Murray McDavid Benchmark 9yo Glencadam

The Maker

Murray McDavid is the 1994 brainchild of established whisky and wine merchants Gordon Wright, Mark Reynier and Simon Coughlin. While quickly successful on the independent bottling scene, things really took off in 2000 when they purchased the then disused Bruichladdich Distillery on Islay for £6 million. In the years that followed, the McDavid team built Bruichladdich into one of Islay’s most  popular distilleries, while using it as their base for expanding Murray McDavid’s range of independent offerings.

Everything changed in 2012 when both were sold to Remy Cointreau for in excess of £50 million! This saw the controlling threesome split up with only Coughlin staying on at the distillery as the new CEO.  Reynier (who reportedly opposed the sale) moved on and set up Waterford Distillery in Ireland, and Wright (who once also held the reigns at Springbank) has become as advisor to the still unopened Ardgowan Distillery.

Yet despite the hefty purchase cost Remy Cointreau appeared to have had little interest in Murray McDavid itself, and quickly sold it on to its current owners – Spanish broker Aceo Ltd. In the years since McDavid has been based at the Coleburn distillery in Speyside where it matures all of its bottlings under the watchful eye of a small team.

At this point I should refer to my rather mixed history with Murray McDavid. It was the first independent bottling I ever bought and as such I maintain a soft spot for it. Yet the Murray McDavid’s I've had recently have come nowhere near the level of those I had in my early years. Indeed several recent releases have been downright poor. A point which is agreed upon by my local whisky group where despite us having several over the years, they have never got out of the bottom half in tasting scores, and often come last on the night.

Things have got so bad in fact, when I last reviewed a Murray McDavid offering around two years ago, I said I’d give them one more chance before deciding whether to just call it quits and move on. This is that bottle.

The Expression

The Highlands distillery of Glencadam is almost a microcosm of the wider rises and falls of the Scotch whisky industry. Founded in 1825, in the early years of legislated distillation, Glencadam has come and gone through the various whisky booms and busts of the last two centuries. It’s had multiple owners and even spent two World Wars as army barracks. Yet through occasional closures and the frequent tightening of belts, the brand is still here and now appears stronger than ever.

For much of its life the distillery has been contributing towards a number of blends – such as Gilmour Thompson & Co’s ‘Royale Blend’ in the late 1800s, and Ballantine’s blend in the mid to late 1900s. This petered out at the turn of the millennium and the distillery shut its doors in 2000.

But, given the nature of the sector, it turned out to a short-lived closure of just three years. After which the ownership transferred to the incumbent Angus Dundee Distillers - who also own Tomintoul distillery. Again, initial production went back into blended whisky, but it was the 2008 re-launch which saw the distillery transform into its current guise, with the first release of its single malt range.

In subsequent years new lines have been added and production increased to about 1.5 million l/y. In doing so Glencadam has quickly established itself as a producer of well-respected age-statement whiskies which are perhaps reminiscent of an earlier time. Glencadam attribute much of this character to the shape of its stills. They have been using the same two traditional pot stills since 1825 and they have a unique lye arm design (where spirt flows out of the top of the still) with an upwards angle of 15 degrees – they tend to be horizontal or downward in shape elsewhere.

I have to confess to being rather sceptical of this kind of thing. So many distilleries make a big deal out of the angle or length of this bit of piping and how it makes a huge difference to the final product. Maybe it does, maybe it doesn't. But I suspect it's always going to be just one of a whole number of factors which influence the final flavour/texture whisky.

This particular expression from Murray McDavid was distilled in 2012 and aged in a single ex-bourbon hogshead for around seven years before being finished for two and a half years in a “freshly emptied” first-fill Oloroso Sherry cask - resulting in a nine year final age statement. It’s been bottled at a hefty cask strength of 59.2% and yielded just 307 bottles. As you’d expect from this kind of release it is of natural colour and is not chill filtered.

I’ll make a punt at suggesting that the “freshly emptied” claim might well be code for a rather ‘wet’ cask that a good kick of sherry left in it. There’s also a wider debate to be had here about finishing. How long does a finish have to be relative to total maturation time to be considered a ‘double maturation’ rather than a finish? Is that different for young whiskies than old? There doesn’t seem to be any agreed rules on this kind of thing, but I’d suggest that spending more than 25% of the total maturation time in the finishing cask is pushing at the boundaries of double maturation.

The Neck Pour

Very fresh on the nose, mountains of sherry. Despite the colour looking more like a PX matured whisky the drier notes of an Oloroso are quickly apparent.

That rich sherry comes straight through on to the palate and is quickly joined by the heavy char of the American oak. But what’s also there is the strong ethanol burn you’d expect from its strength. This improves with time in the glass but is still the dominant flavour.

After about 20 minutes of settling in the glass the secondary flavours begin to reveal themselves. There’s lots of rich milky chocolate, followed by a coffee like bitterness on the finish before a final hit of sherry and spice.

The Body

Nose is getting richer over time and is edging closer to a sweeter PX rather than it’s actual Oloroso. One question I am returning to more as I drink it is how much of the light Glencadam signature I’ve associated with the ten and fifteen year olds in previous reviews can be found here. After working through a good 40% of the bottle I have to confess that I can’t find a great deal of it. For me it’s all very cask driven to the point where the starting whisky doesn’t seem anywhere near as important.

Whether that’s good or bad is something drinkers are going to have very different views on. The tagline on this bottle is the ‘art of maturation’ and that is indeed where the sorcery has taken place. But when the character of the spirit has been beaten into submission to this extent, I can’t help but wonder if there’s a far greater art to balancing them both.

In terms of flavour I’ve taken to adding a hefty dose of water. This isn’t something I do a huge amount of, but this is a very strong whisky and really seems to need it. As you’d expect the nose is now a lot softer. The sherry still dominates but the rest is definitely far more manageable. The arrival is now much creamier. There’s also now more of the bitter oak char coming through with hints towards those more traditional flavours of nutmeg and vanilla.

In other words this is starting to work now, but it’s taking far more water than any previous whisky I’ve had has ever needed. In other words, with a lot of effort the return is there.

Final Thoughts

I feel rather torn by this bottle despite the best part of two years considering it. As presented it doesn’t work for me. The balance is off and the cask dominance has pushed away far too much of the Glencadam flavours I enjoy. Yet if you bring it down with a very hefty dose of water it becomes a much more manageable beast.

This can then be argued either way. On the one hand Murray McDavid have put out a high strength cask dominated sherry bomb that we can all dilute at our pleasure. This gives us far more control over what flavour profile we want and encouraging us to get creative. This is surely a good thing from a whisky nerd perspective.

Yet on the other hand should a whisky be this much work? Is that not what I’m paying the experts at Murray McDavid to do? Would it not have been better (from both a customer experience and economically) for Murray McDavid to have spent more time considering this release and perhaps taken it down themselves to something closer to 50-55%? It would surely be a better bottle for it and still allow room for that adjustment given how intense it is.

But regardless of where you end up on that debate the core failing of what is otherwise an interesting and intense bottle is that the character of Glencadam is so close to being lost completely. I wonder what would have happened with a slightly less reactive finishing cask, or longer in the initial ex-bourbon? For me it feels like one of those whiskies which got a bit out of hand in the finish.

So I have to come back to the earlier question of whether this bottle redeems Murray McDavid following a series of disappointing experiences. I’m going to have to answer no. That isn’t me saying this is a bad whisky, it's just the way it's been presented doesn't work for me. Others have very different views if WhiskyBase is anything to go by. Either way, given the indi bottler competition out there I think I’m happy to just let this one go for a while - minus the constant auction temptation of a pre-2012 release.