Today, a variation on focus on a particular beer (or beers) Friday.
I’m going to tell you some of the beers I sampled (a few ounces of each, not nearly enough to pass judgment) last night. You see if you can guess the brewery where they were made.
– A saison.
– An apricot saison.
– A hard cider.
– A spruce-flavored ESB.
– An orange chocolate stout.
BOOK REVIEW: “The Unbearable Nonsense of Craft Beer”
Is the “craft beer movement” a social movement, a political movement, an aesthetic movement, any sort of movement?
Tom Acitelli uses the term, or simply the movement, on more than a third of the pages in “The Audacity of Hops.” He does not categorize this movement, and that probably illustrates how the words “craft beer movement” have become an entity unto themselves. Only a couple of months ago, the Detroit Free Press suggested “Pride, personal experience help define the craft-beer movement” without explaining what makes it a movement.
Within the context of “The Audacity of Hops” the implication would be that Acitelli is discussing a social movement. The publisher states, “This book not only tells the stories of the major figures and businesses within the movement, but is also ties in the movement with larger American culinary developments.” And Acitelli certainly links craft beer and Slow Food, often itself described as a movement and even defined by Wikipedia as a social movement.
(The lengthy Wikipedia list also includes the civil rights movement, right to life, Tea Party movement, Ku Klux Klan, and Health at Every Size. In the end, what constitutes a “social movement” is less clear than finding a definition for “craft beer” and we know what folly that is. Academics have laid entire forests to waste simply theorizing on the life cycles of social movements. If there is such a thing as a craft beer movement, social or not, it would be interesting to determine where it might be in its life cycle. Another day.)
I’m pretty sure that Max Bahnson and Alan McLeod would not label it a social movement. In fact, perhaps they should rename the eighth chapter “The Unbearable Nonsense of Craft Beer – A Rant in Nine Acts.” Instead of calling it “Evangelism, Movement and Community” they might have chosen “Evangelism and the Myth of Movement or Community.”
A quick explanation is probably in order. “The Unbearable Nonsense” is a work of fiction, science fiction really and not at all like Evan Rail’s “Triplebock: Three Beer Stories.” Rail’s stories are about fictional characters who, through their actions and the dialogue, eventually reveal truths about themselves and beer, perhaps about ourselves and our relationship with beer. Banhson and McLeod are simply Max and Alan throughout the book, time and space traveling into fictional setting, but talking just like the guys who write their blogs.
Each chapter, as the title promises, provides a platform for them to rant. In Chapter 8 they basically kidnap a guy variously known as Lanky Geek, Lank Geekston and LG, a not particularly adept beer evangelist. He doesn’t stand a chance. They describe him as trying to “keep his grip on the myth.” It is Alan who tells him:
Supporting and promoting what you like is a nice thing to do. Sharing it with friends even better. We all do that… But taking it as a mission, as a responsibility? That just ain’t right. Believing that you, a consumer, are part of a movement that involves producers; that ain’t right either. You’ve been lied, duped. You’ve been disingenuously made believe that you and a group of brewers share a common interest. You don’t. In fact, your interest couldn’t be any more different from theirs.
Alan continues to pile it on, then Max resumes. Eventually, “The lanky guy nodded but kept his thoughts to himself.”
I wish he hadn’t. I wish he’d suggested that at some/many/most post industrial breweries those paid the most make only a reasonable multiple of those at the bottom of the salary ladder, compared to an obscene multiples CEOs enjoy at many large corporations. That would imply such breweries are part of a social movement. Or he might have pointed out that the producers genuinely enjoy the taste of the beers they make, just as the customers who buy them must (or they wouldn’t be buying them). So perhaps an aesthetic movement.
Do I know these things to be true? I’d like somebody (else) to do the research. I wouldn’t suggest it, however, if there weren’t anecdotal evidence.
That “The Unbearable Nonsense of Craft Beer” provokes such thinking beyond the words on the screen is a good thing, but I’m not certain what sort of audience this Kindle book (a Lulu version is in the works) will reach. It is one thing to kidnap a Lank Geekston and another to expect him to pay for a series of one-sided rants that will mostly piss him off. He’s not as likely to be entertained as those who regularly read A Good Beer Blog and Pivní Filosof – Beer Philosopher or consider this alternative view.
(And to be honest, even those who agree with the authors may not always be entertained. The word “rant” in the title is perfectly accurate so there is some rambling, and the language R-rated.)
But, geez, it costs just $3.99, less than a pint at happy hour. I only hesitated to hit download when I considered what other sorts of science fiction Amazon might recommend for me based on this purchase.
Beer Is The New Music. Lots of analogies to be made, like “The catch is that, like ‘indie music’, ‘craft beer’ can seem like an ambiguous term.”
