Sober Boozers Club
The Sober Boozers Club Podcast is brought to you by Ben Gibbs - Alcoholic. Since 2022 Ben has been sourcing and enjoying the best alcohol free beer the world has to offer and has been documenting these beverages during his sobriety journey. Ben has worked alongside craft breweries, bottle shops and sober activists to raise awareness of Grey Area Drinking and to help spread the word on the growing market that is AF/NA beverages, becoming the face of the Alcohol Free Beer Club and featuring on many podcasts, as well as securing a number of features on BBC Radio. In 2024 Ben became the first alcoholic in active recovery to win a British Guild Of Beer Writers award for commentary on beer. This podcast features experts from the Beer world, as well as Alcohol Free breweries and sober activists as we explore the world of Alcohol Free beer and sobriety.
Sober Boozers Club
Designing the Craft AF Beer Scene
Ever wondered what goes on behind the scenes of your favorite alcohol-free craft beers? In this enlightening conversation with Richard Gray (aka Zumo Juice), we pull back the curtain on an industry that's rapidly evolving from afterthought to innovation leader.
Richard takes us through his journey as a graphic designer working with pioneering breweries like Mash Gang, sharing insider stories that will change how you view what's in your glass. From exploding cans and experimental ingredients to the delicate art of balancing hop profiles without alcohol, his perspective reveals the extraordinary creativity driving today's alcohol-free revolution.
What truly fascinates is the discovery that the majority of alcohol-free beer drinkers aren't actually sober—with research showing around 85% are regular drinkers using these products to moderate consumption. This insight challenges everything we thought we knew about who these products are for and why they matter.
We explore how certain hop varieties like Sabro shine brilliantly in alcohol-free formulations, creating complex flavors impossible to achieve just a few years ago. Richard's enthusiasm is contagious as he describes the technical challenges brewers have overcome and the innovations still on the horizon, including compounds that might finally replicate the sensory experience of alcohol without the intoxication.
Whether you're alcohol-free, a moderate drinker looking for options, or simply curious about craft brewing's cutting edge, this episode offers a thoughtful look at how the beer world is becoming more inclusive, creative, and delicious for everyone. Next time you crack open an AF beer, you'll appreciate the artistry and science that made it possible.
To find out more about the wonderful world of alcohol free beer and to check in with me head to www.instagram.com/sober_boozers_club
This episode is not brought to you by any sponsors because nobody wants to sponsor me.
This is the Sober Boozers Club podcast. This podcast, we're going to talk to people from within these circles and find out a little bit about their journey. So you sit back, relax and enjoy.
Speaker 2:In today's episode I am talking to Richard Gray, aka Zumo Jukes. Now, richard is a graphic designer by trade and he's happened to work with some of the best craft breweries in the country. We also discuss alcohol-free beer on a daily basis and, I'm pleased to say, he's become one of my closest friends, so I thought it would make sense to get him on for an episode and have that chat in public. How are you, sir?
Speaker 3:Hi, I'm very good sir. How are you?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I'm doing pretty good Pretty good actually, Although I've been experimenting with that Czech milk beer and it hasn't gone well. I mean, you can see my remains in the glass.
Speaker 3:This is like an hour after I poured it up, but it's still, I've poured some, some very bad beers.
Speaker 3:Good beers, but I poured them very badly. Um, and I think we all have at some point. I think you know it's a guilty guilty pleasure or guilty guilty thing where you kind of go. I was gonna put that, I was gonna post that for the gram, it's gonna post that out, and I've just, I've just totally muffed that I'm gonna have to wait for 10 minutes for that to settle do you know, for me, the worst thing is the, the water.
Speaker 2:The tap water where I live is just so hard that, no matter how well I clean a glass, as soon as I pour it up it's just like that looks filthy it looks horrific and I don't know what to do.
Speaker 3:I run it through the dishwasher and I, you know it's like it can become straight out of there and it's still it.
Speaker 2:Just it just looks filthy and you're like it's not, but it's yeah yeah, I've had a finger in the glass before just going around the rim of it trying to get rid of those like horrible little bubble marks on the outside, and it's, I think it's when you start doing that, that's when you go okay, I'm, I'm into this for, like pretentious reasons.
Speaker 3:Now, yeah, which is a problem yeah, I mean, I think I think it depends if whether you're kind of trying to take a picture of a beer for just as a document and I think that's it. There are accounts where that document their beers and like this, I've had this, I've had that. And then there are those that are like just yeah, I mean, I think if you're going to be an account that sits there and says I am, this is a beer account, then you've got to try it. The level's now risen that you can't just get away with just shooting, just shooting from the hip, if you like. So I think when I do it, I'm just like wings, just shooting from the hip, if you like. So I think I, when I do it, I'm just like. You know, I'm a designer, but I also happen to like alcohol-free beer. So I you know there's me taking pictures going. Actually, this one's really really good. And I feel just like I'm doing it as more of a shout out to the people who I think partly so that obviously other people who are following me, like yourself and other alcohol-free big, you're going to be like oh okay, that's one we should check out too, but also just to be like fair play, guys, this is really good and I don't know how you've managed to do it straight off the bat or whatever it happens to be, but, um, because I think that there's the whole standard of the industry. It's just, it's just really really high right now and I still think there's there's there's still scope and that's what's really interesting to me. I feel still there's this scope and you can see where there's going to be growth and you can see almost I think we're almost on the tipping point of some sort of innovation. Somebody's going to come up with something that's going to be an absolute game changer and it's just whether they can get it out there.
Speaker 3:And I think it will be some kind of compound, because I know Smash gang were playing with sorts of bits and pieces in the background and now that obviously they've got the, got the mega bucks to play with jordan's, I know, has got he's basically moved straight into r&d. So he's basically spent the last what is that? Nearly six months just tinkering, playing, tinkering, doing lots of exciting things, and the weird thing is is that mash gang were doing all of that before just on a shoestring budget, but he was the guy who wanted to just disappear down a rabbit hole and discover some weird-ass compound from America that's barely legal in the UK and is shipped over from some dodgy seller or whatever. But yeah, he was getting these compounds and putting them in and they were things like I think even some of the early beers had some sort of alcohol compounds that were not alcohol compounds but like things that would fool your body into thinking that you'd drunk a beer in your stomach.
Speaker 3:And it didn't work on everybody. A bit like the, it's like a nootropic type of affair. So it didn't work on everybody. A bit like the new, it's like a neotropic type type of affair. Yeah, so it didn't work for everybody. But if you kind of concentrated on it and you think but things like that, I think, are going to be where the market's going to start playing with, I think the idea is is that you know, some of these neotropic kind of compounds will stop being gimmicky as they sort of are now, if you like, and they'll start to be really properly functional and it'll be something like to really get that kind of that flavor profile.
Speaker 3:That, depending on the style, there are certain styles that an alcohol-free beer absolutely is nailing and there's others that are not quite there yet and there's some that don't exist yeah, yeah, you're like.
Speaker 2:Someone asked me um recently if I'd ever had a black IPA, and I've only had one to date, and that was an athletic brew that was obviously a US exclusive that Martin Dixon sent across to me and it was good, but I've not come across anything like that since.
Speaker 3:And you're right, there are certain beers that you just can't drink. I think it was the was the brulo. Didn't brulo do a black ipa?
Speaker 3:if they did, that was before my time yeah, you see, the problem is I think it was because there was a brulo uh went through. Obviously this kind of thing was their first. I remember their first three beers. They had a farmhouse beer, they had a pale ale. They had a farmhouse beer and they had, I think, ale. They had a farmhouse beer and they had I think it was a collaboration with Extinction Rebellion and that was the best of the three. The farmhouse was I wanted to have that kind of real farmhouse funk, that Belgium-y yumness. Yeah, just lacking unfortunately.
Speaker 3:Again I would say that there are very few beers that really nail that kind of proper Belgium-y you know, like this has been hanging around kind of funk Beer de Amie is probably the one to go for. They're standard, which you can get from Dry Drinker, I think, usually sometimes.
Speaker 2:Yes, I have seen it on there it drops in and out of stock.
Speaker 3:It's in little tiny stubby bottles, but that's gorgeous. I think it's literally beer with friends and you could down 10 of those easy over an evening.
Speaker 2:These are the beers I love, though it's like the super sessionable ones where you go right, I could have a lot of that. And that's when you know that you've found a beer that you're drinking because the flavour's just damn good. You found a beer that you're drinking because the flavor's just damn good and, like, I mean, that's the only reason to drink this stuff, because it's not intoxicating you. Although what what you were saying about like the functional beverages, kind of seeing an influx potentially in the future, that's interesting. And actually, brulo, while we're on brulo, they did a fantastic cbd um ipa that mark dredge actually put me on to that months ago, pretty much to the date, and that was incredible and that fell into the category of. It wasn't just a gimmick, it actually tasted good, because that's my issue with a lot of these adaptogen beers it's like the liquid's just not quite there yet yeah, I mean, I think, I think that's my my gut.
Speaker 3:My gut is always when I see somebody's gone, oh, we've added such and such to this beer and I'm like is it gonna be good, is it gonna be shit? Yeah and I I I mean I some of them that I come out and I'm like I I really want this, genuinely want this to be really good, and I'm just disappointed that it's just like a bit of sort of beery muddy water with a sort of odd taste.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's like if it was a macro brew and you ignored the adaptogens, you'd say it was average with a lot of them.
