Ardbeg 10 yo (70 proof, OB, bottled circa 1976)
A super rare old bottling that should be just after the mid 1970s and before they transitioned to the gold and black label. Colour: gold. Nose: typically beautiful mix of seawater, diesel, drying kelp, old rope and tar. An extremely pure expression of peat - the kind that is unique to 60s and 70s Ardbeg. The 40% abv leaves you with a curiously dissonant impression of fragility and power. Yet, the overall impression remains one of evocative beauty and peaty harmonics. Mouth: as big and majestic as whisky can be at 40%. Soots, embrocations, seawater, ink, tar, TPC and an almost gelatinous peatiness. Finish: long, fat and superbly earthy, sooty and smoky. Comments: Imagine this at 80 proof. Or - dare to dream - 100 proof! Despite the strength, the elegance, control, power and sheer force of peaty personality are massive. 
SGP: 467 - 94 points. 

Ardbeg 28 yo 1972/2001 (49.5%, Douglas Laing Old Malt Cask, 222 bottles)
Colour: pale gold. Nose: seawater, kelp, smoked rubber, creel nets, tar, iodine, oysters, sheep wool… all the usual 70s Ardbeg tricks. Although, perhaps overall it errs on the lighter side of most 72s. There’s still this wonderful mix of medicines, hessian, old rope and dried seaweed with a whiff of diesel fumes in the background. Dry and chiselled. Mouth: big arrival! Hugley tarry and peppery, lots of smoked fennel, canvas, black olives, seawater mixed with olive oil, shoe polish and coal smoke. One of these Ardbegs that veers towards mechanical and slightly industrial characteristics. The palate is more boisterous and punchy than the nose suggested - which is a lovely surprise. Get’s very sooty, mineral, oily and with an almost greasy old Ardbeg peat. Finish: wonderfully long, emphatic, peaty, earthy, drying notes of seaweed, caraway, brine and slightly dirty smoke. Comments: The character and reputation of these vintages of Ardbeg is such that when you write notes, you can easily find yourself getting a tad blasé about a 94 point whisky. Let’s not forget just how incredible these casks were at the time and how influential they were on broader single malt culture. It’s great to revisit such bottlings and be blown away all over again. Stunning whisky that combines purity and power with brilliant wee dirty and mechanical touches. 
SGP: 466 - 94 points.

Ardbeg 1974/1991 (56%, Scotch Malt Whisky Society #33.11)
Needless to say, these very early SMWS Ardbegs, like the Springbanks, are both super scarce and bear an immense reputation. Colour: gold. Nose: beautifully sooty and smoky. A dank chimney with tarry embers, coal scuttles and old rope. Lots of hessian, paraffin, tar, iodine drops, dried kelp, seaweed crackers and anchovy paste. Despite the power you sense underneath everything unfolds with deft precision and control. Some beautifully elegant salinity keeps everything hyper fresh. With water: extremely pure and coastal now. Seawater, salt, brine, lemon juice, boiler smoke and kippers. Still all the while displaying this typical Ardbeg density of peat. Mouth: Waaaoooow! Pin-sharp peat, pink sea salt, black olives in brine, pure iodine, natural tar extracts, black pepper, smoked mackerel, salted liquorice and yet more tar. Totally thrilling whisky! Poise, power, balance and beautiful structure. With water: bandages, medical embrocations, antiseptic, herbal mouthwash, peat ashes, malt vinegar and camphor. Totally stunning! Herbal, smouldering, medical sooty and hugely salty. Finish: endlessly smoky, resinous, fatty, glycerol, herbal and umami. All manner of earthy, sooty, smoky and peaty complexities fizzing and popping. Comments: Effortlessly brilliant whisky! The kind of that totally dominates you from the get go and all you can do is follow it and try to keep up. The depth, power, complexity and balance are all just breathtaking! I really think these SMWS cask are amongst some of the very best 70s Ardbegs ever bottled. 
SGP: 478 - 95 points. 

