Lagavulin Islay Jazz 2017

Apart from the famous Feis Ile, there is another whisky and music festival on Islay: Islay Jazz. Lagavulin is one of the sponsors of Islay Jazz, so every year they also have a special release for this event. This is the Lagavulin Islay Jazz Festival 2017 bottling, only available at the distillery.

The nose is surprisingly fresh and the emphasis is on vanilla and lemons. The typical maritime elements of Laga are certainly there, but the peat is very subdued. Ashes to no end, though. The salt kicks in after a few moments. This is a lovely, but rather simply nose. But nothing wrong with that.

On the palate, it is a veritable peat bomb. While again very sweet (lot and lots of vanilla), I know get a truckload of ashes and lots of smoke. Pear, lime, flowery honey and a bit of liquorice. Despite the high ABV, this goes down very easily. A peppery note offers some prickling on the tongue. This is dangerously quaffable.

The finish is quite long, with vanilla and some warm peppers at the death.

Only 6000 bottles of this stuff were released, but to my surprise I found dozens of them on the shelves in the shop (even from the 2016 edition as well), something that cannot be said of the Feis Ile bottlings. Strange, for this is very good stuff.

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