Those who spent hours meticulously categorizing albums and reading music blogs will nod their heads at the hallmarks of the current craft beer craze: Obscurity and novelty are celebrated, the mainstream is mocked, and trends change regularly, with old tastes discarded and fresh genres added to the mix.
[Via PopMatters, one of my first reads each morning, and apparently Andrew Mason’s as well]
Announcement – The Session #84: “Alternative” Reviews. It might be interesting if everybody reviewed (or didn’t review) the exact same beer, but it also would be a little too much like a school assignment. [Via Literature & Libation]
Beer Geek Media Agenda for 2014. And best comment of the week: “If every blogger just posted that list, it would save everyone a lot of time.” [Via Boak & Baley’s Beer Blog; comment from Tyson]
Good Brewers Make A Brewery. “Can a small brewery lose three of their star brewers over a relatively short time and still be on top of their game? Chances are they can’t.” [Via Tandleman’s Beer Blog]
Why I Feel OK About Falling Off The Wagon After Years Of Sobriety. Pete Brown wrote about “Dry January” and Alan McLeod about “Why ‘Dry January’ Makes Sense.” And you have this: “Not drinking for two and a half years gave me the gift of never having to think about controlling myself. Starting again brought back the recurring epiphany that I need to be more present and aware in all my appetites.” [Via BuzzFeed]
I didn’t take long for me to abandon my plan for posts specifically related to “beer from a place” — whatever that means — each Wednesday.
Instead, a link and something for you to think about.
At the conclusion of a thoughtful post about how Goose Island Beer Co. has and has not changed since AB InBev bought the brewery in 2011 Jeff Alworth suggests, “But the truth is that the most disruptive brewery in America right now is Goose Island.”
Whoa! That’s a Truth with a capital T if it is The Truth.
Got me shaking my head.
*****
Upon further review, the beers he is writing about do come from a specific place — the Fulton Street brewery — do reflect that place, and are the result of what I am choosing to call post-industrial brewing.
– “I Had Just Three Things To Do.” Alan McLeod’s contribution to The Session #83. Because he’s being hounded by spammers, comments are unfortunately closed. So I’ll ask the question that pops to my mind here: If beer writing becomes less about community and more about individuality could that have an impact on the communal aspect of beer?
– Beers: Baltic and imperial porters, strong enough for cold winter nights. A story in which flavorful beer and humans interact.
– Beer Business Daily Predictions for 2014. Since it seems there’s no escaping discussions that are really about business — will “craft” sales continue to increase? how many openings? how many closings? rising or falling prices? — might as well read what Harry Schuhmacher has to report, because these are things he probably knows more about than anybody. BTW, he’s not the only one asking of legalizing weed will affect beer sales in Colorado.
Schuhmacher’s column in the current (dated January) All About Beer magazine is also an excellent read. Headlined “The Light of My Life is Dimming” it begins:
Everybody I know these days hates light beer, except those who don’t. It’s not just that they don’t prefer light beer or that they like more flavorful beers: They actually actively and morally despise light beer. It’s as if light beer was once a significant other who wronged them somehow — cheated with an import, say — and forgiveness is out of the question.
And of the cheating tarts out there, none is more despised these days, it seems, than poor old Miller Lite. You can forgive Bud Light, who was just a friend with benefits… You can forgive Coors Light because that was just a youthful dalliance… Corona Light was just a hookup on the beach, and Amstel Light was an uptown girl you couldn’t afford anyway. Natty Light and Keystone Light? Well those were just one-night stands and you consider yourself lucky for not getting the clap.
But Miller Lite? That’s the one you thought you’d marry for life.
The column itself is worth the price of the magazine (although as a bonus you get my story about “The Class of ’88”).
– Another prediction: Wine will continue to lose market share; craft beer is on the rise. Yep, linking to wine writer Jamie Goode for the third time in four weeks. And not just because he writes, “You can now get some great flavour experiences from beer for relatively little money. The same isn’t true of wine, and those who make mid-priced boring wine are the ones who will suffer loss of market share.” The whole list of wine predictions is worth reading, but remember he’s in the UK. The US “craft beer” market is arguably more mature, so we might wonder if the “commoditization of wine” he writes about could spill over into beer.
– German brewers push into the craft beer market with new hops. Pardon the hubris, but I told you so.
– You Are Not A Brewer, You Are A Panhandler With A Kickstarter Account. I aim to post five links a week here, bookmarking contenders during the previous week or saving them to Pocket. This popped on my radar Thursday and by Friday it had, as we used to say back in the day, “gone viral.” I expect you may have already seen it, but in case it got overlooked in the holiday bustle . . . a “bonus” sixth link.