The latest missive from The Great One (no, no, not Gretsky, nor even Jackie Gleason) takes hypocrisy and lack of self-awareness to the cosmic level. It seems that he begins by taking yet another shot into the ozone at the BS of his “real and natural” straw man, and then goes on, Al Gore-like, to claim that he invented natural wine 25 years ago (and seems to me, maybe organic and biodynamic wines as well). It turns out that he was Alice Feiring when Alice was still drinking Gallo jug wine. Parker did, in fact, write the passage below, and then went on to make a complete and utter mockery of it with all of the crap that he has spewed in its wake. He has always been too busy pimping the latest vintage of a lifetime to bother to be accountable for what he has said in the past. As a friend observed, “I guess Rolland and Cambie didn’t get the memo”. And I suppose Parker forgot his 25-year-old prime directive while pimping those two, Cotarella, Marc de Grazia and other perps instead of chastising them for encouraging manipulation of wines, and while laying the big numbers on the spoofed industrial sludge of Marquis-Phillips, among many, many others. Of course, I am sure that he would tell me that 16% natural alcohol in all of the world’s great wines is what God intended for man, or else He/She would not have given us sunshine and global warming. I find these to be particularly odd thoughts coming from a man whose only claim to fame depends upon two blended wines that by definition require human “sculpturing” and change percentages of the grapes in the blends every year to produce a desired result. On the other hand, maybe it simply reflects that Parker once knew what was right, and spent a lifetime unlearning it. I suppose that I could be charitable and view this as an attempt at “if you can’t beat 'em, join 'em”, but I know that his heart really is not in that, any more than my heart is in being charitable to Parker…
"Radical thoughts from 25 years ago
With all the BS about wine’s “realness’, naturalness”.etc.etc…I was cleaning my office and came across a passage I wrote and published nearly 25 years ago…and it became part of ALL my Buyers’ Guides, The Great Wine Estates, and this site’s archives:
“Exceptional wines emerge from a philosophy which includes the following:
1.permit the vineyard’s terroir(soil,micro-climate,distinctiveness)to express itself
2.allow the purity and characteristics of the grape varietal,or blend of varietals to be faithfully represented in the wine
3.produce a wine without distorting the personality and character of a particular vintage by excessive manipulation
4.follow an uncompromising,non-interventionistic winemaking philosophy that eschews the food-processing,industrial mind-set of high tech wine-making-in short,give the wine a chance to make itself naturally without the human element attempting to sculpture or alter the wine’s intrinsic character
5.follow a policy of minimal handling,clarification,and treatment of the wine so that what is placed in the bottle represents as natural an expression of the vineyard,varietal character and vintage as possible.”
Anyone want to provide a rebuttal to this? Can anyone find another wine writer,blogger,wine-maker who has referenced this common passage in much of my life’s work?"
RP was a huge help to me ‘back in the day’. Before the internet, before even the '90s, he wrote long tasting notes about interesting parts of the world.
Parker got me to buy '82 Bordeaux in reasonable quantity.
His notes got me interested in a number of Calif producers (in particular, Marcassin) for flavors that didn’t exist in other wines.
He got me interested in Northern Rhone wines in the early '90s and Southern Rhone wines in the mid-late 90s.
He was never much help with Burgundy or Piedmont, but that’s ok as others happily filled that void.
I did wind up buying a bunch of the ‘spoofy’ Aussie wines (and also some iffy CDP’s) based on his recc but such is life.
It absolutely seems that over the last 15 years or so, he’s gone off the rails.
His restrictive wine board (Squires, what a loser)
The lawsuit in France
The Jay Miller payola scandal
And the endless beating of the AFWE drum, it’s just sad to watch.
But I think not unprecedented. He started as a wine reviewer and over the course of time became anointed by the popular press as a Wine God. His head has expanded, over time, to be too big for any hat.
Parker did not help me much with wines. I learn it from reading books by Hugh Johnson and Krama. I remember well that I always prefer to buy Burgundy wines which were rated from 88 points to 90 points by Parker.
Bill, clearly he enjoys these brouhahas. His points show how much he, the “truists” and “elitists” once had in common. Perhaps he should’ve kept the passage in plain view, rather than buried in his office?
