Official 2024 Release | 46% ABV

Score: 5/10

**Average. In a good way.**
***TL;DR***
*Easy on the palate, painful on the wallet*

The Artisanal Premium

Several years ago I came into some money via a tax rebate and decided to order a custom built guitar.

This was back in 2014 and at the time I was playing Dobro in a Western swing/gypsy jazz fusion band.

For those of you who don’t know what a Dobro is, it’s a type of resonator guitar. A resonator guitar is basically a guitar with what is, in effect, a metal speaker built into the body. When the guitar is strummed, the vibrating body drives the metal cone and creates volume - hence the term ‘resonator guitar.’

The Dobro is actually a specific brand of resonator guitar, but the word has become a catch-all term for a type of lap style guitar that’s played with a metal bar and fingerpicks. The correct term for this sort of guitar is actually ‘square neck resonator’. They’re mostly found in bluegrass and country music and are, in terms of the sound they make, one of the most distinctive of all instruments. If you want to hear some superlative Dobro playing, then check out this video of Rob Ickes. The Dobro solo starts around the one minute mark and is a good example of what makes these guitars so unique.

Relative to regular guitar, there are very few Dobro players out there, although it has become more popular in recent years, probably due to the ubiquity of cheap, Chinese-built instruments that have flooded the market. Needless to say, there aren’t that many quality builders of these instruments, and the handful of reputable luthiers that do exist are mostly concentrated in the United States.

When I decided to have one of these guitars made, I did my due diligence. Ordering a custom built instrument is inherently risky. It means trusting somebody with a lot of money, upfront, in the knowledge that it may well be years before your instrument arrives. And even when it does arrive, there’s no guarantee that the instrument will be any good. If it’s not very good, you can’t simply return it, in the way that you can if you order, say, a Gibson Les Paul from a big guitar store. You can’t play it first, either, because it hasn’t been built. It’s basically a roll of the dice.

On the other hand, the upside of ordering a custom built guitar is that you can have whatever you want. You get to choose the wood, the inlays, the hardware – the only limiting factor is budget. The tax rebate I had wasn’t that spectacular, but it was enough to get me an instrument made of all solid wood, as opposed to laminate ply. After doing some research, I contacted a builder in West Virginia, sent my deposit, and began the long wait.

The instrument, which was initially meant to be delivered within six months, took three years to arrive. There were several issues along the way, including a particularly tough Appalachian winter, which stopped the builder from accessing his workshop, and a cancer diagnosis, which understandably slowed his progress. During this time, I waited patiently, and tried to reassure myself that I would eventually receive my Dobro, and that I hadn’t just wired thousands of pounds to a stranger on another continent who had no intention of delivering what I’d ordered.

Thankfully, throughout the build process, I was kept up to date with sporadic photos of the guitar on the workshop bench during various stages of construction, although I’d be lying if I said that it wasn’t a nerve-racking experience. Still, eventually, after what felt like a lifetime, I received an email, telling me that the guitar was finally ready to ship.

Fortunately, the instrument was everything that I’d hoped it would be. The body is made from Koa, a type of tree that only grows in Hawaii. It’s hand numbered inside, signed and dated by the builder and has my initials inlaid into the fretboard: a complete one off instrument. If I were to compare it to buying whisky, then I’d probably liken it to buying your own cask. It may be similar to others out there, but there is nothing out there that’s identical.

Of course, there’s something special about owning this sort of instrument, just as I’m sure there’s something special about owning your own cask of whisky. Knowing that something is unique – that it’s been crafted by hand, using traditional methods, in a particular environment – is incredibly seductive. That’s why, in a world where things are increasingly produced on a large scale - with efficiency and profit as the driving factors, anything that’s vaguely artisanal can command a premium.

Large companies understand this. Just take a look at the food industry. Browse the shelves of any high end supermarket and it probably won’t be long before you come across the word ‘artisanal’ on a packet of biscuits or a loaf of sourdough bread. The festishization of anything regional, small scale, or traditional, is something that marketing departments have embraced wholeheartedly. ‘Heritage tomatoes’, ‘farm-to-table produce’ and ‘hand cooked crisps’ are all terms that have become synonymous with middle class food buying habits. Perhaps the most obvious example of this comes from chains like M&S, who in their food adverts talk about ‘hand-crafted’ pasta sauce, and ‘Channel Island cream’.

