Signatory ?

Signatory is one of several independent bottlers that buy casks from distillers and bottle them on their own (and may mature them in their own warehouses as well). Some others are Murray McDavid, Whyte & Mackay, and Cadenhead.

Independent bottlings usually have the distillery name in small type, not using trademark typefaces or logos. Some distillers don't allow even that, so the bottler might simply give the geographic area of the distiller.

IB's may be quite different from the official bottlings - they often come from a single cask, and it may not be a "typical" cask for the distillery (e.g. a bourbon-cask Macallan). OB's may be a vatting of different batches, ages, or cask types, to try to keep the product fairly consistent from year to year.

I have an IB of Highland Park 20 from Signatory - it's pretty nice, but I'm going to have to get an official bottling of the HP 18 to compare it against. The IB has a pepperiness that makes me think of Talisker without the peat.

No age statement: may be a very young whisky, or perhaps a vatting of old and young whiskies. If an age statement appears on a bottle, it is the age of the youngest whisky in the mix, even if only a small percentage comes from a young cask. A cask that has been aged too long might be "fixable" by adding some younger whiskies, for instance, or a young whisky might be brought down to drinking strength by adding older whisky.

NAS isn't necessarily a bad thing; for instance, Aberlour A'bunadh is (IMHO) exceptional. FWIW, I *don't* consider Aberlour 10 to be "toxic s**nk water." ;-)

It's very hard to say how the Signatory NAS Lagavulin would compare, but at $20, I'd give it a shot.

Thanks Russ. Great info.

Ah, yes. My comment that has defined my worth as a human being (or more accurately lack thereof) to some in this group :-)

I must say that I did down a dram of the Aberlour 10 last night, partly because of the comments in reaction to my (admittedly overly) harsh assessment. To be more specific, I find Aberlour 10 to be totally lacking in character, with a disturbing aftertaste that hints of the medicinal/chemical. This is the same flavor that keeps me from liking Glenlivet very much.

But, to be totally fair and honest, my bottle of Aberlour is about

Cheers and thanks again Russ. I have only had Laphroig once and liked it very much so $20 for the Signatory is a pretty easy call.

Paul

----- Original Message ----- From: "Rajmund M" Newsgroups: alt.drinks.scotch-whisky Sent: Saturday, August 14, 2004 6:23 PM Subject: Re: Signatory ?

Glenfarclas is probably the most aggressive distillery in defending their trademark from the indie bottlers. I have a truly amazing "Ballindalloch"

Ballindalloch just happens to be the town where Glenfarclas is situated.

Al Jones