The big news Friday was that billionaire Hamdi Ulukaya, the Turkish-born CEO and founder of Chobani, has purchased Anchor Brewing, lock, stock & steam. The stories will keep coming in the next few days, some with bits and pieces that have not been previously reported. We’ll have to wait for the most interesting ones, which will come from on the ground and be about what hasn’t happened yet. When I see them, I will pass along links.
Step away from the beer bubble for a moment to consider style. It is a function of culture, right?
Let’s start with the conclusion of Jeff Alworth’s riff on a post about XPA at Hop Culture, which goes, “Style is one useful way to think about beer, but it’s not the only way. Too often, it blinds us to something more interesting.
“As a final comment, I’ll connect this point to the discussion last week about hazy IPAs. See what happens when you think of them as less a style than a function of beer culture. Does that change the way you think about them?”
Has “beer style” disconnected from “beer culture,” and if so, when and why?
Quite honestly, I won’t pretend to know. Instead, a couple observations.
– Scotty Hargrave, who perfected XPA as a homebrew, is a Johnny Appleseed when it comes to Balter XPA. I’ve seen him handing out cans, including to me (great beer), during hop harvest in the Yakima Valley region of Washington and the Nelson region of New Zealand. Perhaps American brewers who choose to make something similar are thinking about style or perhaps about Scotty and that specific beer when they do.
– Balter was founded in 2016 by former world surfing champion Mick Fanning and a group of high-profile investors and sold less than four years later to Carlton & United Breweries. Within a year, Asahi Beverages purchased CUB from A-B InBev. Expansion that followed seems to have left the culture surrounding XPA intact.
Now, a connection that may or may not, well, connect in your mind.
Last week, Saving Country Music reported that Zach Bryan is pissed that Warner Brothers had sent his newest single to Top 40 pop radio, because “I’m not a f–king Pop artist.” Check out the details if you like. What was new to me is that SCM recently proposed a “Dewey Decimal Classifications for Country’s Subgenres.” (See image above.)
As somebody who listens to John Moreland, Joe Ely, Lucinda Williams, Brandi Carlisle and other similar artists, ones who sometimes are filed under 564-Alt Country, this system could be useful. As a bonus, it might be even more useful in keeping large swaths of country music out of my ears.
It stands in contrast to the seven, just seven, genres Kelefa Sanneh uses to classify popular music. Again, to skip to the last words, in this case his Chapter 3: Country.
“Even more than most genres, country music attracts detractors—ever since the sixties, it has remained among the most despised forms of music in America, sneered as for being too country, or perhaps not country enough. And yet country music has managed to do the two most important things a musical genre can do: it has changed, and it has endured.”
How many subgenres of IPA are there now? Has it changed? Has it endured?
LEDE OF THE WEEK
OAK HARBOR — In a small brewery attached to his Fleet Street house, Stephen Chavez put a glass to the nozzle of his fermenter, pouring in the golden, hazy color of his Believer IPA, a flavorful beer made with actual Douglas fir tips, pine, spices and Chinook hops.
“No one makes cookies like Grandma does,” he said, “and no one’s gonna make beer like we do.”
— From Army veteran right at home with Crossed Arrows Brewery on Whidbey Island
QUOTE OF THE WEEK
“It was pretty funny to see those guys (other brewers) have their grip so tight on what they’ve always done. It’s like, just let go of the rope; you’ll be alright. We’re just going to jump off the building. It’s not as far as you think, so just follow.”
— Scotty Hargrave of Balter Brewing, talking about brewing XPA
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– 10,000 Human Decisions — On Mariage Parfait Oude Geuze, Frank Boon, and Belgian Lambic Culture
– A portrait of craft beer’s identity crisis
– On queuing, or not, and British pub culture