Friday, July 11, 2014

New Whiskey Labels: Fishy Rebel Yell Label and Peated anCnoc

 
In the label BS department, a new line of Rebel Yell labels cleared this week, including a new small batch bourbon. The label claims that Rebel Yell has been "handcrafted according to the original time honored recipe since 1849."  Imagine that; they were making Rebel Yell bourbon before there were even rebels.  Of course, this is total BS since Rebel Yell was created by the Stitzel-Weller distillery shortly after the end of prohibition.  When the distillery closed, the brand was sold to the St. Louis based Luxco Company.  Luxco is not a distillery but a bottler of sourced bourbon. (Rebel Yell has made this claim before, but it's much more prominent on these new labels - the 1849 date likely comes from the founding of the original W.L. Weller Company, which has little to do with Rebel Yell.)

Close readers will also note that the label states this bourbon was "distilled and aged by the Rebel Yell Distillery," a distillery that you'll have trouble finding if you visit Kentucky.  If you go to the Kentucky Secretary of State's website, though, you will find that there is a listing for the Rebel Yell Distillery, and it just happens to have the exact same address as Heaven Hill. To be fair, the label does say it was distilled by said fictional distillery for Luxco, Inc, which is actually a change for the better from past labels.

In Scotch news, a label cleared for anCnoc Cutter, a peated anCnoc.  It has a peat level of 20.5 ppm. 


7 comments:

Josh said...

New label, same weak and lifeless whiskey. Always love the TTB posts though.

Andrew said...

I believe what Luxco is doing is called "Templetoning"

Justin said...

@Andrew
...or Diagoeing. I , too, love the TTB posts. Don't stop Sku!

Sam Komlenic said...

I know that the 80s were really hard on the industry, but it was my Golden Age of whiskey.

Old Overholt and Sam Thompson ryes, both still available and still distilled in Pennsylvania. Original Michter's right there on the shelf next to Jack Daniel's.

And anytime someone was headed South, orders were to bring back as much Rebel Yell as they could afford. It was not sold north of the Mason-Dixon line back then, and was a solid 90 proof.

We loved the stuff, but at the time had no idea why. Now I long for the days of inexpensive and accessible S-W whiskeys. Good times.

kallaskander said...

Hi there,

sku I was trying to follow the link for anCnoc Cutter as there is an anCnoc Rutter as well as an anCnoc Flaughter and an anCnoc Tushkar exclusivly for Sweden here in Europe.
Just wondering if they would bring out new versions for the US or if there is a mispelling of the name.

The link does not work - probably they applied for the label clearance ot the anCnoc Rutter and somebody got it wrong...

Greetings
kallaskander

sku said...

Hmm. It works for me, and it's definitely Cutter. The TTB website does have trouble from time to time. Maybe try again.

kallaskander said...

Hi there,

you are right. It is Cutter 20.5ppm in the whisky.

Greetings
kallaskander