Imperial 1996 Gordon & Macphail (Blind) Review

Hi everyone,

Today I’ve got another mystery sample courtesy of u/UncleBaldric.

Imperial is one of the more available closed distilleries that is receiving a bit more attention than it used to. Remember the days when you could easily pick up a Signatory CS Imperial for £80? And these Gordon MacPhail Distillery Labels for under £60? Yeah, those were the days, the days when I didn’t realise how good I had it. I even remember recommending that someone start buying Imperial because the prices were going to go up. Did I go and follow my own advice? No, of course I didn’t.

Anyway, I had no idea this was Imperial at the time of first tasting but I did come back to it for post-reveal notes.

 

u/UncleBaldric Sample ‘B’

Colour: Amber

Body: Medium/Full

Nose: Bright cherry and strawberry notes, kinda artificial though, juicy, putting your nose in a bag of strawberry sweets. Maybe some tobacco.

Post Reveal: Yes, of course. Red apple, dunnage, tobacco. Noses like a 40yo Speyside from Sherry.

Taste: Soft and sweet. Lots of ripe cherry and grape. Feels like just above 40%. Dry oak, spicy too with ginger and black pepper. Maybe it’s an old Blended Malt from Sherry?

Post Reveal: Dry and old tasting, much older than 19yo. More spicy than first taste too, bringing it out of balance.

Finish: Short length. Quite drying. Lovely strawberry, some spices.

Guess: Reminds me of a 1977 Blended Speyside Malt from Sherry… But it’s lacking something of the complexity and balance. Maybe a 2001?

Reveal: Imperial 1996 G&M Distillery Label 43% (Sherry Casks)

Very happy with my guess here. Right cask, right strength, right age (this was bottled 19yo). Forgot that Imperial often tastes older than its years. I have had the 1995 equivalent and rated it well. Felt like this wasn’t quite as good.

76/100

 

Updated Distillery Rankings

Scotch Review #867

Whisky Network Review #1042

Network Average: 75.2

Best Score: 94

Worst Score: 12

0-49 Terrible

50-59 Bad

60-64 Just About OK

65-69 Ok to Good

70-74 Good

75-79 Very Good

80-84 Excellent

85-89 Superb

90+ Magnificent

 

Full Disclosure Disclaimer: I currently work as the Global Brand Ambassador for Penderyn Distillery. The views expressed here are purely my own and do not reflect the views of Penderyn Distillery or The Welsh Whisky Company. I try to maintain as much objectivity as I can but feel free to take my reviews with as big a pinch of salt as you like. Furthermore, my rating scale is NOT based on a Parker type wine scoring scale or a school/college/university % or A-F grade score. You can find more on my scoring here. I apologise for any seemly low or 'bad' scores given with my system and I am sorry I can't say only nice things. Please keep in mind that I am ethically compromised and I am unable to produce 100% unbiased reviews.

Why is this here?

Imperial 1989 Carn Mor [Road to #1000, Review #983]

Hi everyone,

Last year I was working a lot in Germany, which meant tasting a lot of cool German exclusives that are only released there. Unfortunately I wasn’t able to spend a lot of time there this year as I really like it there.

Despite being a closed distillery, Imperial was more affordable and pretty readily available when I first started in whisky. There were Signatory Cask Strength 1995’s for about £85 then.

Now it’s a different story but I know there are plenty of casks out there because I visited some warehouses of a certain independent bottler and they have racks of the stuff.

Imperial 1989 Carn Mor 44.7%

Colour: Light Gold

Body: Medium

Nose: Tropical fruit along with the classically Imperial dusty dunnage and leather, some pear, lemon peel, cigar box, green and red apple, particularly dusty this one. Oh, also beeswax.

Taste: Soft, dusty and old, leather, dunnage, then more fruity with red and green apple, some lemon, sour oak. Not as much complexity as I would have expected for almost 30yo.

Finish: Medium length. Very soft. Green apple, some lemon and dusty something?! Dust?

Bourbon barrel, bottled 2018 at 28yo as an exclusive for Schlumberger in Germany. Good but it is quite dusty. Perhaps too much. This dusty note is normally encounter with Glen Scotia so it’s interesting to see it here with Imperial. Not sure if it’s something coming from the spirit or cask but I might guess the cask in this case as it isn’t something I’ve had with an Imperial before or since.

