Crafting Spirit: Inside the World of Japanese Whisky with James Bowker

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[SPEAKER_01]: Welcome back everybody to another fun edition of the Rolex Whiskey Passion Project.

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[SPEAKER_01]: I have my dear friend James Balker on the call with us today.

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[SPEAKER_01]: James, tell us who you are and what you do and I can’t wait to see you in a few weeks.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Thank you, men.

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[SPEAKER_00]: It’s great to be with you.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Hey, my name is James Balker.

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[SPEAKER_00]: I’m the global advocacy manager and brand ambassador for the House of Centauri.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Say all these wonderful Japanese Whiskeys from the Finding House of Centauri as well as

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[SPEAKER_01]: And how did your whiskey journey start?

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[SPEAKER_01]: Like, where does it go?

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[SPEAKER_01]: But taking me back to, like, not obviously, you know, drinking long Island iced teas and pounding shots.

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[SPEAKER_01]: That was part of your thing.

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[SPEAKER_01]: But like, when did like whiskey peak your curiosity personally?

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[SPEAKER_00]: So, I was pretty young for me.

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[SPEAKER_00]: I’m not going to name any numbers because I’m sure you get myself into all sorts of trouble.

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[SPEAKER_00]: But I was a young lad living in the countryside in England.

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[SPEAKER_00]: And there was no public transport available.

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[SPEAKER_00]: to meet my girlfriend and see some, see some mates.

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[SPEAKER_00]: So I needed some money.

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[SPEAKER_00]: I like just got the easiest job I could in the local village pub, which happens to have a pretty epic whisky selection.

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[SPEAKER_00]: They had like 200 whiskeys for a tiny little shit.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, it wasn’t even a fancy place.

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[SPEAKER_00]: It was just like a canal side pub, but they had a fancy restaurant attached to the side of it that was run by the landlord’s son.

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[SPEAKER_00]: And so he shared our wine and spirit selection.

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[SPEAKER_00]: I got so basically, he had access to absurdly good whiskeys from an absurdly young age.

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[SPEAKER_01]: And what did that look like, like give me an example of, you know, because it’s kind of interesting because this must have been right when like single malt we’re going to be pop obviously that 200 it’s not blends like I grew up with, I mean, obviously the argument we’ve lens, but you’re talking about a proper selection.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Oh, which will yeah, I mean, with course we had to have our teachers and our famous grounds for the for the pub regulars, but.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, I reckon we probably had about 150 single mults, a Scotch single mults.

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[SPEAKER_00]: We probably had two dozen American whiskeys, and then maybe three or four, you know, other, quote, unquote, other, one of those, or rather two of those were Japanese whiskeys.

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[SPEAKER_00]: And that was really when I first got into it, because my dad was a whisky drinker.

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[SPEAKER_00]: He was a Jack Daniels fan.

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[SPEAKER_00]: I wanted to kind of win his approval by proving my, my manliness by drinking Jack Daniels.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Couldn’t

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[SPEAKER_00]: I was, I meant dude, I remember the first time I tasted Jack Daniel was like that gave me a drama of it when I was watching TV with him sometime as a teenager and ran to the bathroom to spit it out.

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[SPEAKER_00]: I was like this is the most disgusting thing that’s ever entered my body and that was just me reacting to spirits for the first time but I reckon it was about six months later I’d kind of started working my way through some of the whiskeys in the pub.

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[SPEAKER_00]: The landlord was like, as long as you so one, you can have a taste of it.

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[SPEAKER_00]: And so I just went on a kind of drive of selling every whisky I could so that I could taste it and finally find when I liked and there was the Japanese ones that first appealed to me as the first one.

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[SPEAKER_01]: What a Japanese whisky’s look like back there.

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[SPEAKER_01]: What were they?

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[SPEAKER_00]: So they were the Yamazaki and I was either the 10 or the 12.

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[SPEAKER_00]: You know, well, I always say the 10 when I tell this story because it seems cool, because it’s discontinued, but it took the honest like I remember it was one of the two and it was neeker from the barrel.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Those were the two first Japanese whisky’s I tasted and they were the first ones.

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[SPEAKER_00]: I was like, oh, here’s something I can actually drink.

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[SPEAKER_01]: Wait, you know, it was interesting because I grew up all blended.

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[SPEAKER_01]: So, you know, it was Johnny Walker.

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[SPEAKER_01]: It was Valentine’s.

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[SPEAKER_01]: It was, it was, it shivers.

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[SPEAKER_01]: That was what we had.

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[SPEAKER_01]: And, you know, when I tried Japanese whiskey for the first time, I was like, this is different.

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[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.

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[SPEAKER_01]: Like, whoever made this, because I didn’t, you know, like, you, you went through this whole thing, you know, you like, you know, there’s 150 single malls, there’s, there’s 2 dozen American whiskeys in this 3 Japanese whiskeys and my, when I tried it for the first time, I was kind of like whoever made this, unfortunately nobody cares.

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[SPEAKER_01]: Right.

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[SPEAKER_01]: So they put so much hard work into it because it’s more like a, it’s more pride.

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[SPEAKER_01]: That felt the name in the whiskey than any other whiskey that had like because there wasn’t a market for it.