Ardbeg 1975/1987 (55.7%, Scotch Malt Whisky Society #33.5)
Colour: gold. Nose: what strikes first are the more sooty and cereal tones. Like fresh kiln air tinged with blue peat smoke. Then you start to get these wee whiffs of menthol tobacco, black olive, kelp, brine and bonfire ash. Extremely pure and with a big but brittle austerity. Malt vinegar, camphor, vapour rubs, bandages and seawater. Whereas the 74 was a little easier and more restrained, this is rather more beastly. Immense! With water: the power remains but what is so striking is the freshness. Really pure sea air in a glass! Sandalwood, gorse, sand, crushed shells, white fish and simmering stock full of many different herbs. Mouth: Powerful but restrained arrival that then unfolds into the most immense salinity! Pure seawater, wet seaweed, oysters, sea urchin, mercurochrome, aspirin, petrol, natural tar and antiseptic. The kind of gunk you could stand a spoon in and disinfect whole hospitals with a single measure. Also profoundly peppery, sooty, oily and still wonderfully tarry. With water: the power is still dazzling but everything is even more fat, precise and generous now. More black pepper, more olives, more brine, more smoked sea salt, more olive oil, more medicine, more herbs and more peat. Just MORE! Finish: endlessly fat, greasy, salty and medical. A big, fat, slithering peatiness. Comments: Quite flabbergasting whisky. These SMWS bottlings are so precious because they show this immense distillate in its comparative youth and without any sherry to dress it up. Just uncompromising, naked and un-diluted raw 70s Ardbeg, bouncing around the glass and quivering with peaty power. This one is a tad more raw and guttural than the 1974 but the overall quality is almost identical. These two SMWS casks make Octomore feel like Speyburn.
SGP: 468 - 95 points.

Ardbeg 10 yo 1978/1988 (57.8%, The Syndicate, 240 bottles)
A rather rare example from Sir John MacTaggart’s private stash of casks. This label series is more commonly associated with Lagavulin, Caol Ila and Laphroaig, but Bowmore and Bruichladdich have both also featured - and of course this wee Ardbeg. Colour: pale gold. Nose: deeply ashy, petrolic and saline. An assertive and almost brutal minerality along with these notes of boiler smoke, dried kelp, black pepper and smoked olive oil. There’s also some rather earthy notes of black tea and vegetal things like baked cauliflower, caraway, antiseptic and asparagus. Given time you also get something almost cheesy - unlikely, but in a good way. With water: gets very smoky, earthy and drying. Lots of smoked canvass, fabrics and coal dust. Really a beast of an Ardbeg!  Mouth: big, fatty, oily, salty and drying. Lots of dried smoked herbs, peat, frying bacon, seawater, tarry rope, anthracite embers and mercurochrome. Whoever said 1978 Ardbegs were lighter? With water: green olives, anchovy paste, sardines, salty butter with chives. On the whole it’s hugely gutsy, greasy and full of fatty and rather industrial-accented peat smoke. Also brilliantly salty, this is the answer to the question: ‘how many ways can the flavour of salt manifest in Scotch Whisky?’ Finish: endless long, salty, oily and full of greasy boiler smoke, black pepper, gentian eau de vie, tar and TCP. Comments: We’re not in the same league as the SMWS pair (not much is really) but this is still an immensely impressive Ardbeg. It manages to be both monolithic and playful at the same time; brutality and tomfoolery in the same glass. Goes to show that Ardbeg was still making some rather incredible whisky in the late 1970s. 
SGP: 477 - 93 points. 

Lagavulin 12 yo (43%, OB ‘White Horse’, Jardine Matheson & Co Japan import, 1970s)
This is a super rare version of this old White Horse series for Japan. As with most of these old white label Lagas, this should be pretty serious stuff! Colour: orangey amber. Nose: Old Lagavulin + sherry = beauty! You have this mix of oily, almost syrupy and luxurious peat fused with dry, leafy and salty sherry. Amongst it all there’s bitter marmalade, smoked dark chocolate with sea salt, hessian, wet leaves, wine cellar must, black truffle oil, smoked mint, iodine drops and natural tar. Given the time the peat becomes more elevated and pronounced. You are unmistakably on Islay! Get’s more peppery, more oily, drier and more towards seaweed and gloopy old medicines. Stunning and rather emotional due to the sheer force of old style charisma about it. A little more time and it starts to reveal lots of raisins, dates and dried tropical fruits. Just beautiful. Mouth: Stunning! Leather, many different old tobaccos, long-aged Cuban cigars, smoked dates, raisins, tar, camphor, putty, smoked olive oil, hessian, bitter orange marmalade again, tannic black teas, paprika, dark chocolate with chilli and old school, herbal-infused dry peat smoke. All wrapped up in this very leathery and salty old school sherry. Finish: long, salty, gamey, leathery and full of deep, bass-like peat and dried seaweed. Comments: Just magnificent! To think that these bottles used to be given away if you bought a case of gin or some such other nonsense. This is everything you seek in great whisky: balance, depth, complexity and stunningly intertwined flavours. Not to mention these bottlings are the absolute epitome of old school peat and sherry in perfect harmony. 
SGP: 565 - 94 points. 