75/100

Thanks for reading!

Updated Distillery Rankings

Scotch Review #825

Whisky Network Review #983

Network Average: 75.1

Best Score: 94

Worst Score: 12

0-49 Terrible

50-59 Bad

60-64 Just About OK

65-69 Ok to Good

70-74 Good

75-79 Very Good

80-84 Excellent

85-89 Superb

90+ Magnificent

Full Disclosure Disclaimer: I currently work as the Global Brand Ambassador for Penderyn Distillery. The views expressed here are purely my own and do not reflect the views of Penderyn Distillery or The Welsh Whisky Company. I try to maintain as much objectivity as I can but feel free to take my reviews with as big a pinch of salt as you like. Furthermore, my rating scale is NOT based on a Parker type wine scoring scale or a school/college/university % or A-F grade score. You can find more on my scoring here. I apologise for any seemly low or 'bad' scores given with my system and I am sorry I can't say only nice things. Please keep in mind that I am ethically compromised and I am unable to produce 100% unbiased reviews.

Why is this here?

Imperial 1989 Carn Mor Review

Hi everyone,

I did hear from an industry insider, that the source of the casks for Carn Mor is different to most independent bottlers. The quality is meant to be higher and that tends to be why they are slightly more expensive than other indies. I haven’t really seen any evidence from that in terms of taste, although I’ve only had a few, but it has made me curious to try more from their celebration of the cask range.

Imperial is a closed distillery that we are seeing less and less from. There were a lot of casks from 1995 that have made it out into the world, but not much from before that, making this one quite intriguing. Especially as I’ve always found Imperial to taste older than its years anyway.

 

Imperial 1989 Carn Mor 43%

Colour: Gold

Body: Medium

Nose: Classically Imperial, dunnage, dusty fruit, lovely tropical Old Laphroaig-like pineapple and cinnamon, candied lemon peel, more herbal as it develops.

Taste: Dry, lots of oak, classy leather and tobacco, then the tropical pineapple and mango, wool, woody, slightly musty orange (in a good way).

Finish: Long length. Dry, wool, apple and orange, a little elastic rubber (which is a shame!) holding it back.

12/1989-07/2017, so 27yo from a Bourbon barrel. A lovely Imperial but the finish is just a bit out. The strength works though, despite looking quite low.

83/100

Distillery: Imperial

Average Score: 79.7

Distillery Ranking: 10th/64 places

Up/Down: 17>10- Up 7

Thanks for reading!

Scotch Review #595

Whisky Network Review #705

Network Average: 74.6

Best Score: 94

Worst Score: 12

0-49 Terrible

50-59 Bad

60-64 Just About OK

65-69 Ok to Good

70-74 Good

75-79 Very Good

80-84 Excellent

85-89 Superb

90+ Magnificent

Full Disclosure Disclaimer: I currently work as a Brand Ambassador for Penderyn Distillery. The views expressed here are purely my own and do not reflect the views of Penderyn Distillery or The Welsh Whisky Company. I try to maintain as much objectivity as I can but feel free to take my reviews with as big a pinch of salt as you like. Furthermore, my rating scale is NOT based on a Parker type wine scoring scale or a school/college/university % or A-F grade score. You can find more on my scoring here. I apologise for any seemly low or 'bad' scores given with my system and I am sorry I can't say only nice things. Please keep in mind that I am ethically compromised and I am unable to produce 100% unbiased reviews.

Why is this here?

Imperial 1995 G&M Review

Hi everyone,

Imperial is one of those closed distilleries that’s never quite achieved the same level of hype as others and prices have stayed pretty reasonable. That’s despite it being closed 1985-1989 and 1998, finally being demolished in 2013 only to have Dalmunach built right on top of it in 2014. Although to be fair it’s cool looking with that glass.

Only being closed in the late 90’s also means that there’s a bit more stock than Brora or Port Ellen, and of the stocks left, the most coveted are the 95’s. I don’t know why, but it seems similar to 97 Clynelish. They were just making some great whisky that year.

Gordon & MacPhail seem to still have quite a lot of the stuff, because they’re still releasing it under their ‘distillery labels’ series.

