Hey! Get out of here, you! Some guy on the internet has made an unfounded proclamation questioning a professional’s integrity while having no direct experience with the product of discussion. Who do you think you are to disagree, eh?!
FWIW, here’s Antonio’s answer to a pretty specific question today on the Vinous board. I believe he’s commenting specifically on the 2014 reviews that were just published.
(Sorry, it doesn’t copy very well, but I think you can get the jist. the first paragraph is the question. the next 2 paragraphs are his answer.)
Antonio Galloni Posts: 3,581
12:07PM
(David Stern said:
Antonio,
I am wondering if your criticisms of Aldo Conterno’s wines and operation are truly objective and not founded on some subjective, personal experience with the winemakers. The wines are great.)
My views are what I think of the wines. Since you ask, I have never had anything less than very pleasant experiences with the Conterno family, going back to Aldo Conterno himself. But my job is to give readers objective opinions of the wines, no matter how much I might personally admire the people who make those wines, including some whose wines make up a big part of my own cellar.
As for the wines, they are neither great on their own, nor in the context of all the other wines I tasted for this article, and that I have tasted in 20+ years. In my opinion, of course. I am looking for a Cicala Barolo that tastes like Cicala, a Colonnello that speaks to Colonnello, etc. Not wines that are totally anonymous. That’s all there is to it.
I have to wonder whether he tried these wine just once or multiple times? If you have been complimentary in the past and found the wines to be really different than what it had in the past, I would think you would have tried them a few times to ensure that bottle variation wasn’t the cause here.
And yes, I do believe reviewers give an extra nod to those wines that are performed well in the past, especially when tasting non blind.
I also think reviewers choose their words very carefully and it’s not only the score that matters but how the wines are portrayed.
Just my two cents here. Cheers.
I would say he tried them just once, and he would have had to buy the bottles to try them since I believe he is no longer invited to taste at the Domain.
I do think the score for the Granbuseia 2008 does look odd relative to the other 2008s. Yes he could just have felt that it was significantly inferior to the other wines of that vintage, but I looks more like to me that in 2012 he had the predisposition that he liked A Conterno wines and school red the wines tasted highly; in 2016 when he decided he didn’t like A Conterno wines he scored th Granbussia appropriately.
Definitely don’t think there’s an anterior or nefarious motive, just think that these wines are not tasted blind and the scores reflect a confirmation bias of how the reviewer expects the wines should be.
I’m a huge believer that professional reviewers should taste and score blind. Sadly very few do.
You’d hope. But with the number of wines most critics are required to write up these days (admittedly they are self-imposed quotas if you’re the boss, like Galloni), there’s no way they can regularly retaste most wines – particularly when they’re dependent on samples. It’s been a long time since Parker routinely assigned scores with remarks such as, “Tasted three times with consistent notes.”
The irony here is off the charts. We supposedly rely on critics to fairly score and assess wines so we don’t have to necessarily “try before we buy”, and here we may have to buy a wine or wines to check the critic.
Todd, we need a “like” button on this site.
This.
It’s also extremely ironic that what we claim we want in a reviewer is someone who will call it as they see it, and mark down a wine that deserves it. And here we are casting huge amount of suspicion on a reviewer who is actually doing it. Such a fickle and frankly hipocritical crowd.
Something I learned many years ago as a journalist is that about 95% of the time when the subject of a story complains about a story,
it’s really the headline that’s the problem.
I think Marcus raised a fair question in his original post:
If his subject heading had been, “What gives with Galloni’s scores on Aldo Conterno?” I don’t think anyone would have objected. Obviously we all encounter scores we find puzzling, whether we’ve tasted a wine or not. It’s the suggestion of bad motive that was inflammatory and unjustified.
It’s hype to get people to read and comment by creating controversy.
Just my $0.02
If you haven’t noticed your admonition isn’t proving very effective. I was first to even mention a commitment to trying the wines, but if you want to abolish commentary on wines people have never tried you’d be abolishing the better part of the comments here or on any other board.
Indeed intelligent people are having a conversation about something you happen to be very uncomfortable with for some reason. If you can’t see the relevance to Jonathan Wu’s post above, I can’t justify engaging any further.
Fully agreed
I agree with your point, but to be fair my title has done its job by generating discussion and readership of the post in general, I am not trying to offend or defend anyone. In fact I have 1 magnum of 2013 Cicala that I purchased on futures last year that is now sleeping in the cellar, If I had a 750ml bottle I would crack it in the name of science and post my opinion.
I was sort of hoping that a well traveled berserker may have tasted at the domain in the last couple of years and give me some solid insight
I drank Colonnello and Cicala 2012 in the Great wines of Italy event in Hong Kong, each 3 small glasses pouring from different bottles. I found them among the best in the event. I also didn’t see any change in style compared to other recent vintages. I understand some people’s criticism of over-extraction and overoaking and it’s totally alright to dislike their house style. But I think this “new style” has been like that since around 2004 vintage and wasn’t started from 2012. If one scores their 2006-2011 with 95,96 points, then their 2012s are definitely not 87,88 point stuff.
Robert–I think you misunderstood me, or I didn’t make myself entirely clear. I agree with what you point out is ironic about this. i was pointing out a separate irony–that we ask for reviewers to be critical, and then when they are, we don’t trust them.
Not sure what I’ve been unclear about with regard to my reasons for being “uncomfortable”. I don’t necessarily have a particular love for Antonio’s reviews, but I think it’s very unfair to question a professional critic’s ethics without providing any proof. The topic is interesting, but I agree with John Morris. I think it would have been better to have made the topic less accusatory. Remember Antonio reads this board and posts periodically, and very likely is reading this thread.
Wild speculation here, but if ratings dropped significantly with the November 2016 report and since then have continued to be lower than “expected,” perhaps there was a change in importing procedures that exposed the wines to heat. Anything about the TNs that might suggest that?
John,
in todays hyper points 86= a big FU and the fact he bagged the domain in his preamble, the fact that he rated the 2008 wines when tasted from barrel (botti or whatever) and then blasted 2008 Granbussia from bottle a few years later, the fact that he is persona non grata at the domain. Seems like a sudden on set of negativity in the last couple of years. I hope someone gives me a valid explanation for the sudden demise of the wines and I would be happy if AG posted here in response, I have said nothing that I would not be happy to say to his face
nope,
not even a bracket score and a question mark