Speaker 3:I mean, I think the worst advantage for that one one, I think, was a saffron beer for me. See, I didn't again, I didn't, I didn't, yeah it was, it was very and it's interesting, um, and it was bright yellow in the glass, like really bright yellow, like like I've had a heavy session day glow pee, um, you know, it was like, oh god, that's, it was, yeah, it, it, but it just it, just the saffron taste. I think if you maybe, if you like saffron in a beer, then great, but it was. You're already in a diversive niche yeah alcohol free.
Speaker 3:Then you've made it even niche by saying, okay, we've put in this really diversive flavor that has some health properties, and then we're making it neat and it. It just didn't really work for me personally.
Speaker 2:I was gutted when Function that's the one the mushroom beers, when they kind of went away, because I really felt like there were legs there or something to go with. Yeah.
Speaker 3:Yeah, is it Zoe? I think there's a female founder beer, that one. Um again, she, she really pushed for it and I, I think one of them was very, very good, was good, but it was one of those ones. It was good, but not great enough that you kind of wanted to buy a crate of it. So if it kind of came in your rotation or you saw one out, you but oh, yeah, right, and I think there's.
Speaker 2:There was a number of beers at that at that point in the market where if you saw them you were like that's interesting see, that was really early days for me yeah like all, because this is a thing I forget or you don't realize that you've been in this game for a long time, really the alcohol free beer game. Like I first discovered you on the internet when you were doing a few designs for mash gang, I was like this guy's got like the dream job they're making making sweet ass cans for sweet ass breweries. How did you get into all of that? I'm assuming you were like a designer by trade and then stumbled upon it through a love.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I mean that's it. I was like it's a cliche to say that graphic designers and craft beer go together, but they really do. I mean every single craft beer sorry, every single designer seems to just have a love of craft beer along the way, and obviously getting a brewery client is the kind of the dream for quite a few of them. So I had obviously a couple of brewery clients anyway. So, yeah, I've been freelance for three, four years, probably by the time the pandemic hit. And then obviously, I kind of think that's it I kind of discovered Mash Gang at about the same time as everybody else, that kind of just after they'd done that launch party and they'd launched a couple of beers. And I think that's it. Jordan just kind of reached out and was like actually, you know, it's the usual thing, I think that's it. Jordan just kind of reached out and was like actually, you know, it's the usual thing, you just you just chatting absolute crap about beer really. And he was kind of like actually, could you, are you able to help us out with some stuff? So I think it was initially like, ok, we've got this design, can you like it's? It's a really really rough ready form. But and I was like well, it's got six spelling mistakes. Do you want me to correct those two? And so, yeah, it was just basically doing a job that effectively that he, jordan, was sitting there going, you know, backwards and forwards with various people. It would take him a week and I could do it in an hour, so it was instantly speeding up their process.
Speaker 3:And then, along the way, it's obviously just it was yeah, it was just it. Naturally there was a natural fit. We got on really well. You know, I was there when they canned the first stoop in Leeds and drinking it off the chalice, which was great, because everyone was just like, yeah, this is great, we can drink this all day because people, when they're packing beers on lines, will drink whatever's coming off the line. That can be the eight percenter which you kind of shouldn't be drinking around. Heavy machinery, yeah, but stoop easy, yeah. So I've got. I've got a real soft spot for what we call dirty leeds water stoop okay, because it hasn't been really better.
Speaker 3:It has been bettered, but it hasn't been bettered. But if I had to sit there and say, like leeds stoop is up here and then there's like london stoop bit cleaner, yeah, scotland scoop stoop was there yeah, but dirty leeds stoop is just the one it's just, and it just shows you the difference in water profiles. It really does show you how water profiles just massively affect it, and the recipe has been tweaked to be fair.
Speaker 2:There's a lot of other work going on there yeah, they didn't just make the beer and then like sit on it for I mean five years lockdown. Obviously not five years of Stoop. But I was talking to a friend recently it was like five years for first lockdown. It's like no, that's outrageous. But yes, stoop has been around for a while. I think it was around when I first discovered Bash Gang. I'm sure it was Stoop and Chug, I think, were the two big hitters. They were very early.
Speaker 3:I mean, they pretty much had a core range, which was, I say, core range. They kind of had a the range they launched with. I don't think any of them, apart from anxiety saint, the which obviously got bounced around the schedule because it kept failing a little bit and needing a tweak and but it got there eventually. Anxiety saint was the only one of that initial kind of we launched in the brewdog launch party beers, that that initial kind of we launched in the brewdog launch party beers that really survived.
Speaker 2:I think tahiti treat might have kind of but re okay, see, this is.
Speaker 3:This is a whole world I'm not familiar with it's wild, yeah, the four times the dark before times when beer was different.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I mean, but that's it. There was some. I mean there was there's. Weirdly, there is just as many beers that we kind of made a label for that then got put out on like the socials. Never happened, didn't work, failed just. And that's nothing, I'm gonna mash it, they would, just, they would put out stuff and then for one reason or another it just wouldn't work and it was. It was content in the end of the day, so it didn't really matter too hard. But there's some, there was some. Yeah, I mean it like all these things.
Speaker 3:I think lots of breweries have probably and this is this is I mean having the behind the ears for at least like three or four breweries now I know that there was, there have been afs or rafs in production that have either failed and then will not see the light of day either ever or not yet. So they need to go and do them again, work out where they went wrong, mainly because obviously that's it. If they over-accentuate and they go too high, you've got a problem, you've got a. I mean so interestingly so, like when FIAS and MASH Gang first started working out. You had obviously Natural History came out and South Central came out, but there were Big Natty.
Speaker 3:Okay, big Natty was Natural History just over-accentuated, which is why it had to be a collaboration with Fias, because Mashgang don't have the license to sell alcohol beers because they're an alcohol-free brewery. So basically, if it's a collaboration, collaboration they can get away with it. So effectively. Every single so any beer that fierce and and mash gang collaborated on was basically a mash gang beer. That just something went wrong in the tank man, so it over accentuated that's mad.
Speaker 3:That's mad, but I mean it means you don't have to waste the beer. Yeah, that's the thing like when I was doing and they were only over a little bit, so I think they ended up coming out. I think they say the label was 2.5, but I think they were about 2.3, 2.2, 2.3.
Speaker 2:So they were, they went over, but not stupidly so yeah, it was a similar thing when I, when I did the collab with sam, that we could be friends and I say I did for collab, like when sam made a beer and put my name on the can which is what I'm drinking right now oh, very nice, that was supposed to be a lager, and I think, I think you you might be one of the only people.
Speaker 2:I told about this when it was happening. It was going to be a lager and it failed in the tank and it came out at like one percent um and sam has admitted this on on this podcast actually.
Speaker 2:So I don't feel bad for for kind of outing him now. I was kind of going to keep it hush forever, but um, no, I'm not going to. So, yeah, it came out at one percent and he said well, first thing is, I can't really put your name on a one percent beer because that's just a bit a bit silly, but secondly, it just doesn't taste very good so there was no saving that one, which was a real shame, because it would have been fine to release just a one percent beer if yeah, if you can, you know, because so much of this stuff does go to waste.
Speaker 2:I've talked to brewers that have had to abandon brews and and it's all just wasted, not just like time, but a waste of money, a waste of resources and it's, I think.
Speaker 3:I think you can see that one of the biggest trends you can see now, as well as the, the bigger breweries and having extra shots. So they're not just doing the one shot now and then kind of going off and doing other things, they're coming back regular. So I mean, dayer have obviously had a second, another one, verdant have done two or three now, um, and it's really encouraging. But the other thing I'm also really I think it shows a lot more um, hope and integrity is that they're not just using the same hops. Yes, so you, for a while, every single time you got an alcohol and it's I would say it's not even alcohol free. It was anything below about four percent, four point five percent. We're just like yeah, yeah, we'll stick in citra and mosaic, no one will give a shit, and it's just like great.
Speaker 3:That's how you make it taste like one of the pale ales that I can find in the pub. That's brilliant. But does that work best for an alcohol-free beer? Because at the end of the day, you know there's something lacking. So you as a brewer need to work out how to put something back in, and I think some of these newer hops are doing such a good job of that and I think the two biggest examples of that one is a Brass beer that I uh did the design for called life's af beach. Okay, be careful on that one, because it's called life's a beach right before when. But they've just made the at it but put the af in the middle. They've. They are kind of redone the recipe completely because it's, but the basic thing is they've used sabro sabro, bringing that coconutty and it just kind of grassy, it's a pale ale, it's, but the basic thing is they've used sabro sabro, being that coconutty and it just kind of it's a pale ale.
Speaker 3:It's a pale ale, pina colada beer. That's basically what it comes out as and it's brilliant. It's really really good for a first af effort. I didn't they have another one that they were working on I don't know if that's still in production, I hope it is which is another one of their core range. But yeah, they that one came out first and I was like, yep, send me a crate, that looks awesome. And I did and I was like, yeah, I'm just. I fell in love with Saboro, so summery.
Speaker 2:It was the Mashgang Northern Monk Dipper. I can't remember what dippers are like now because it's been so long Hot burn.
Speaker 3:That's it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, like now, um, because it's been so long burn, that's it. Yeah, yeah, bloody hell. But I drank the mash gang dipper purely because I was like I get to drink a dipper again and I don't know how it held up to a full alkyl. But I know that the flavor that came through from the hops it was like it did so much because there was so much in there. And that's when I was like what's this kind of candied grass I'm getting Because it's delicious? And George kind of took the piss out of me and was like, oh yeah, ben's discovered Sabro hops. I was like, all right, fine, it's Sabro. Then I'm learning, all right, but yeah, sabro is.