 

Imperial 1995 G&M 43%

Colour: Light Amber

Body: Medium

Nose: Red apple, oak, old warehouse and dunnage, iron, almost blood-like! Which is very unique. Grapefruit and white pepper. Great nose.

Taste: Sweet orange, old, complex oak, musty dunnage, grapefruit, lime peel, a little iron and blood. Great balance of the old, musty oak and the fresh grapefruit.

Finish: Short/Medium length. Spiced orange, but a bit flat unfortunately.

Bottled 2014 from Sherry Butts. Great, great whisky until the finish. Really lets this down unfortunately, but I’m really impressed by what I’ve tried from Imperial so far.

79/100

Thanks for reading!

Scotch Review #522

Whisky Network Review #615

Network Average: 74.6

Best Score: 92

Worst Score: 22

0-49 Terrible

50-59 Bad

60-64 Just About OK

65-69 Ok to Good

70-74 Good

75-79 Very Good

80-84 Excellent

85-89 Superb

90+ Magnificent

Full Disclosure Disclaimer: I currently work as a Brand Ambassador for Penderyn Distillery. The views expressed here are purely my own and do not reflect the views of Penderyn Distillery or The Welsh Whisky Company. I try to maintain as much objectivity as I can but feel free to take my reviews with as big a pinch of salt as you like. Furthermore, my rating scale is NOT based on a Parker type wine scoring scale or a school/college/university % or A-F grade score. You can find more on my scoring here. I apologise for any seemly low or 'bad' scores given with my system and am sorry I can't say only nice things. Please keep in mind that I am ethically compromised and am unable to produce 100% unbiased reviews.

Why is this here?

Imperial 1995 The Ultimate, Review

Hi everyone,

Another whisky review coming at you today. It’s from a closed distillery but one of those ones that’s closed relatively recently and so is still relatively available.

If you hadn’t heard of Imperial Distillery, I wouldn’t blame you. It was defunct for a number of years, only really producing between 1991 and 1998. It was never really available on its own and is only available through the independent bottlers. It was demolished in 2013 and a new distillery was built on the site, Dalmunach.

This is a sample I picked up from FineDrams a while back and is bottled by The Ultimate Whisky Co., who I haven’t seen in the UK but are mostly in Belgium and Holland I think.

Imperial 1995 The Ultimate 46%

Colour: Gold

Body: Medium

Nose: Noses older than 19 years. Dusty fruit, mothballs, dunnage, beeswax polish, old dry wood. Some fresher fruit starting to appear, red apple, soft raisin, some spices too, fresh cut ginger, clove. Liquorice and old homemade limoncello come out after a bit.

Taste: Soft arrival with red apple and fruit, quickly becomes dry with lots of oak and spices, some dunnage, Hessian, then the fruit comes back a bit with dried orange peel but doesn't overcome the spiciness. After some time its softer, lemoncello, very dry old oak, tannins, bitter lemon pith.

Finish: Medium/Long length. Intense spiciness with dry old oak and some old dusty lemon peel.

Bottled at 19yo. Really interesting stuff. Reminds me of Bladnoch or Glen Elgin with the dunnage style. It felt a bit overaged with any water, but neat it was a good example of a more ‘traditional’ tasting whisky.

77/100

Thanks for reading!

Scotch Review #433

Whisky Network Review #493

Network Average: 74.3

Best Score: 92

Worst Score: 22

0-49 Terrible

50-59 Bad

60-64 Just About OK

65-69 Ok to Good

70-74 Good

75-79 Very Good

80-84 Excellent

85-89 Superb

90+ Magnificent

Full Disclosure Disclaimer: I currently work as a Brand Ambassador for Penderyn Distillery. The views expressed here are purely my own and do not reflect the views of Penderyn Distillery or The Welsh Whisky Company. I try to maintain as much objectivity as I can but feel free to take my reviews with as big a pinch of salt as you like. Furthermore, my rating scale is NOT based on a Parker type wine scoring scale or a school/college/university % or A-F grade score. You can find more on my scoring here. I apologise for any seemly low or 'bad' scores given with my system and am sorry I can't say only nice things. Please keep in mind that I am ethically compromised and am unable to produce 100% unbiased reviews.

Why is this here?