Lagavulin 40 yo 1979/2019 (49.1%, The Syndicate, cask #112, 188 bottles)
Colour: deep gold. Nose: a fragrant and beautifully honeyed kind of peat. Gives this great impression of oiliness and viscosity. You also get these beautifully complex notes of toasted black pepper, smoked green tea, natural tar extracts, lamp oil, hessian and candied citrus peels. Hints of smoked paprika, petrol, embrocations and old ink. Like some other older official Lagavulins (thinkings the 30 and 37yo Special Releases) this has the same quality of deep and wayward complexity that leads you down many tangential and tertiary paths. There’s olives, gentian root, many herbal and medical notes and a beautiful array of coastal incursions. All the while this very mature, honeyed profile - which wouldn’t be out of place in a very old Glen Grant for example - is ever-present. Mouth: dry, tautly structured, herbaceous and stunningly complex. Many herbal and smoked teas, cured meats, salted liquorice, precious hardwood resins, eucalyptus, tea tree oil, camphor, vapour rubs, iodine, more of these natural tar notes and smoked mineral oil. Still immensely fresh, vibrant and ‘together’. There’s no sense of diminishment from the age or wood. In fact the wood stays a respectable distance throughout, just delivering this perfect nibble of spice round the edges. Finish: very long, full of hessian and this rather textural, ropey, leathery kind of peat. Lots of black olive, dried seaweed, smoked mint and eucalyptus oil. Comments: Impeccable and rather special old Lagavulin. It’s commonly thought that most Islay whiskies (apart from Bowmore and possibly Bunnahabhain) run out of steam after about 35 years. But this Lagavulin is still fresh, vivid, coastal and bursting with complexity and life. Hugely pleasurable old Lagavulin that still reeks of distillery character. What a cask! 
SGP 465 - 93 points.

Lagavulin 27 yo 1991/2018 (51.8%, OB ‘Casks of Distinction’, cask #0016, sherry puncheon, 432 bottles)
Another from this often excellent but still rather silly series by Diageo. Colour: deep copper. Nose: smouldering wet leaves, chocolate, hessian, damp dunnage warehouse, tar, caraway and metal polish. What’s interesting is that you get the impression of a similar fusion of sherry and peat as you do in these old official 12yo White Horse bottlings, however, here you feel the modernity of the distillate making things a little sharper and more jagged. It’s still excellent stuff though, no doubt. More aggressive smokiness, more jams, dark fruits, plum sauce, seaweed and black olives in brine. With water: beautiful, classy and very elegant development along the lines of tobaccos, unlit cigars, sandalwood, dried seaweed, cured meats and touches of old balsamic and rancio. Mouth: big, brusque, tarry, hugely peppery and very salty. Lots of cured game meats, beef stock, dried seaweed in hot ramen broth, Maggi and other umami and savoury liquid seasonings. Gets increasingly salty and very punchy. Technically brilliant and impressive, but after some of these older style examples you kind of feel it lacks a little soul and class in some ways. Gets increasingly sooty, dry and with a rather burnt aspect emerging. With water: again water works wonders. Brings everything together around this core of sooty peat smoke, dried seaweed, dried dark fruits, mint, eucalyptus and earthy, meaty notes. Finish: long, leathery, sooty, peaty and with lots of spices, salinity and medical aspects. Comments: Water really helped this one by bringing out a more cohesive and classical profile dominated by distillery character and a greater harmony between cask and distillate. Bring a pipette and spend some quiet time with this one. 
SGP: 556 - 92 points. 