Speaker 3:It's like the good karma range again also worked on what Steve did with those three.
Speaker 3:They are all using Kent-grown British hops and I think it shows quite how much because, as I say, child's gone from the top of my brain.
Speaker 3:But it's basically a programme designed to try and make more flavoursome uk hops that have the same sort of profiles as these us hops basically, and all of them are kind of they're all sisters and brothers and relatives and cousins and there's a lot of random hop on hop incest going on, but it is coming up with some amazing flavor profiles that means you can drop these things in and nobody would know this wasn't some amazing US hop and of course those sort of things. When you start to throw them into an AF beer they really do get to shine and you don't need much hop. That's the thing I think that's the big learn I did get is that you don't actually have to when they double hop, triple hop, you don't have to hop at the same rate as you would if that was an alcohol beer okay I don't believe ethanol maybe cuts through something like that yeah, I mean, I do remember basically because one of the things when jordan was said with verdant, was it verdant with the foot when they had that first collab?
Speaker 2:yes, yeah, with the candle.
Speaker 3:And yeah, and if you tried it, it had a proper punch of hops and it was almost a bit too much. And it's not something that hasn't happened in the Verdant beers that have then come after that, where they've kind of tweaked it and did their kind of special project range and then obviously have released you know a psych and things like that, and it hasn't got that problem. And basically it's because they Jordan said look, you don't need to hop at the same level, it just doesn't need that kind of aggressive hopping. You can double it what you would put in, but this is the recipe amount. This is double, this is triple, but it's just it's. It was intense, it was, it's like chewing hops and even their first small batch, number six, was very green as like a cali, like it was.
Speaker 2:It was a bit much for me. And then I went back and had I think I might have had one of the last pints in their tap room, because I just happened to be in Cornwall at the time and they were almost at the end of it and on tap right at the end it was damn good, Like delicious. And then obviously they've done Syke, which is a continuation of that, and I think it's really well balanced now and it's nice to see breweries kind of go along this road and to experiment and it be like right, that was okay, you've done it, but now you've stuck with it and you've actually released a really solid offering.
Speaker 2:Like it's nice to be at that place now. Like it's nice to be at that place now. Like I don't think there's many beers that come out now from these like well-loved craft breweries that are poor, like some of them might be a little bit disappointing, but I haven't had one in months that's like oh, that's not very nice no, it's wild.
Speaker 3:No, I think that's it. I think the standard is so high and I I think the thing is also there's the advice out there. Now there's kind of like there's no one's gatekeeping it, then everybody's. I mean, they're all open for collaborations, they're all open to things, so there's a lot of goodwill in to get it right and I think that's it.
Speaker 3:I have a lot of time for the breweries that have just almost quietly added an AF to their core range and then just gone. Yeah, of course we've had a core, why wouldn't we? And whether that's whether they, especially the ones that have got tap rooms. Actually that makes a much more sense, even if they don't always have it on in the tap room on draft, which is a little frustrating, yep, but which you really hope they would. But I mean, like the utopian lager, absolutely banging. Yeah, in fact I actually had that fur, I think. Weirdly, I think I've had one of their pails, because they don't really do pails before, that might.
Speaker 3:But I think that was the first of their lagers I'd had and I was so intrigued with it because at that point I was still zebraing a little bit I was actually like I want to try some of their others and I've got to be honest that AF really does stand up with the range. It's just a natural fit to the range and it's just so nice to see a really solid core range option that happens to be alcohol-free. It's in the same way that I mean, you know, I really like the fact that when they add a, you know whether it's a low ABV option as well, because, again, that whole bit between 0.5% and 3% isn't really dealt with because it's so hard to get. But anything that's in that range was, I mean, even before the pandemic, that was my kind of that would be my sweet spot. I really love just table beers.
Speaker 3:So actually my journey on it was really even pre-pandemic was like, yeah, although I was still buying some of the service, I was just coming down and down and down on the ABV over time and finding that actually I really just wanted like really flavoursversome, um, like table beers initially, and then, slowly, it's just since then, the market for alcohol free has just got so much, so better, so much better, so much better that's not a sentence has just got better. Yes, I think that's it. You, I think that you could take some somebody. So there are some people out there who you could take out and go right. Here is a, an alcohol free. Here is the two percent version, here's the 4% version, here's the 6% version, here's the 8% version. And there'll be people who go for the 8%, just but they taste the same. They all taste the same. If I told you they all tasted exactly the same, they'd be like, yeah, but they don't. This one's got alcohol in it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think there's still that stigma. I don't think we're ever going to really lose that stigma because I think the more it, the more kind of available it becomes, the more people are going to be triggered by it. I think, like I have to remind myself I'm in a very niche part of the internet where I'm in a lovely echo chamber where even like the full fat beer people that I interact with are very much flying the alcohol free flag and I was. I went to beer x last week and I kind of had to remind myself that I'm probably like 12 months ahead of a lot of the people here, because all I do is think about alcohol-free beer, whereas there's a whole world of beer out there, that there's loads of things going on as well as alcohol-free beer. So if I'm maybe mentally 12 months ahead of some some beer people, then how far ahead are we to like your regular drinker and that's not in a like, I'm not trying to belittle anyone.
Speaker 3:No, I think the thing that's the biggest, one of the things that's not talked about, I think is the biggest factor in Mash Gang's success, as well as the fact that, yes, they were doing the weird, crazy stuff that you loved from craft beer but alcohol free, which no one else was doing. So the idea of having experimental beers and not just going we've produced a pale ale, guys, do you want a pale ale? We've got a pale ale. It's got citra and mosaic in it and then leaving it for like 10 months and then another doing anything else, and I think that's it. It's just the idea that and you were like how is anyone? And the reason that there were no one else was doing it is because it was just financially, just suicide. Yeah, yeah, we're here, we'll produce a beer that's going to take you the cost of tenner but we'll sell it for three quid, but it tastes like a breakfast cereal, exactly like what the fuck. But some of those things were just absolutely mad and they were like kind of brain injured and come on, but a big come on.
Speaker 3:But one of the biggest points that makes MASH Gang such a successful is the fact they did not talk at any point and actually market towards the sober community at all. They happened to include them and they included everybody else as well, and it's that inclusivity that I think is key to MASH Gang. It's not so many of the brands are like yes, you can be sober too, and it's only for sober people. And it's actually the biggest thing with mashgang is, I think at one point they did a survey and it was something like 85, 86% of people were drinkers who just happened to use mashgang to moderate because it tasted good and they could either have it at the beginning of a session and they could. They could either have it at the beginning of a session, or they could have it in the middle of a session, or they could have it at the end of a session.
Speaker 3:I mean, I do think there was an anecdote that somebody came up. I think it was when they it was my mashgang launched it uh, in london at one point and it was yeah, I think. I think that was it and it. Somebody came up to them and said to, because they'd seen him at the bar and he'd been ordering like double IPAs and then he had a pint of stoop and they were like what are you doing? And he's like well, basically, if I have this, I only have three of these double IPAs rather than four, and that's the difference between being dragged off with my mates for tequila shots yeah or just going home and having a nice light.
Speaker 3:And that's it, whereas if I have this, I say no to them and I go home and I get the rest of my weekend. Man, I think that was just like yeah, okay, cool.
Speaker 2:See, this is another thing that I need to remember is that a lot of drinkers, like full-alcohol drinkers, don't have a problem with stopping. For me, I full alcohol drinkers like don't have a problem with stopping. Like, for me, I could never mix for two because once I've got ethanol in my system, like I want more ethanol and, you know, maybe some lovely cocaine. If it's going, most people, the majority of people, can go. Oh, do you know what? I could have an alcohol-free beer.
Speaker 2:Now it it's just historically, like when I was growing up and like when I was introduced to the world of beer, there wasn't a good alcohol-free beer. It just didn't exist. So why would anyone drink it? And that's not because the concept was terrible, it's because the drinks were terrible. I feel like that was a massive part of it. I don't think that there has always been a stigma against people drinking beer that doesn't have alcohol in it. I think the stigma has formed through the poor quality of these liquids historically. Why?
Speaker 3:would you drink that? What are you doing to yourself? Why would you not just drink a Coke?
Speaker 2:I can remember my dad saying to me and I get it because it is awful.
Speaker 3:Those awful beers were like they were just executions in pain in drink form, because they were just horrible malt. I mean there were some beers now that are like malt beverages they are not brewed, They've never seen the inside of a brewery kit, they've not been left for any amount of time and they are. You know the exercises. I mean I would say exercises in liquid brewing. There's an exception to that rule. If you ever had Neon Rain from Nash.
Speaker 3:Gang. It's very, very hard to get. Basically, I think it was about 10 bottles, I think it was not that many more. It was a very yeah. Weirdly it's the one beer that it's their first beer that won an award, but it was like because it was such a weird yeah. So basically it was a fully liquid beer, so liquid hops, liquid, liquid, liquid malt. It was with one of the malt houses as and they would try basically the reason why you never.
Speaker 3:It was going to get a bigger run, so it got. I think the run was like it wasn't quite 10, but it was not more than like a thousand. It was quite niche. It was going to get a bigger run, so it got. I think the run was like it wasn't quite 10, but it was not more than like a thousand. It was quite niche. It was quite a quick release and I think it was that one and I think it's called Dark Forest and they had different hot means. They couldn't replicate it on anyone else's kit at any other time. It just would not scale at all. So unfortunately it was and they couldn't even repeat it on their kit again. So it was this weird thing where this fluke came out Once in a lifetime, and it just tasted incredible and everyone was like, wow, this is the future, but couldn't replicate it.