RMP inspired many consumers, most he’ll never meet, prompting and guiding explorations in to the world of fine wines. I give him full credit for his positive influence on me.
Once the nearly unassailable emperor of wine, his shortcomings and those of the WA have been exposed, sometimes ferociously. Anger is an understandable if not necessarily productive response. As much as he seems to condemn “Kim-Jung-unism”, it’s a return to the supreme leadership that he seems to crave. Times have certainly changed, and hopefully he can transition towards the nontheistic “Lama” role suggested by Terry Theise.
I believe that when he wrote that passage, he at least thought he meant what he said. And, for the most part, back in the 1980s, there wasn’t much micro-ox, RO, mega-purple, tannin powder, etc., so that non-interventionist meant don’t filter it, which was consistent with his desire for bigger and better. That said, back in the 80s and early 90s–with the exception of what could then be taken as anomalous enthusiasms for big Aussies and Duboeuf Beaujolais, most of the wines he recommended were actually wines.
I am curious as to what he is thinking now in quoting himself. Does he really think he still believes this? It would be easy enough to quote him–even from back when non-subscribers like me could be on his bored–arguing with most of those propositions. If he thinks he still believes this now, I would agree that his level of self-delusion is quite high. If he doesn’t think he believes it, it would be interesting to hear him to account for how he has changed.
This is less about Parker’s lack of self-awareness than the way in which the ‘natural wine’ shtick is an irresistible marketing ploy, then and now. Wine is a craft product, not a natural product, so the natural wine definition is always going to be intellectually incoherent and susceptible to all kinds of manipulation (so to speak). Coming out of the 1970s the rhetoric of ‘naturalness’, purity, anti-industrialism was always going to be adapted to market wine and also market the careers of soi-disant wine intellectuals. Parker is far from the worst offender in this regard; see the advertisements for tank farm wines featuring Italian peasants strolling through soft-focus vineyards as wistful music plays in the background. At least Parker went to bat against sterile filtration and excessive acidification. See for example this pretty decent article he wrote in the Atlantic in 1999, “The Dark Side of Wine”:
He really did speak up consistently against what he called ‘industrialization’ of wine for many years, even though he’s now giving positive reviews to the likes of Apothic Red. Of course, even back in the day his definition of industrialization likely varies from yours, but again, since all wine is a manipulated craft product there is always going to be an element of arbitrariness to where you draw the line. I actually think one reason that the Alice Feirings of the world are so absolutist (NO OAK NO SULFUR NO EXCUSES!) is in order to distinguish themselves from Parker, who had already staked out one part of the anti-industrialization space for himself. They had to be Bolsheviks to his Menshevik in order to establish a clear identity.
Yes, this is partially what I was getting at. I do agree he went over the edge with his embrace of Australian wines in the early oughts, and there is some lack of self-awareness given some of his recent enthusiasms. But I think micro-ox and RO were pretty common by the early-mid 90s, well before he wrote the Atlantic article I linked in the previous comment. The ground may have moved under his feet a bit; he found himself liking those wines so he never did hard thinking about what was acceptable intervention and what wasn’t. (Along the lines of our guest Clark Smith’s important book “Post Modern Winemaking”, which does a major service in actually taking on this issue directly rather than evading it).
Bill,
Adulation is a highly oxidative substance;corrosive. Look for who has handled it well and you have Saints, Gandhi, etc. And school is still out on Kevin Durant. Parker has lost his connections to anything real, at least in terms of the wine world. Once was Emperor and now the Duke of Churl. Well advanced into authoring his own demise. Mad & sad. Maybe time to look the other way, I think that the stage he stands on now will be itself next in line to fall apart.
So does this mean the next time some moron whips out the “there’s no such thing as natural winemaking” argument, we can count on Parker to offer a rebuttal?
That article is as ridiculous as the bit that inspired this thread. How can one define “excessive fining and filtration”? Even though he keeps referring to that, Parker wisely doesn’t try. He does, however, say that sterile filtration “guarantees that the wine is lifeless but stable”. I think a lot of producers of very good whites with residual sugar and/or zero or partial MLF would find that interesting. Then there’s the standard garbage about “non-interventionist” methods and low yields, despite the fact that the former has no definition and the latter is a blanket statement that has been proven untrue enough times to stop saying it (2004 Champagne, for example).