I’m sure that the phrase ‘hand crafted pasta sauce’ is perfectly legitimate, but what does it mean? It’s designed to convey a sense of something artisanal, but does that mean that it’s made in someone’s kitchen? Perhaps the ingredients are handpicked? Or perhaps it’s stirred by hand? Who knows? When you actually dig down into what the term ‘hand-crafted’ means, in the context of a mass produced pasta sauce, it’s not very clear - any more than the meaning of ‘hand cooked crisps’ is clear. What we can be sure about though, is that it allows producers to charge more money. Because anything that’s handcrafted is surely worth a premium, right?

The whisky industry is, of course, heavily reliant on this sort of marketing as well. In fact, they’re masters of it. Scotch whisky is steeped in tradition and regionality, and the big distilleries, understandably, lean heavily into that. Take Macallan, for instance, who use ‘hand-picked sherry seasoned oak casks from Jerez’, or Talisker, which is ‘crafted on the shores of the Isle of Skye’. There’s Dalmore, who also use ‘hand-selected’ casks which are also ‘expertly curated’, and Bowmore, who have ‘crafted’ their whisky since 1779 and whose whisky making processes have been ‘gently refined’ as the ‘centuries have passed.’

There is, of course, nothing wrong with distilleries emphasising their histories, their regionality, or their sense of tradition. In fact, it’s entirely understandable. Marketing departments know that in a world where everything moves at a hundred miles an hour – where technology is king, and where mechanised processes are behind 99% of the things we buy – conveying a sense of history, tradition – or even just a human touch – is something that helps to move product. That’s why words like ‘crafted’ and terms like ‘hand-selected’ are so ubiquitous in the Scotch whisky lexis. They juxtapose with the world around us, reminding us that Scotch is an old fashioned product with an old fashioned ethos, even if it is produced on a large scale, and backed by global conglomerates whose first duty is to the shareholder.

The whisky that I want to review here is genuinely a small batch product that’s made on a family run farm distillery, from barley that’s been grown by the producer. Unlike the Macallans and Dalmores of the world, Daftmill doesn’t have the history to talk about, but their whisky does command a premium, based – at least in part – on the perception that it’s small-scale and artisanal. In the case of Daftmill, this perception is valid. The details on the bottle inform me that the distillery produces as few as 100 casks per year. It even tells us which field the barley was grown in.

I picked this bottle up before Christmas on a shopping trip to Leamington Spa. It was sitting on the shelf of a whisky and wine specialist, at RRP. Prior to this bottle, I’d only ever been able to try one Daftmill, and that was a sample.

I’ll be honest with you, I wasn’t sure what to make of it. It was quiet whisky – the sort of whisky that you don’t really get to know very well based on a single 3cl sample – and I came away none the wiser as to whether Daftmill was worth the premium or not.

When I saw this bottle then, I had to grab it. I’ve spoken before about how I tend to get queasy when going into triple figures for a single bottle of whisky, but on this occasion, I decided to throw caution to the wind. Mike Wolfe, of American Pickers fame, has a saying which I like: ‘The time to buy it is when you see it.’ This is true of many things, and whisky is no exception.

I’m not sure that Mrs Mackay was entirely won over by this argument, but she agreed to let me buy it anyway. In fact, when we got to the till, she went one further and offered to pay for it. It was two days before Christmas, and she hadn’t got me a present.

I figured that, whether it was worth the £110 or not, it would be better than a pair of socks.

Review 1/2 - Fergus

Daftmill 2011, Winter Release 2024, 46% ABV
£105 / £110 still some availability

There’s no question about it, this is whisky to geek out on. Not only is it produced by a small, seasonal, farm distillery which is family owned, but the livery on the bottle also contains all sorts of interesting information. The back label informs us that the distillery only runs in the farm’s quiet periods; that Daftmill is made using the farm’s own barley and that the barley - Publican - was grown in field 43ac and was harvested on the 28th and the 29th of August. The whisky in the bottle is a vatting of 27 first fill ex-bourbon barrels and was matured in the farm’s own dunnage warehouse, on the upper level. The casks were filled in December of 2011 and the whisky was bottled in 2024. The information on here is fantastic. This is truly transparent whisky, designed to convey a genuine sense of craftsmanship that is sadly lacking, more widely, in the industry.