Speaker 2:Wasn't to be God, imagine having. I mean, they've done fine, haven't they? So I'm sure they're not kicking themselves too much. But that could have changed everything. If it was like liquid beer. It sounds so ridiculous yeah, I mean it's.
Speaker 3:The fact is, the reason why some of those bit those brewers do the quote on quote liquid beers is because they're incredibly cheap to make and because you don't have to. You can just mix it with water in a tank. You don't have to brew it, so you're not using all that kit, so you can basically make something that's it's basically beer flavored water. That's effectively what you're not using all that kit, so you can basically make something that's it's basically beer flavored water. That's effectively what you're making. So, and when, and, of course, when those ones, those get out and about, because, of course, because they're cheap to make. They got a lot of marketing budget. They get out there and, of course, people then experience and they think, oh, this is what alcohol-free beer oh, it's like dog food.
Speaker 2:Do you know what I mean? Like the weird dog food kind of thing which is just malt, isn't it?
Speaker 3:Yeah, I mean then you get something that's properly, it's just a bit too malty and you're like this is okay, but can I just have something else?
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 3:I mean, I think, the one beer I would say I would most like to see an alcohol free that I've never seen kind of looping back to that, it's a Saison.
Speaker 3:Yes, it's not very popular at all in the bigger market. So you make it down to a niche. But I think somebody will do it, essentially because there was one which was like a sea salt swimmer Saison I think it was. Again, it was, somebody had it. I don't know it was found in the't know it was a found in the UK. It was one of the range. And it was wrapped in paper.
Speaker 2:Yeah, skippers, yeah, I'm sure of that. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I had that really early doors again, but I can't remember it. No, but I remember I loved the bottle.
Speaker 3:It was a lovely bottle and it was okay. It's just a bit forgettable, I mean, I think weirdly, I mean just to go back again to loop into the Sabro hops. I do like some weird ass hops. So Sriracha Ace is kind of my go-to Not my go-to, but like it's one of those weird ones that it's one of the most diversive hops out there, which means for me to sit there and go can I have a Sriracha saison please? Naf is to basically say I will, oh, I will buy the entire, yeah, entire batch, just can it and send it to my house, thanks and because no one else will drink it because it will be.
Speaker 2:You couldn't even persuade jord to do that like no, no he's yeah, yeah, I managed to. Obviously I managed to get Siege Perilous across the line, so that was my bit and that I think either that or Crystal ammunition, I think is their best lager, like I think they were fantastic.
Speaker 3:I mean again Dirty Leeds Stoop. But you see, I have soft spots for Stoop and I do say even before that and this was before those ones came out that it is a lager that I would drink happily in lieu of any other, like ABV or otherwise. It is one of the best lagers, hands down ABV or otherwise. It is really good and it's just because it's just got that level of complexity and difference and just enough and also that kind of lovely refreshingness and it laces beautifully down the glass. I know Jordan will not be happy if I don't mention the lacing, because he did spend a lot of time on that, but it did lace really well down the glass. But yeah, it's all of that stuff. It was just a really solid beer and I think yeah, I think, with our quick lager dive, with things like crystal ammunition and siege perilous, there was a couple of other bits and pieces around the same time.
Speaker 2:Low life, low life, low life and crystal ammunition got dropped at like the same time and george was so into low life. I can remember how proud of low life he was, he was it was really good.
Speaker 2:Do you know what? I think low life is at its best when it's not lukewarm, but just slightly chilled and a little bit warm and straight out the can. It's the only alcohol-free beer that I've ever enjoyed, more out of a can than being poured up and really chilled, because it just makes me feel like a piece of shit when I drink it like that and an actual low life.
Speaker 3:Yeah the weird thing is is that low life as a name came up really early. I keep was like the third or fourth beer that I was working on with jordan. He's like, oh yeah, I want to call it low life. And I was like, really, I mean, because it's there's miller high life, so that was what we were rifting on. I was like, really, I mean, because it's there's a million high life, so that was what we were rifting on. I was like, yeah, but have we? And I basically I said I don't, I don't think we can get away with it, like I don't think, and I basically I think the reason why then it weirdly looped back around year and a half, two years later and I said not to, not to put too fine a point on it, but you previously said no life, why not?
Speaker 3:And the reason why it made sense the second time, like a year and a half later, it's because the brand kudos was there. It wouldn't have felt this. It felt like we could get away with it because it wasn't like a who the fuck are these guys?
Speaker 3:it was more like you guys yeah, exactly, and that's it needed the brand to have evolved and to done that, so it would. The first time we tried, it was cool. We ended up with, uh, calling it brewski, so brewski was was effectively what? The very early below life? Um, it wasn't. It's totally different, but in the way that jordan's beer is always kind of art because he's tinkered around with him, he's like oh yeah, this is the same beer. It's not. Um, he's done something, it's the same broom.
Speaker 2:It's just got had 17 handles and 18 heads. Yeah, yeah, I think it's really easy to forget and this is going to sound like so wrong to say, but it's so easy to forget how brilliant jord is because you chat to him. It's just like look at this guy like he's like an exceptional human being and a fucking maverick, and just like all over the place and chaotic as fuck, but so fucking switched on and so important as a person, um, and not just because I think he's a wonderful human being, but for what he's done for the industry I mean, that's it.
Speaker 3:I, in terms of the fact that you know, I mean I remember him. I think it was at northern monk and somebody kind of said something and he kind of answered the question and they went well, I didn't know you knew anything about brewing. It was just like, yeah, I am the brewer, but I mean, like I remember there was at one point, I mean this was not a jordan problem, but, like you know, when he sits there and talks it goes. This beer didn't really work necessarily the way we anticipated because of logistics and he was always using the word logistics he designed to get something delivered it was a flavor extract, I think from memory to get it delivered to the old flax store northern monk, and I think it was supposed to arrive there on the monday and it didn't and they were going to. It was going to getting stuck somewhere, it was going to dispatch, it's going to arrive on the tuesday. We were brewing tuesday morning. So this, this beer, this thing was going to arrive at some point during the day at the site.
Speaker 3:In the end they just went it's in the tank, now we're gonna have to make a call. And so they literally just raided the fridge of the flavor extracts and just threw in some other different things. They just changed the recipe on the fly while it was in the tank. No, and it still tasted incredible. That's how good jordan is. He literally wing. He did a total and adam adam also deserves credit on that one. But they totally, the two of them just bang their heads together, totally winged it, disappeared behind the tank, pressed around with it.
Speaker 3:Stadium craft mad it's mad and I know you know what are you like? What, seriously, how?
Speaker 2:how did you do that? Yeah, and because, like it was, this knowledge wasn't available when MASH Gang started. The knowledge that is available arguably comes primarily from Jord. When you talk to people that were involved in the early days, or whenever you looked at a can of beer in the early days, you'd be like, oh shit, it's got MASH Gang on the back of it. Even if it wasn't a collab beer, it was like with mash gang, done with mash gang, like what he's passed on to people.
Speaker 3:Like that, that knowledge is invaluable yeah, at one point he was going to just put a load of recipes on a website and just be like there have him really yeah, yeah, he was, I mean he's he's.
Speaker 3:The only reason he stopped doing collabs for a while is because it was it was going to have to be him going up and down and left and right and he doesn't drive and he's stuck in the middle of Wales. So that's it, literally logistics. But yeah, I mean I think to say that I would say at the moment, if you had to say who's the top dog in alcohol-free in the UK at the moment, I would say we can be friends possibly pipping it at the moment. They had a really good January some absolutely solid beers. They, you know, got a whole raft of collabs. It would be really interesting to see. Obviously they did obviously your stomach ache beer with Vault City because you drank too many in a week Too many of them Too many, but again, total summer crusher.
Speaker 3:I am intrigued to see what we Can Be Friends can do beyond just the IPA pale thing. I know it's their thing for all of the kind of whatever the mash gang stuff that's going on at the moment, where they're kind of settling into the new normal internally, which, again, I don't know about now. I wouldn't write them off just because I know how strong Jordan can be. So I think they will come back with something and they will come back and I'm hopeful. Also, I genuinely wish them well. I would like them to come back and absolutely blast us off with the next iteration and actually just push the market to the next level.
Speaker 2:Yeah, the way I see, like MASH Gang now, like we talk about like who, okay, who is like leading the way in the UK at the moment and for me I agree it is we can be friends and I think what MASH Gang did with the acquisition and what me I agree it is we can be friends. Um, and I think what mash gang did with with the acquisition and what that has done for the people involved is huge and what it says about the industry is huge.
Speaker 2:But now they're kind of it's, it's different, and I don't mean that in a bad way. It's just like, okay, they're, they're doing better things, like let's they've, they've completed the game and now they're on to the second game if we look at it like a video game. And it will be really interesting when they start dropping new releases and everything is all in place. Whatever may be happening there.
Speaker 3:And it's like right, this is brand new. The initial plan is, as far as I know, is to really try and concentrate on the core range and get it into pubs.
Speaker 2:Yes, which makes sense for where they are, which makes sense and I think, I think that's it.
Speaker 3:I think, if, as long as you can hopefully have the money to kind of get over because some of the hurdles with alcohol free on draft is basically because you've not got alcohol to disinfect the line, you've got to turn it around relatively quickly yeah, or have a very clean line and the problem is is that you know, salamanship, uh, and cry in pubs is patchy, yeah, and it's the nicest way of putting it.
