Bill, '98 remains one of my favorite, if not my favorite, vintage for Australian Shiraz. It was very good across SE Australia and has shown over the last two years to be in excellent form. Contrary to others I do not think these wines are the exception rather than the rule. There is a lot of mis-information out there right now about Aussie wines and, in tough financial times, I doubt that trend will change. Glad you enjoyed the bottle you had.
Not to be a PITA but does anybody else think the original long quote goes beyond “fair use” under copyright laws?
[I’ll now go back to contemplating opening a lovely Victoria Pinot Noir tonight.]
But that gets back to my point - as long as TWA is dependent on importer samples, they can’t offer any other opinion.
If DJ wants to be able to make suggestions as to alterations in the portfolios, then he needs to travel to Australia and learn what those suggestions might be.
I mean - it’s really pretty tautologous - if TWA refuses to travel to a region, hence is completely dependent on importer samples from that region, then necessarily TWA will only know of that region what the importers are able to show TWA from that region.
DJ needs to travel in Australia for six or eight or ten weeks a year - put in some elbow grease - and learn what people are doing on the ground.
That’s pretty much what Parker does with Bordeaux & the Rhone every year, but I guess he must feel that Australia just isn’t worth the travel budget.
I tell you, though - for example - if somebody in Australia is making high acid $15 dry Rieslings which could compete with $60 grosses gewachs/smaragds from Germany/Austria, then I’d sure love to learn about it.
Nathan, you seem to be suggesting that RMP and Dr J have never traveled or don’t travel every year to Oz. Where are you getting this info? In fact, without doing any research, you could read what was posted by the OP and see this:
“My eyes were opened when I visited in September 2008 and did some tasting.”
And who knows what those importers really give him to taste…no wonder everything is 97-100 points. You want properly review wines then get off your butt and travel the region, meet winemakers and get dirty. Relying on importers to feed you “crafted” wines to get high ratings is a bullshit game and we can all see through it.
I seriously doubt we’d see these high scores had he tasted blind. But that’s a different subject altogether. But I agree with your general premise, who knows what he is tasted on. Plus, 100+ bottle marathons are never a good way to taste, IMO, I don’t care how highly you rate your palate, whether you spit or not, you will get affected after certain point (although I’ll grant that point is different for all of us).
Who’s the American importer working the backwoods of Australia finding the hidden gems the way, that, say, a Neal Rosenthal or a Thomas Calder or a Joe Dressner is working the Jura?
Surely there must be people in Australia who are making elegant [restrained] Cabernet, high acid riesling, unoaked chardonnay, light pink & aromatic pinot noir [or even gamay], etc etc etc.
Wouldn’t it be great if TWA would approve a travel budget that would send DJ over there for a couple of months with orders to do nothing but seek out the weird, off-beat, interesting stuff?
The market for the Yellow Tail/Marquis-Philips/Mollydooker segment is pretty well established at this point - we know the style, we know the winemakers, we’re even starting to get some data points as to the ageworthiness - now wouldn’t it be neat if TWA would take the lead in ferreting out something different?
Why have travel budget at TWA for Oz, why not hire a local who lives and breathes the stuff? Parker travels to CA, drinks plenty of it, but I know he doesn’t get CA Pinot, travel budget or not. Same here, why not hire who really knows the stuff and lives in CA?
My reaction to JM’s position was initially, and remains, one of appreciating the irony of it.
He is not even a good politician about it.
I used to buy a lot of Aussie wines, very heavy on the '98s especially. I’ve either sold or drunk nearly all I had and haven’t replaced them. I buy much more from California and the Rhone now and have lost my taste for Aussie wine. Every now and again I have one that reminds me of what I used to love in them, but more often than not I"m left picking splinters from my teeth and making a puckering face after enduring the high alcohol and over ripe pruney fruit. I’m simply done with it, my tastes have evolved. I certainly don’t trust Dr. J’s palate or scores either, they’re more inflated than the Goodyear blimp, so that has helped keep me away from trying them again. I think Bob made a huge mistake doling out the tasting of so many areas to others, especially Aussie wines to Dr J.