Why, oh why, oh why then, it does not say the words ‘un-chill filtered’ and ‘natural colour’ anywhere on the bottle is beyond me. Look, we know that Daftmill don’t chill-filter or colour their whisky; anybody who’s willing to drop £100 plus on a 12 year old whisky is no doubt already aware of that - but even so, I feel as if those words should be on this bottle somewhere. It never fails to confound me how many distilleries - distilleries that are clearly aiming their whiskies at people like me - fail to disclose the fact that they’re not using E150a. If I was running a distillery and I knew that I was targeting the enthusiast market; if I was disclosing the sort of granular information that’s written on the back label of this bottle - knowing that the people who were buying the bottle love to geek out on that sort of stuff - then you can bet your bottom dollar that I’d also be shouting about the fact that the whisky in the bottle wasn’t wearing fake tan. I know this might sound like nitpicking, but I think it’s important.

Think about it this way: if every distillery that wasn’t colouring their whisky, made a point of putting the words ‘natural colour’ front and centre of the label, then we would know exactly which distilleries were colouring their whiskies. Producers would be shamed by virtue of the fact that the words ‘natural colour’ weren’t written on their bottle. This is why I think it’s important that the distilleries who are giving us fully natural whisky - distilleries like Daftmill - shout about it.

Nose

The first word that comes to mind, when I nose this whisky, is ‘clean’. It’s February as I write this, but really, this is a summer dram. I get white wine - crisp, light white wine - some lime juice, a touch of lemon and some strawberries. There’s also some coconut and a touch of Turkish Delight. I also pick up a little candle wax, along with some pear drops. It really is a clean, refined, sophisticated nose. There’s nothing shouty here.

Palate

The palate follows through on the nose. Again, it’s clean. The white wine is there, as is the lime, the lemon and the coconut. Again, I get wax, along with some custard creams. There’s also some banana here, and some peaches. There’s a slightly doughy note as well, like maybe cookie dough.

It’s good whisky - the epitome of honest, straight-to-the-point, bourbon matured spirit. The real question is, is it worth paying double what you’d normally expect to pay for a whisky of this age?

The Dregs

The answer to that question is complex, but I’ll do my best to answer it. I started this review by talking about the Dobro I had built. I love that guitar, and it puts a smile on my face whenever I play it, but if somebody came to me and said, ‘should I get a custom built guitar, and is it worth the money?’ my answer would be ‘well, it depends.’ Let me explain.

Had you handed me that guitar a decade and a half ago, when I first started on the instrument - the benefits of having such an instrument, as opposed to say, a perfectly playable entry level Dobro, would have been lost on me. The differences between that guitar and a well set up Chinese instrument from a big factory, wouldn’t be appreciably different, to someone who isn’t in the Dobro rabbit hole. Certainly, they wouldn’t seem different enough to justify spending thousands of pounds more.

Because the truth is that there’s a law of diminishing returns, when it comes to instruments, just as there is with whisky. Once you go above a certain price point, you’re paying for things that aren’t always directly related to the sound. The name on the headstock, the materials that the instrument has been made with, the potential resale value, the finish, the reputation of the builder, the scarcity of the wood…all of these things factor into the price.

When it comes to a handmade instrument, from a luthier who’s working out of a small workshop, with no CNC machinery and perhaps only one or two other people to help, you’re also paying for that person’s time. You’re paying for the fact that the wood has been cut and shaped by hand; for the fact that the glue between the joints has been wiped clean; for the fact that somebody has picked out the specific tone wood that the instrument is built with, tap tested it and made sure that it's to your liking before beginning the build. You’re paying for the fact that they’ve taken pictures, sent you updates, and made adjustments and changes where required. All of this takes time. And time costs money.

I guess that what I’m saying is that judging anything that’s small scale and artisanal, against a mass produced product, is always difficult, because they’re two different things. Ordering a custom built instrument is expensive, and risky, but when the risk pays off, it’s worth it. For me, the risk that I took in having my own Dobro built was worth it, in the end. It’s a beautiful instrument. The second I played it, I knew that it had been worth both the money and the wait.