Speaker 3:So I mean you've got, uh, you know, it's always lovely finding a pub with with an alcohol free on out on on draft, I think. Obviously, you know lucky saint has done a great job putting it out everywhere not so much pushing up the country, but they are. But they do spend that A lot of their capital goes towards their sales team. They've got an enormous sales team, like almost too big a sales team.
Speaker 2:Yeah, even on Instagram. The amount of. Lucky.
Speaker 3:Saint marks and Lucky Saint KT. They're doing London alone and they really are hitting London hard. We'll see how they succeed, but I mean, I think I mean they had a very strong lager and I think whatever they were going to do as a second beer was always going to be a tough ask to match up.
Speaker 3:I think the first time I had that well, I think their first. The first time I had the pale I thought it was very grassy, it was very young, Didn't think it quite there yet and I'd heard some notes about that online so I thought, okay, I'll give it the benefit of the doubt. Had it a second time and it was better and my general opinion was that this was this was very good for what where the market was overall, but it wasn't the best beer that could be that. It was a very much.
Speaker 2:If you know, then you know, but there's better stuff out there every man pale it's an.
Speaker 3:Every man pale it, it will. You know, it's a broadly drinkable beer that you won't be offended by, but it's not going to knock your socks off. I feel like they kind of know that though.
Speaker 2:Looking at their marketing now, for a bit it was all orange and now they're kind of like actually we do a really good lager, maybe that's the way to go. Obviously, I don't think the pale will go anywhere because I'll still buy it occasionally in the supermarket the pale will go anywhere because it's, you know it's. I'll still buy it occasionally in the supermarket, like as as part of my if I, if I just don't fancy a proper job um or like I don't fancy a proper job.
Speaker 3:I know what you mean. I just want to talk about beer but you know if I fancy something a bit different.
Speaker 2:god, actual work. The amount of people that are shocked that I after like that, I have a day job and I don't think it's because the content that I do is good, I think it's just because of how much I kind of throw out. It's like no this is a passion project.
Speaker 3:But yeah, but that proper job is now solid. I think they've done a, and I think that's also another good thing. Is that that's it. They've really taken their time to come up with something that's just a bloody good beer. Yeah. It's so good and I think it leads the way. I think it probably leads the way for where quote-unquote macro.
Speaker 3:But I mean that sort of bigger, more traditional brewers can go Trusted brands. Trusted brands, yeah, I mean, that's it. I can't remember which one of the beers we were talking about, where it was actually brewed at Adnams, I think I noticed on the can. Was it the Daya? Yes, yes. I think it was. I haven't looked on whether their latest one is Daya.
Speaker 2:I'm sure it was Daya, because that was not the most recent one, but the one before. That, wasn't it?
Speaker 3:Yeah, spoken into existence. I think they were brewing that at Adams and I thought, oh, that's interesting Because, again, I think we've touched on the fact that there are some beers that are like they're good but they're not. They're very chameleon beers. I think there are two for me that fall into this category. They're very chameleon beers.
Speaker 3:I think there are two for me that fall into this category that they can be a great or they can be just a bit meh, and I think one of them is holy faith. I've had it. I've had an absolutely amazing pint of it on draft. I've had some quite good cans. That's some pretty.
Speaker 3:You know, yeah, where it's just you're yeah, where it's just, you're just like and that's it. I've had one that's literally tasted like. This is the you know this could have. I'm actually kind of going have you just poured me the 4% faith? Is this, what is what? This is amazing and yeah, and then the other one I think is Ghost Ship.
Speaker 2:Okay, see, I just don't get on with Ghost Ship.
Speaker 3:Yeah, so ship, yeah. So maybe I need to try it again. Yeah, you see, go ship, because, because it's one of those things, it falls into a category where, because it's a citrus, if it's doing, if it's playing badly, it will just come across as a bit too citrusy and a bit too orangey and a bit too kind of. And I think there was a whole period about the time it was launched where there was a lot of beers in alcohol free where they were like there was a lot of beers in alcohol free where they were like there's no bit, there's no alcohol, we must put something in, let's add orange juice. And it was just like let's cut it with lemon, let's cut it with orange, let's cut shot of tropical cordial that'll do the
Speaker 3:job, just like can we stop with? Can we? Can we just not? I don't want them all to taste like lemon radlers. You know, know, if I want a lemon radler I'll buy a lemon radler. So there was a lot of citrus beers, citrus pale ales, particularly with citra and mosaic, and citrus Citrus, citra mosaic, and I was just like, no, please just stop, just stop doing the same idea.
Speaker 3:But thankfully they've got out of the identikit beers now and then, yeah, so that one, like I say I've had it, I've, I've had a very good, some very good ones. I don't think I've had it on draft yet, but, um, but I have had it. Yeah, some very good bottles, some very not so good ones. And I say I know martin's had it on draft and he said yeah, yeah, on draft. He was like this is, this is great. I could sit here all afternoon, wow. And I think it depends whether you want it to kind of, because when I say it chameleons, that one chameleons into being like a really nice, best bitter, but not because it's got like that, say that citrus just kind of cleans up, so it kind of tastes just like a nice.
Speaker 2:I need to give it another go because every time I've had it it's just been like ugh, I just really haven't got on with it. But maybe, like I hate the smell of orange zest, like it turns my stomach, so I think like really orangey kind of beers are just like a no-go for me.
Speaker 3:Like I say it's the weird one, it's because it's so divisive that you might get a good one. Yeah, you might not.
Speaker 2:The weirdest one for me was Thornbridge's Green Mountain. That was the most bizarre drinking experience because you pour it up and it smells like one of the bad Holy Faiths. I think Holy Faith is pretty renowned for being either really good or quite poor in cans. If it was as good as it is when it's a good one, it would be one of my top.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Possibly be my number one beer for consistency, if it was that good.
Speaker 3:You see, the weird thing is I always know the monk. The AF range is good like the Holy Faith. Win it on a good day, holy Heathen Peak, obviously very good. What they just released it's I'm assuming it's an evolution technically, uh, although it's again citra lager, but I mean, it's a.
Speaker 3:I think it's a bit of a thing of the northern lager which they did northern lager and then did northern lager as an af yeah and there, yeah, the northern lager alcohol free was was incredible really good, good you could see they'd obviously taken some of the inspiration from having Mash Gang's stoop there Not a straight copy, I hasten to point out, because they couldn't afford the hops, probably but just because it's a bit of a weird-ass hop profile is lovely old stoop, but I just think it's just a really solid lug and I just I think with the pails I just they're good, but I know northern monk have got better. I think that's the thing, isn't it when you.
Speaker 2:I think I had this with daya, like with um spoken into existence, like I feel like my take on holy heath, your take on Spoken Into Existence are pretty much identical, but like swapped. So I drank the Dale one and I was like it's too much, nelson here. That's how I felt.
Speaker 2:It just disappointed me a little bit. It was still very good. I think my first can. There was something wrong with it, because that one was like almost I couldn't really finish it. And then, after you said how good it was, I thought, okay, I can't be that far off here. We can't be like here and here on the spectrum. There's got to be some middle ground. So I've got another cannon. It was, it was better. But I thought that holy heathen was like brilliant. But this comes on the back.
Speaker 3:It's a very good beer. For me, it's just this. I, I just, I just know I mean this again. This is I think this is the disadvantage, quote unquote uh, sometimes being able to experience some of the breweries out abv output and and there's a natural comparison point, I mean I think you to say that alcohol-free beers are the same as abv beers would be would be wrong I think to say that they are as good as and they are an equivalent.
Speaker 3:And there's a. There's almost a different drinking experience to knowing that this is a, an alcohol-free pale, to being this is a abv pale. Regardless of that abv scale, obviously, the higher you go up you, the more hot burn you're going to get, the more the alcohol is going to be tasteable. Tasteable, that's not really a word, but, like you know, the there's a reason. I mean, with holy faith you can kind of they were always this thing of what if you made it even lower? And obviously they've done a so holy faith, so faith is so Holy Faith sorry, faith was 5.5%. They've now lowered that to 5%. They also do a lower version at 4%. I prefer the 4% version because I just think it's a little bit lighter, a little bit fluffier, but before that I would always go go striding edge, which is 2.8, right so, and now I? I I basically have kind of all, but it's given up on those as well, because I've just got alcohol free. But do you think I sort of zebra a little bit?
Speaker 2:do you think we'll ever see like table beers being obsolete? I was, I was asking this in earlier episodes. I say earlier episodes. They might come out after this one because I'm not very organized. But I went in on table beers a little bit and was kind of like what's the point? I don't understand them, because if you can get a 0.5% to be as good as a 2% now I don't understand where the place is for low beer. But then I've been reflecting on that recently and I've been like right, that is ben the alcoholic talking, that's not ben the beer lover talking, and it's hard to separate the two sometimes. So what's your take on that, on table beers and the future of them?
Speaker 3:I think, I think, as I I think there is a, there is a, there is an. If there is a different flavor profile that you get from just a little amount of alcohol, um, so those beers at 2.5, 2.8, um, 2.8 is an arbitrary thing because it's about keeping it under a tax threshold right that's why 2.8 is the weird number that you see they're getting under a tax threshold we accidentally got there again.
Speaker 2:One of the odds, yeah but yeah.