You’re right to point out that he now gives positive reviews to some of the most messed with wines on the planet, such as Apothic Red. Also, look at his list of importers who supposedly hold these same beliefs. It includes some real knee-slappers: Jorge Ordonez, Eric Solomon, Kysela, Dan Phillips, and Kobrand. Even though he doesn’t say they were completely dedicated to natural wine or whatever you want to call it, and there are some terrific producers represented there, anyone who knows those portfolios knows how ridiculous of a statement that was.
Parker decries the effort to make every wine taste the same, no matter where it’s from, yet I would say he is the single person most responsible for that trend. He says “owners of wineries, particularly in America, must learn to take more risks so as to preserve the individual character of their wines, even at the risk that some consumers may find them bizarre or unusual”, and yet he has so many times told other people they are wrong for having a different opinion of a wine than his. He has championed the 100-point scale, which has been the primary tool in encouraging the things he claims to be against.
I don’t usually take part in these Parker-bashing threads, but I couldn’t help but comment on that article, especially since it was mentioned in Parker’s defense. Maybe his knock on Hugh Johnson, a wine writer greater than Parker could ever dream of being or even realize, got me a little worked up.
Absolutely some truth here, but on the other hand, is there really a fight worth fighting there anyway, even if somebody would show up for Parker to fight with? For me, Parker did not really give birth to the natural wine movement…vegetarianism, veganism, Earth shoes and Monsanto Chemical Company did, which make his schizoid pronouncements about natural wines seem a little silly…
Bill, I am with you all the way but was hoping this would be passed on by this board.
It seems as if the reason he writes these things is to have people comment on his site and drive traffic.
If you look at any discussion on his board (I know it’s ‘Squires’ but really it’s his) there maybe 10 comments a day by a very select few and then 90% of those people are fawning at this feet.
Even when you look at the comments on that thread by the 4th or 5th comment someone was speculating as to when ‘the other board’ (us) would chime in.
As Dan says, let the old angry King spew whatever it is he feels he needs to spew, because the only ones who listen are us (and the 20 people still left on the Squires board)
Don’t feed the beast and keep him relevant, let him stand alone to an empty theatre.
Jonathan, it is clear that he thinks that he wrote the last word on the subject 25 years ago and that he is, and at all times for the past 25 years has been, Mr. Natural. There is no question that he aspired to something 25 years ago that virtually all natural-wine types could embrace, and had he understood what he espoused and stuck with it, Alice Feiring and the no-sulphur types probably would never have gained any traction. However, he apparently cannot grasp that, nor can he grasp that he has loudly and repeatedly pimped wines and styles that are the very anthesis of what he wrote a quarter-century ago and worse, has tried to pass them off as the alpha natural wines of late.
Jason, feeding the beast does not keep him relevant. It explains to the next generation why he once was, and how and why he is becoming less so every time that he touches his keyboard. I passed on bringing his pathetic tap dance on the 2005 CdPs (and attributing Gertrude Stein’s most famous quote to Bill Clinton) over here. I found it hard to pass on the latest one. And hey, I only see what friends e-mail to me. Paying to read this stuff would risk keeping him relevant…
I think there is not so much an argument as an exchange worth having between proponents of two different ways of thinking about making wines. If we get the stupid metaphysics out of the way (there is no such thing as natural wine being my candidate for useless truism since if there were no difference in the wines we were talking about, we wouldn’t be arguing), there is a good case for manipulation as a policy to be made. After all, the standard distinction between aesthetic and natural beauty has to do with human beings artificing one of those things (of course, I’m not burdened with the belief that wine is an art form). If the answer to that position from the non-interventionist camp is some version of taste preference (as it may well be), we will know that we should be exchanging preference information rather than trying to win arguments.
I doubt Parker could function in such an argument. But that would just mean he would have nothing to do with it and we could just forget him as a subject matter–a consummation devoutly to be wished.
I think you’ve got it exactly right. But he doesn’t seem to be aware that he has been taken in by the spoofifiers and industrial swill makers and that his well-stated creed hasn’t squared with the points he gives out for a long time.