
I pretty much always consider color, especially when tasting blind. I think in is worthwhile noting bright red or purple, versus garnet or bricking, versus amber etc. Threads such as this one are depressing because people spend so much energy complaining about wine descriptions. Why not try to see what is useful in a description (or don’t read it if it is a wine you have no interest in)?
I think it’s the term itself Alan. “Legs” is such a loaded term, and before people accuse me of being PC, it’s simply a fact that the phrase is not in the male dominated lexicon of wine by accident.
Talk about viscosity if that’s what you mean. But why talk much about it at all? Tt’s usually not so variable to note except in the extreme, specifically fortifieds or a few table wines. Mostly though it doesn’t seem to correlate useful in table wine.
Color by contrast is highly variable in young wines and especially old ones, so it’s much more notable. But “legs”? Eeew. Good luck with that one people.
When I first learned about the phenomenon, I learned to describe it as “tears” not “legs”, which actually seems more descriptive to me. But the point is, it’s not about viscosity, not at all. It’s about alcohol concentration - that’s what determines how high the tears will go. Other factors, such as viscosity and color might make them more apparent, but don’t create or enhance them.
As I said above, I don’t think I’ve ever noted the legs/tears in a description, but I do take note of them as an indicator of alcohol level.
I always refer to color in my notes, and will mention the legs if I note them as shorthand for viscosity.
I am older - as some folks have already observed, maybe it’s a generational thing? I will also usually comment on the finish if noteworthy, although I can’t sai I have ever tried to “time” one.
OTOH, to the best of my knowledge I have never eaten a lightly stewed huckleberry, so you won’t see me ever use that as s descriptor 
Alan’s right that glycerine and viscosity don’t contribute to legs/tears. Here are a couple of good (esp the first one) youtube videos about this:
Have to get rid of https. Only http
I’m with Chris.
I certainly take note of aftertastes, their quality and persistence (which I think has mainly to do with tannin and acid). It’s the idea of timing them in seconds that’s ludicrous and completely subjective.
I’m a human stop watch