Speaker 3:So I think I think there is a you, there is a there a you can get a bit more. The hops just come to start to sing a little bit higher and they come a little bit more. And I think for me that there's a point where it's kind of like this is and supposedly there was some, and it's an urban myth, I think but that your body could break down the alcohol at the same rate. You could technically drink it at 2.8. So you wouldn't get drunk, but you would.
Speaker 2:It's bullshit, obviously but again the idea was the alcoholic spoke.
Speaker 3:The alcoholic bloody spoke man yeah, but the idea is that it should be able to go through right and it's.
Speaker 3:It's low enough that you, if you, you know, want to have a beer and you have a couple of units, you could have something that it tastes more like beer than, obviously, if they come up with a beer. That's where the profiles are exactly the same. It's, it's my, you know, it's, it's your alcohol free. You're two percent, you're four percent, you're six percent, you're eight percent, ten percent, um, and just go right, where are you on my scale? What do you want to drink? Yeah, because there will be people who will sit there and go oh, oh, this. I think you know this mid range is better.
Speaker 2:I think this is better.
Speaker 3:And you could. You could, you could size to be give them the exact same liquid and they'd be like and tell them that the ABV is different and somebody would go yeah, I like it. This, this is the six percent. I like this. This is the best one. It's the same liquid. It's still alcohol free. We've just given you Bex blue.
Speaker 2:Right, or whatever, same liquid. It's still alcohol free. We've just given you becks blue right, yeah, or whatever, just where you're comfortable, or wait what you're familiar with. Yeah, I mean that's it.
Speaker 3:I, I, yeah, I mean. My thing for for years has always been um, why, if, if I can get pretty much the same flavor profile from a four percent or sorry, as from a yeah, from a four percent beer as I could from a six percent beer, why am I needing the six percent beer? I just don't get it. If I can get it, the same flavor profile, uh, and an enjoyment from a two, two percent, 2.5 percent beer, why would I go for a five percent beer? And so the same is true when you take it to alcohol free. Why? Why do I need to have an alcohol beer if I can get the same enjoyment from an alcohol free beer and I can have two of them? Yeah?
Speaker 2:unless so I mean, as we were saying you can, you can extend it because you know, sometimes for some people getting a little bit boozed is quite fun. So I suppose if you can get to that lovely two pint stage on like six pints of table beer, yeah that's a that's a good time and all power to the people that can still do that. I'm not jealous at all no, but that's it.
Speaker 3:if you think about if you were to just total up your abvs, as I'm not as some weird arbitrary system of monitoring your thing, but you know, that's it. It's six. Six pints at five percent is a lot higher than at 25%. I'm not going to try and do the maths now, my brain is fried, but you get what I'm trying to say. You could basically go and have four beers and keep it under 10% total versus higher and higher and higher, and I think that's it. There is always going to be a market at the moment for those people who want to drink enormous stouts. Yeah, I loved them.
Speaker 3:Huge 12%, 14%. I mean obviously I'm doing labels for them. I'm not a big fan of them because I almost get tempted to sneak in a secret message. I haven't, if anyone's listening. I haven't done this. I will never do this please don't drink this that just says perfect for alcoholics yeah, well, literally.
Speaker 2:But the first thing as soon as you mentioned like a 14% start. So, yeah, I love them, like hi, the most open alcoholic on the internet, but that, yeah, I loved them. But that was when things got dangerous for me was when I started drinking these high ABV beers. I was never a nasty lager drinker until I was a nasty high ABV beer drinker and then the spiral started.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I see, I don't think those high ABV stouts are drunk by anyone who isn't an alcoholic particularly. At least there will be people who will sit there and go. I can have one on an evening and I'm like, yeah, okay, and how many evenings a week? And you're like, and then then it starts so because the problem is you don't need very many of those before you suddenly already hit. What is it? 14 units you're allowed in a week in the uk now they keep lowering it, so I think it's about 14 and yet arbitrary. I kind of wonder what I haven't because I haven't asked, asked at any point. But I think technically, depending on which you ask some a alcohol free beers technically count as like 0.1 units because legally it's got a slight unit yeah so, at which point you kind of go well, I've had 10 of these.
Speaker 3:Does that count as a unit? At the end of the week, and the answer is no, course it doesn't, because then you'd have to add brioche buns, bananas and all the other shit and you'd be like, yeah, that's just not going to do well, I was on the radio not long ago talking about Sainsbury's with the meal deal and how they had alcohol-free beer in the meal deal now, which I thought they had about a year ago.
Speaker 2:I'm sure Lucky Saint was in a meal deal like a year ago, but apparently it became news again in like the Metro, lucky Saint and Corona were in a meal deal and I've got a good relationship with my local BBC station and they rang me and said you know what are your thoughts on this? And I kind of gave my take on it and then hung up and thought, oh, I'll listen to the next person just to see what the first thing was. Guy comes on and this isn't to discredit this man at all, because if you don't know, you don't know. Um, he was like the thing is this stuff? It's still got alcohol in it and you look at it 0.5 alcohol, it's still got alcohol. And he was fuming, um, and I just kind of.
Speaker 2:There were two things that came into my brain. The first thing was I emailed, um, my contact at the station said, just so you know, this is the science on this, because I think it's really important to put it out, and they did. And then I felt like a real keyboard warrior. But the second thing was the people that were so furious about alcohol-free beers becoming a part of a meal deal are probably the same people that are praying for the good old days to return, when you'd go for a pint on lunch. Like you know, pints at lunchtime at work.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I mean I remember I will say I didn't really ever follow the corporate structure. I don't really like corporates, and if anything gets a bit too corporate, I'm like it just sort of makes me shudder in the corner and I'm like, yeah that was my life.
Speaker 3:for a short time I didn't get on well, but I remember drinking. I think it was. Perhaps they brought it in Sainsbury's it doesn't exist anymore. I think it was called like Barrelled or something like that, and it was a fruit juice that they had brewed like a beer, like in a brewery or something. I don't exactly know because this was way back, but it basically, when I say something about that process, whatever they'd done to it, meant that as a fruit juice it was like red fruits or whatever Just gave you know that sip you get from the first sip of beer, that one that's the really refreshing. You just kind of go, just a little dopamine hit.
Speaker 3:Yeah, it did that and I was like how the hell have they done that? Because it had that thick kind of. You know it would coat the back of your mouth, it would make you feel refreshing. It was, it was. It was first sip of lager, first sip of beer, first sip of pale whatever, it is good and I I'm hoping whoever made it has gone on to do some amazing things. You know you'll probably find that they nail like own bro, dog or something, I don't know probably fucking jordan by accident yeah, probably there'll be somebody.
Speaker 3:I don't know what happened to that. Because it, because they say that the sainsbury's, near me, is one of those trial stores where they occasionally just add shit, that you think, oh, it's amazing.
Speaker 2:And then you can't buy it anywhere else yeah.
Speaker 3:So they just try stuff out which is really good and also really annoying simultaneously. Um, because at the moment their alcohol free range is like four, five, five shelves long. It keeps getting bigger and bigger. Okay, because they were falling behind, well, on both beer, the craft stuff on the other aisle and the alcohol-free stuff. They were falling behind on both and now they've slowly started to catch up. Because that's it, they've kind of gone right. We'll get a bit of Holy Faith in there. We'll get a bit of holy faith in there.
Speaker 2:We'll get a bit of proper job up here. Yes, I did see. Proper job was now in sainsbury's as well that's it.
Speaker 3:So that's the fact that they're just slowly starting to, you know, branch out. And it's not just shit, it's actually some quite nice stuff for me.
Speaker 2:I'm so disappointed in my um, my asda, because the schoof is in a lot of asdas and it's not in mine. But my asda is still, and it's a big asda, like it used to be a bnq. That's the size we're talking here, but the alcohol free section in my asda is still bex, heineken, guinness, I think bavaria, and that's it, and it's like what this is like.
Speaker 3:It's a big supermarket yeah, I mean, sometimes it's. It's weird because they do vary quite a lot around the country, because I remember going into a, an asda, and going what the hell have I? This is really what. And thinking it looked really posh, okay, which as does.
Speaker 3:No, no but, it's all just depends, because obviously they do the same offers, but it depends which offers they put on the ends of the aisles. Yeah, so most asters it's like yeah, it's the crisps, it's the you know the junk food, it's all right, but this one obviously had some of that. But it was all like, oh yeah, nice ingredients. La la la, it's harrogate for you harrogate the poshest in the country did you go to bath?
Speaker 3:yes, and it would have been the same. It would have been like oh yes, this is the poshest. We are going for the waitress crowd.
Speaker 2:You don't want to know what's on the end of mine. In my ASDA at one point they were putting security tags on the cheese because addicts were like from I want to say heroin. But I don't want to make an assumption. Didn't Anthony Warren Thompson steal some?
Speaker 3:cheese, did he? I think so. I think he did. Got done in for stealing cheese. Whoa, actually, I was just trying to work out who was the best supermarket now in terms of just a range, and although I think Ocado do quite a good range of alcohol free because they had Vendorstrik, vendorschik- yeah, yeah. Yeah, it's a playground.
Speaker 3:From yeah, yeah um the playground and from the dutch place from the netherlands yeah the dutch place god, the dutch place, the netherlands, yeah, so they've got a couple of those as well as like some other. Wow, quite good. And I was about like okay, because I don't think anyone else actually stocks other than like the proper, yeah the supermarket. Yeah, because that's it. You can't are you and you can get it over here. It's just not that often, that's crazy. Because they are quite good beers.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I love their Playground IPA. I think it's fantastic. I had it in Café Golem in Amsterdam and that was lovely. It was like oh okay, that's where I kind of, Because I didn't get on with their hard-pour stout. No, but stouts are a tricky one, and I kind of wrote them off after that, which was foolish of me, because the Playground IPA is very good, but there are some incredible European beers as well that are out there.