Lagavulin 1991/2016 (52.7%, OB ‘200th Anniversary’, sherry butt, 522 bottles)
I tried this at a tasting shortly before it’s release and remember being impressed, but I never managed to take proper notes before. Colour: deep copper/amber. Nose: wonderfully fat, meaty and earthy. Lots of savoury broths, broiled seaweed, miso, tar, salty black liquorice, olive tapenades, tarry rope and TCP. If you had an old bottling of the 16yo from around the early 1990s and imagined a version at full strength then you might conjure something akin to this style. It screams ‘Lagavulin’ right out of the glass. Continues this tight rope ballet between gamey cured meats, embrocations, tar, earth and a heavy bassy peat note. I find it pretty brilliant I have to say. With water: gets more elegant and more ‘together’ and concise. Seaweed, old school peat with these rather herbal, rooty and earthy accents, seawater, preserve lemons in brine, tar and iodine drops. Utterly majestic. Mouth: gah! Pure peat bog water and petrol mixed with chilli-spiced ramen broth, salt cured fish, dried kelp, old tarry rope, creel nets and natural tar liqueur. You might also add my beloved Maggi liquid seasoning, hot smoked paprika, aged pu erh teas, eucalyptus and this extremely medical-accented sherry. I know we haven’t mentioned sherry thus far, but it pervades everything rather perfectly. Hugely leathery, gamey, meaty and riddled with various tobaccos, dried herbs, old school cough medicines and umami seasonings. The complexity is also hugely impressive, this is one of those drams you could go on picking wee flavours and aromas out of for a good couple of hours. With water: once again, water just creates cohesion and everything now coagulates around this rather resinous, fat and almost greasily peaty core. Embrocations, tobacco, wet earth, charcoal, salted liquorice, natural tar - well, you get the picture by now… Finish: thrillingly long, salty, meaty, bitterly chocolatey, full of tobacco, more tar, smoked prunes, jasmine, ointments, dried seaweed and hessian. Did I mention peat? Comments: We didn’t call the anti-maltoporn brigade but, rather evidently, we should have had them on speed dial. Anyway, what a way to celebrate a bicentenary. Terrific work Diageo and especially everyone at Lagavulin. Better late than never! I just adore the fusion of sherry and peat here, two beautiful forces that create something greater than the sum of both parts. Although, let’s not forget time is really the third key ingredient in this glorious collision. 
SGP: 577 - 94 points.

Lagavulin 1980/1995 (63.8%, Scotch Malt Whisky Society #111.2)
A pretty scarce early SMWS Lagavulin bottled at a paint-thinning natural strength. Should be fun. I recall the 111.1 being same vintage and similar strength but from a pretty active sherry cask, whereas this one looks almost certain to be refill. Colour: pale gold. Nose: grassy, fresh and sooty at first nosing. It feels quite close to some 1988 and 1990s bottlings at similar ages so we’re in familiar territory. A fairly thick and slithery peat with lots of iodine, punchy medicines, seawater and a whole bucket of petrol. What’s impressive is not the power but the restraint; you don’t really feel that vertiginous alcohol. With water: opens superbly with water. Lapsang souchong, dried herbs, seaweed in miso broth, anchovies and a kind of coiling, layered smokiness. Taut and punchy yet also controlled and beautifully structured Lagavulin. Mouth: superb delivery, like a very early Special Releases 12yo with a little more age and coconut-flecked sweetness. Smoked malt extract, TCP, smoked meats - indeed, just rather smoky all round. Lemon cough syrup, antiseptic and charred white fish over coals. With water: a collision of syrupy medicines, herbal extracts, seawater and rather savoury, umami notes. The overall salinity is increased and there’s this familiar malt vinegar and chip fat morass which once again harks back to an early OB Special Releases 12yo. Only here there’s also green peppercorns in brine and English mustard powder. Finish: long, ashy and full of BBQ embers, fragrant wood smoke, pebbles, ink and some drying tarriness. Comments: Some aspects could fairly be considered as challenging, but it’s a whisky that commands attention and rewards a little skirmishing. Beneath all this masculine bluster, there’s much beauty to be found. Cleaves very close to some later official releases while still carrying a few echoes of the past. 
SGP: 367 - 92 points.