Whether or not this Daftmill is worth the money isn’t quite as straightforward; but even so, comparing it to a mass produced whisky of a similar age that might cost say £40 to £50, is futile. The big distilleries have economies of scale on their side. They can buy the casks that they use at a much better price because they’re buying them in the thousands, rather than the hundreds. The same no doubt goes for the cost of the bottles, the labels and the corks. The distribution is no doubt easier, when you have a network of retailers that spans the globe. Buying a whisky from a distillery that’s producing millions of litres a year should be cheaper, because it’s likely going to be cheaper to produce.

I guess the point I’m making is that an expression like this is always going to cost a bit more than something from a producer that’s knocking out thousands of bottles a week. We can’t begrudge Daftmill for charging a premium. And I don’t regret spending £110 on this bottle.

That being said, whilst I’m happy to pay a premium, I feel as if a ten or twenty pound premium would have been more appropriate. If this bottle had cost me, let’s say, £70 - or if it had been £110, but presented at cask strength - then I’d be perfectly happy with it. As it stands, it’s underwhelming, especially for the money.

We are where we are, though. If you want to try Daftmill, you have to dig deep. I’m a whisky enthusiast, somebody who’s been keen to try Daftmill for a long time, and so I was chuffed at being able to snag this bottle at RRP. I’m glad that I bought it because I can now say that I’ve tried Daftmill, and I know what I’ve been missing out on. I wouldn’t replace it, though. If the price of these Daftmill releases stays high, then they’ll be a try-before-you-buy in future.

All that said, I love what this distillery is doing and I wish them every success with it. Daftmill is the real deal - a bonafide farm distillery, making simple, honest whisky in small batches; whisky that’s meant to be opened and consumed. They sit in sharp contrast to the marketing waffle that we’re constantly being bombarded with from the bigger producers. For that reason alone, they ought to be commended.

Score: 5/10 FMc

Review 2/2 - Ainsley

Daftmill 2011, Winter Release 2024, 46% ABV
£105 / £110 still some availability

I picked up this bottle last November back in Glasgow. Yes, the suitcase was a bit heavier on the way back. I was reluctant at first, but I quickly did the math and it told me I couldn’t get this any cheaper at home.

The wholesale price for a 46% bottle of Daftmill sold by La Maison du Whisky in France is, from memory, around 113€. That’s without the 20% VAT. So even if I were to order one from my shop and sell it to myself without making any cent on it, it’d end up more expensive than getting it at retail in the UK. So I did.

And, despite mostly agreeing with our resident Dobro player Fergie, I’m glad I did.

Score: 6/10

**Good stuff.**
***TL;DR***
*It’s all about the taste, most of the time*

Nose

Fruity, and fresh. Pears in syrup, orange juice and pineapple cubes. Fresh grass. Very inviting nose. Lemon flesh, tart. A hint of green bell pepper. Granny smith apple skins. Tart pear and apple hard candies.

With water: Immediately a tad fruitier, with mirabelles, cooked yellow fruits, puff pastry drenched in melted butter. Milky runny caramel. Lemons, limes, kumquats, and Seville oranges.

Palate

Light, delicate, with white fleshed fruits leading the charge. Medium length and a balanced influence of the wood.

With water: creamier, with vanilla ice cream and wood spices such as soft cinnamon enveloping those persisting white fruits. Juicy pears.

The Dregs

I’ve had the chance to taste quite a few cask strength Daftmills not so long ago (more on that soon), so I’m lucky enough to know how brilliant and vibrant these whiskies can be. So, while I don’t get the same experience from this bottle, I feel like I can still appreciate its nuances and it will get drunk when summer comes, let me tell you that. This is dangerous whisky.

It is a perfectly classic Lowland whisky, that none of the other perfectly classic Lowland distilleries are able to make. Pricey? Yes, but sometimes, rarely, one accepts to pay a bit more for the tasting experience.

Many thanks to Fergus for letting me tag along.

Score: 6/10 AF

Tried this? Share your thoughts in the comments below. FMc

Dramface is free.
Its fierce independence and community-focused content is funded by that same community. We don’t do ads, sponsorships or paid-for content. If you like what we do you can support us by becoming a Dramface member for the price of a magazine.
However, if you’ve found a particular article valuable, you also have the option to make a direct donation to the writer, here: buy me a dram - you’d make their day. Thank you.
For more on Dramface and our funding read our about page here.