Speaker 3:I mean, I will admit I didn't buy the two Adminson Stouts initially because I was like there's probably other beers I'm going to prefer more on their own P5 order. And then, obviously, trembling Madness got them in because they read my emails and are stalking me and they work out what I'm going to buy and then they bring it into the stock and this is me, yeah that was a mad range and then they bring it into the stock and it this is me.
Speaker 3:Yeah, that was a mad range. Yeah, because I was waiting at one point before Christmas. I was waiting on or maybe January, but I was waiting on Northern Monk to get their order through and I was waiting on the Sykes to arrive and then both of them arrived in Trembling Madness the same day and I was like, okay, and obviously you have to. Obviously the advantage with Tremble Madness is I can order. If I order before four o'clock I get it the same day. They literally deliver it an hour later that's so good and then go hi.
Speaker 3:Yeah, here's your order. It's a bit heavy and you're like yes, it is because I just get, you get the pretty box and I just get like a bottle of a box box of mead that's been stuffed with cans and has some refreshers stuck in the top yeah, I get the refreshers.
Speaker 2:I still get the refreshers.
Speaker 3:I forget about the refreshers, but I get them regardless I mean it's always like when I go to break it down for recycling, usually in his bmw.
Speaker 2:He's just like excuse me, mate that's the world I want to live in, though, yeah, when you've just got beer being sent, that like the saddest beer delivery I ever had was um, it was during covid and I put out a thing on facebook. I was like I've ran out of beer. Who wants to bring me one? And someone that I used to work with and spoke to them in like years just messaged me.
Speaker 2:I was like go to your doorstep and was a solitary like a bottle of grosh on there and I was like this is really, really sad of me yeah because I was only half joking when I asked if anyone could bring me beer.
Speaker 3:You see, that's it. There are some big beers that haven't got an AF version, and some of them you just wonder if it ever will.
Speaker 2:Mm.
Speaker 3:No, I think there are some that I will say that are never going to get one Carling. I don't think there's ever going to be a Carling AF.
Speaker 2:I would love that so much.
Speaker 3:I just don't ever see it. Maybe April Fool's, but other than that no.
Speaker 3:Yeah, it doesn't make sense the cross-carling drinkers are kind of your typical full-on angry gammons who just will never. I mean the guy who lived above me. We discovered this during COVID because he'd go out every day, even though you were like not supposed to. You drive out in his car and he'd come back with a crate of curling or two and you'd be like, okay, well, he's stocking up, that's fair enough. It's COVID, you're not supposed to go out every day and he'd go out the next day.
Speaker 3:But the problem is the crates weren't every day, but the bags to the recycling kind of was just. You got the impression that was like, hang on a minute, three crates have just gone in. It was three days ago. He had three crates, went in and hang on and you're like going, you're drinking a crate of Carling every day, every day, because his wife was drinking wine, because we saw the wine bottles would go out and they were also going out, so she was drinking probably a bottle of wine every night and we're like wow, just wow, and I think somehow always kind of just any any level of alcoholism I could have just sort of slunk into during covid I think, that was kind of kept me on the same.
Speaker 2:Now it's like thank god for calling then yeah because I do think a lot of people kind of developed a relationship with alcohol during COVID. It's going to go down as one of the. I mean we're seeing the effects of it now, with a lot of studies coming out about home drinking and things like this and the harm by alcohol.
Speaker 3:I think there was some statistic that the same amount of alcohol is now being drunk as before. I think it was 2024. They said the same amount of alcohol is being drunk, but just by a lot less people. Okay, wow, there was a literal statistic that was like that yeah, 10 of the markets now stopped drinking, but the alcohol level hasn't gone down. It's just that more people, like 10 of people are drinking more than they were pre-pandemic. So there, so there were those who've given up and there were those who've cut down, and then there were those who have cut down, and then there were those who just go.
Speaker 3:no, I'm going to drink more, so yeah.
Speaker 2:But no, I think if we ever see an alcohol-free Carling, I think that's when we can accept that this is not real and we're living in a simulation. It's the end of days, isn't it? Yeah, it's got to be Like I, but it was like a test that was sent out to a certain supermarket.
Speaker 3:It's such a weird thing, though, because it's like rebadged. Is it like 4X or something? It's basically one of their other random brands, but yeah it's re-badged it. Yeah, but the weird thing is that Aldi do a Madri copy.
Speaker 2:Theirs actually is brewed in.
Speaker 3:Spain, so theirs is more authentic than the actual product because actually theirs is brewed in the country that it's supposing to be from.
Speaker 3:So the M&S Czech Pilsner or Czech Lager the weird one I found, though and I haven't had it mainly because I don't like the original particularly which is they do cans in Aldi of and this and this is what I think. I sent you a picture of it because it's a. It was a total game changer and it's um heineken double zero, but a rip-off, and you know something, something's happening with the market when aldi does a rip-off of it. I mean, aldi's rip-offs don't always make sense. I think it's weird that they've got establishment ale and punk IPA and they're both brewed by BrewDog, so BrewDog is actually destroying their own market within Aldi. Well, they did a co-op as well, didn't they?
Speaker 3:Yeah, but that's it. That anti-establishment ale is brewed by BrewDog and it's basically the same thing. They just split the line, but it just. It's bizarre. But yeah, I think the idea that they have brewed. They've literally think that Heineken 00 is so popular and there's going to be such a market that they've done a copy of it. That's mad. You probably find it's better it wouldn't be surprised well, it wouldn't be a high bar to get over no, but I just don't want to buy a crate of it because, yeah, that's the thing.
Speaker 2:Like I'd get one just to be like. Okay, I mean, I am the kind of person that I will buy a crate of it and the rest of it will just sit in my cupboard and never be drank, or or I'll do a giveaway. Um, be like, you don't want to win this one, don't enter you'll regret it here you. You get all of these amazing beers I and I've snuck some shit into, you could win this one delicious beer, and all of this as well.
Speaker 3:Yeah 20 amazing beers.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that'll be the next one. So, yeah, nobody enter the next giveaway, because it's just going to be the shit that I didn't want that's going out of date soon or has gone out of date, which hopefully we're seeing the end of these very short shelf lives yes, I'm noticing a real improvement there, because that was a real issue for me for a long time yeah, I think I mean that's it.
Speaker 3:I think I know, yeah, I think they're getting that's it, but there's, I think it is the thing with both mash gang and others. We're all learning at the same time about okay, how much do we need to put these through pasteurisation? How much do we need to throw preservatives at them? Can we get away with one, not the other? Can we do both? Can we do this, can we do that, and that's it. I think you know there was a lot of. There was a, because there was a. There was the summer explosions.
Speaker 2:I've heard of the summer explosions, yeah.
Speaker 3:Northern Monk sorry, northern Monk, but had. I think it was a very. I think it was a holy, I think it might have been a holy heathen. The first batch exploded in a drawer. It wasn't that warm, and then I may, when we moved out I may have had to. I did take a half-distance move, but there was a slightly blue stain on the carpet from one of the Mash Gang slash Northern Monk gatchas. Right, because the blue ones like to explode quite badly if you've got them too warm, because apparently that one's over-accentuated or did something a bit afterwards.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 3:So the blue one, the red one was fine, the yellowy one, the other two were okay. Yeah, so the blue one, the red one was fine, the yellowy one, the other two were okay, but the blue one, the blue one and also the most staining yeah, yeah, it's almost like they did it intentionally yeah, so yeah, the blue one was, was explosive.
Speaker 3:It didn't do it very often and then and say if you kept it cold, it was it was fine but yeah, there was this very much a point where you had to keep every single one a a AF beer at a really stable temperature and drink it about three months before it got to its day or you were screwed. Yeah, and the weird thing is because obviously because I did all the cans for a lot of the MASH gang stuff I can see when I see someone on a go and they're going oh yeah, come and drink some of this amazing MASH gang beer and I'm like going. That's like two years old.
Speaker 2:Don't open it, don't do that, don't go near it. It'll explode.
Speaker 3:You're going to be so drunk, yeah, or you'll just be stuck on the toilet for four days.
Speaker 2:Yeah, one of the two. Yeah, because that's it.
Speaker 3:Some of the times they go a bit.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I've seen a video, do them around recently actually, of those Mashgang Northern Monk beers, the different coloured ones.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 2:As an advert.
Speaker 3:Yeah, there's a guy for I think it's an advert for Brewster. Yeah, yeah, yeah, it's Brewster. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:It's Brewster, and it's like each one's a different colour. It's like bro, this was nearly three years ago.
Speaker 3:Three years ago. Yeah, like years ago. Yeah, like, what are you? What you're doing? Yeah, the only. What?
Speaker 2:the only, the only thing they're going to do is decorate your walls now and your toilet.
Speaker 3:Yeah, if you, if you can even get the, the things open. But I mean, yeah, I don't think that, I think I, hopefully, I'm thinking it's an. It's a clip from it's got when they were out and it's just yeah, and it's just been like reused and they haven't thought of likeing it. I hope not Because. I just can't see them.
Speaker 2:Check your labels, for goodness sake, it's not like the full-out stuff. That was a lesson I had to learn quite early on.
Speaker 3:I've lost so much beer to it, see that's the other thing I'd like to see a bit more of in AF. Did you ever have? They came in bottles initially, which is the Ta'ul. It was like dragon fruit and something. They were like fruit beers, yes.
Speaker 1:I can't remember what they called the range, though. Yes, why is that ringing a bell?
Speaker 3:But then they put them into cans and they were fine. But of course the cans were. I think the cans were three, threes, but the bottles were like three, seven, fives or like they were a little bit.
Speaker 3:They weren't quite big, they were quite somewhere in between the two yeah, that's really ringing a bell because that was the reason I first placed an order with um, omp5 and then, annoyingly, they brought the uk trembling, bloody madness. I think they did, but I think they took two months to get it over, because then I ordered some more because I remember talking to Jordan about these and they were just, they were just like really. They felt really sophisticated, they felt like an experienced beer. So if you're talking about those big ass stouts and those massive kind of like, some of the stuff that Vault City do is kind of like oh, we've got a crazy you know donut beer with you know sprinkles or whatever.
Speaker 2:Like funky fluid kind of vibe.
Speaker 3:Exactly Some of those stuff. You know you want to put it in the glass and you know you kind of want to sip and savour and I think that's it. Sometimes they can obviously go a bit too silly and they become. Okay, this is a gimmicky beer that you just want to drink and you probably drink a little bit of things like some, like the cereal beer which was just flavorsomely cereal milk. I still remember jordan. The first time they made the cereal um, the cereal beer, he washed his hands six, seven times. They still stank of lucky charms. He had to, he, just he. He was just like he's going to get the guy going. Why is that smell? Jordan?
Speaker 3:he's like, like, just I've washed my hands six times I still smell of lucky charms because he had to unbag them on and put them in the yeah, that's what I think you know what next time? Just to use it, use flavor extracts and not to put, like any cereal, in the mash tun. I love that beer. Yeah, there's a reason that mash gang have a reputation for sticking mash tuns Like absolutely gumming the breweries, Because the amount of shit they would add to some of those beers that one literally was like we're going to have to get this out with like a crowbar.
Speaker 2:You know when milkshake shops became really trendy and you could pick any chocolate that you wanted to go into your milkshake.
Speaker 3:Jack and george just like fell in love with that and that's where his whole like character arc began was in a milkshake after a while you put those in and you just they all ended up tasting kind of similar, because it was like oh, it's a chocolate milkshake with a vaguely taste of caramel.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and really, really sickly sweet, because I've got carried away again and that was probably the early sign to me that I had a problem with addiction, because I had every chocolate that you could possibly get but you see, I think, I think that's it.
Speaker 3:Experience beers yeah, oh, beers is one of those areas.
Speaker 3:The idea that you could I mean, I know Jordan talked about it at one point and it was all kind of just you know, kind of, if it ever happened the idea, though, that you could create something flavoursome, a bit sophisticated still definitely a beer, and obviously with those fruit flavours. The problem is, you go, if you go too like juice, and I think this is one of the reasons, like you know, sort of um, you know, if you took some of the vault city ones and then just made them AF, they'd sell. Oh yeah, they'd sell, but some people would go well, that's just a fruit juice, that's just Finto, isn't it? It gets much harder to argue um, but, and again, so with some of those things you kind of go into, like some of those things where you go, well, yeah, actually it, but I think that's it. The balance with those those sours had from to were that they yeah, they just tasted of it. They didn't taste as sophisticated when they were in a can yeah again is they lost that experience and they were still tasty.
Speaker 2:It's a massive part of it, isn't it?
Speaker 3:But the experience of having them in these big, kind of big bottles that you kind of can crack open, pour really nicely into a lovely tulip glass and just sip and savour and just be like you know, oh, this is lovely and I think that's it. I think you can still have those experience beers, ones that you don't want to, just you know. Spears, ones that you don't want to, just you know. I mean, I think that's it because because there's the proclivity that you can just chug literally any af and you can go down the glass really quickly and then you can open another one. It means that yeah, that's great, but you also want to have those ones where you just be like, actually, I just want to have a. Yeah, this is a treat, this is a treat for me, because that's what.
Speaker 2:That's what these drinks are. They are a treat. You don't drink them instead of water. It's like I'm going to have this because it's nice and I'm enjoying it. So, that's where they should be in your diet, and I'm no health expert, trust me. Final question we touched upon it briefly earlier when do you think the future lies with alcohol-free? What do you think the next breakthroughs are, or what would you like the next breakthroughs to be?
Speaker 3:I say I certainly think there's going to be some sort of discovery of, say, a molecule or something, a chemical, something that adds that flavour profile of alcohol beers but without the the alcohol, something that really replaces it, whether that's something, I say, nootropic but something that's properly functional, I think it's, I think there's something there, and because you can look at any other industry and there's almost an equivalent where they've kind of got around the problem. So, whether there's something, you know whether it's a natural extract, they can add a plant extract, something that and, and you know, you could be then further down the line where they discover that it's actually addictive and that we shouldn't be drinking it. But you know, that's kind of down the line where you kind of go, well, actually, yeah, this is so. I think there's that. I think I'd be interested to know whether or not, obviously, when they do the review of where the thresholds lie, so what?
Speaker 3:Obviously, when they do the uh, they're doing a review of whether, where the thresholds lie, so what counts as alcohol free, what doesn't? Because there's a lot of confusion and just you know things about. You know, does 0.5 count? At the moment it's got to be a low alcohol, it'sa non-alcoholic beverage not, and all this kind of stuff. I think that will all get cemented down and and reclarified, and I think I mean I know, for example, ireland at the moment are going to put in a new. They're starting to put in stuff that says uh, I can't remember the exact wording, but it's something like alcohol can cause cancer and yeah, like the alcohol warning labels and things and it's, it's well.
Speaker 3:The worst thing of theirs isn't is that they actually are going to end up killing their market a little bit, I think, because they've they put this thing on and it's a clear sin. Right, they've done it. It's been written by a bureaucrat in word and it currently it's in it's in times e-roman and you're supposedly you can't change it and it's huge yeah so.
Speaker 3:But the thing is, because it's got a nutritional information it has to have, yeah, the calories and the carbohydrates it would basically mean because that information is just not available. For most specials it just isn't, which is why special alcohol-free beers don't tend to have it on. So there were likes from Daya and yeah, yeah, yeah, because they're only doing them as limited edition. Once that stock's gone, it's gone, whereas you do get it on your core range stuff because they have to count as soft drinks and therefore right they.
Speaker 3:Because they have to count soft drinks, they have to be counted with the calories again. It's one of those weird things where it's almost counting alcohol-free beers as a health choice as opposed to because you can't. It's not that you can compare it to a beer, because nobody knows what. If I go and bought a can of Deja, does it have the ABV calories on? No, but they're alcohol free. If they have a core range might do Right, okay.
Speaker 3:So basically you've got the calories on a lot of alcohol free beer, but you haven't actually got it on the ABV stuff at all. You never have because they don't have to put it on. And there's so much other shit like all of the buyback schemes and the recycling schemes and just just a lot of clutter just a lot of clutter um, which I have to sit there and knee around with and be like yeah, um you know, just trying to work that all through that and also all the you know the allergens and all that kind of stuff and that just gets dense and stuff.
Speaker 3:But yes, because they're doing that, I think there's going to be a lot of just that, yeah, I think, just changing how people can perceive the sector as well. So I think it will change, because I know that one of the big things when they were potentially changing that 2.8 percent, uh, I think they've got to make it higher or lower, I think, or something, that text threshold. It would have brought more beers under the threshold, right. So I think you've already starting to see like lots of beers already getting brewed lower and I think there's just a natural thing where there will be more and more beers coming in at that range and I think that's it.
Speaker 3:As they start to legislate more on alcohol-free sorry, alcohol beers and there's some clarification of alcohol-free, I think you'll get more and more alcohol-free coming through and it will be genuinely alcohol-free that we can actually say it, whether it's 0.5 or 0.0. There won't be any of this. You, yeah, we won't have to the argument about whether 0.0 is more pure, um, if, if, obviously it's on there and if you're, you know, strictly kosher or you're you know, whatever your lifestyle is. If you need it to be 0.0, brilliant, it's there, but it doesn't need to be on the wording. I think you can look at the ABV, because that's just a specific thing. It's like the same as if you've got an allergen for oats. You'd be looking at every beer label to check whether there's oats in it.
Speaker 2:I think it kind of goes into the same sort of thing. God, I hope to live in a world where I never have to tell anybody the ABV of a ripe banana again. That is the one thing that I want from this. Richard, thank you for coming to chat to me. This has been long overdue. Like just a good like face to face, albeit through a computer screen conversation about beer, because, I mean, we talk every day pretty much, so you know, this is, this is more or less just what we do anyway. So, um, yeah, I'll probably talk to you in about five minutes afterwards anyway, and if not, then I'll catch you tomorrow oh yeah, catch you later we can, and indeed did, talk about alcohol-free beer for an entire evening.
Speaker 2:I had to edit out pretty much more of that episode than ended up making the cut. Richard is a fantastic advocate for alcohol-free beer and he's a fantastic graphic designer. If you picked up any earlyANG beers, you probably had him to thank for the artwork on there. For now, my name is Ben Gibbs. You can find me on all the socials at Sober Boozers Club. You guys, take care, the music's stopped. Now I don't know what to do. Is this going to make the final cut? I think it probably will, you know.