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[SPEAKER_01]: They were like, Hey, we’re going to put the best thing out there.

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[SPEAKER_01]: We hope somebody realizes it.

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[SPEAKER_01]: But right now the data is not showing anybody cares.

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[SPEAKER_00]: right on man.

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[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, I, I was lucky.

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[SPEAKER_00]: We had a good selection in this place.

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[SPEAKER_00]: And I think it was just that everything I tasted was too punchy for me.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Like I was, I’d say, I was a young lad.

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[SPEAKER_00]: I was used to drinking.

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[SPEAKER_00]: I don’t know if you guys have WKD here in the US, but think if, like, an energy drink suddenly became alcoholic, that was the sort of stuff we were drinking in the back then.

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[SPEAKER_00]: And then I tried a Scotch.

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[SPEAKER_00]: I’m going to move the first time I tried a Freud.

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[SPEAKER_00]: And I felt like my head was going to explode.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Like, and not in the fun way.

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[SPEAKER_00]: This is too much.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Right.

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[SPEAKER_00]: And this was the same time I was first learning cocktail.

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[SPEAKER_00]: So I was like, okay, maybe if I make a cocktail with this stuff, I can enjoy it.

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[SPEAKER_00]: I’m making my first ever old fashioned and like, no one at this bar would say it was able to teach me.

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[SPEAKER_00]: I was just opening.

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[SPEAKER_00]: It was different skydore remember.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Opened it up, found the thing.

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[SPEAKER_00]: I did the old fashioned way where you take a sugar cube and you spend like, I feel like, yeah, it’s 10 minutes muddling that thing to get it.

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[SPEAKER_01]: So I was like, with the cherry.

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[SPEAKER_00]: with the chicken out exactly the whole thing and drinking it bit after 15 minutes of hard labor to make this bloody cocktail.

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[SPEAKER_00]: I tasted it out like this is this is still horrible.

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[SPEAKER_00]: I was hopeless when it came to whiskey to begin with.

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[SPEAKER_01]: But those were the two in the restaurants I used to run those were the the two drinks that my bartenders hated were old fashions and mojitos.

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[SPEAKER_01]: because you muddled everything and they’re like, are you having kidding me?

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[SPEAKER_01]: I’ve got to be 10 minutes on this drink.

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[SPEAKER_01]: Right.

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[SPEAKER_01]: To get a shock.

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[SPEAKER_01]: Get a jack and coke.

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[SPEAKER_01]: Exactly.

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[SPEAKER_00]: I like it so you stop through all sorts of silliness in this period.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Like I remember in my angst or in my like,

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[SPEAKER_00]: my wish to taste everything on the backbar to finally find something I like.

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[SPEAKER_00]: I was just making bad recommendations and because I was a young guy working in like a from a little village pub, I just didn’t really care at that point.

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[SPEAKER_00]: I was just like, I want to taste it there for I’m recommending it and this one guy is kind of haunting memory always.

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[SPEAKER_00]: You know when you have a memory and it just kind of like churns your chest because you’re like, oh my god, I can’t believe I did that.

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[SPEAKER_00]: So this guy comes in, he’s clearly a whiskey lover, and he’s like, hey man, and I’d really like something like a LaForey, can you recommend something?

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[SPEAKER_00]: And I was like, yeah, absolutely, try try this.

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[SPEAKER_00]: And my point here there, it’s it was like, I come in with which particular product it was, but it was a Glenn Rothers, which is a space side.

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[SPEAKER_00]: I really soft, really easy going, Sherried whiskey.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.

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[SPEAKER_00]: And he was obviously looking for a peat monster.

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[SPEAKER_00]: But I just, I kind of, he was like, oh, I’m not sure that’s going to be right.

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[SPEAKER_00]: It was like, trust me Nate, it’s so good you’re going to love it.

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[SPEAKER_00]: I really pushed this whiskey on it and finally had it, obviously he sent it back and it’s just like so many memories of making bad recommendations about whiskey from purely a selfish motivation.

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[SPEAKER_00]: I want to taste it therefore you’re going to drink it.

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[SPEAKER_01]: No, I’m going to assume since you’re in a small town that the brands aren’t coming to educate you, that you’re self-educating?

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[SPEAKER_00]: Oh, dude.

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[SPEAKER_00]: I wasn’t even a thing I was aware of.

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[SPEAKER_00]: I did not know that brand education existed.

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[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, this is a, it’s not even a town.

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[SPEAKER_00]: We’re talking a village of like a couple of thousand people.

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[SPEAKER_00]: The pub wasn’t even in the village it was that remote.

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[SPEAKER_00]: You had to walk about a kilometer to get through like fields or along roads to get to this part that was completely off the radar of any whiskey companies.

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[SPEAKER_01]: But isn’t it wild that that yet such a huge selection?

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[SPEAKER_01]: Like, and you think that that’s like, pre what we see now?

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[SPEAKER_00]: Right.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Right.

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[SPEAKER_00]: I honestly don’t know where that came from.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Like, as I say, they were connected to this fancy restaurant, but as far as I’m aware, the guy that ran the restaurant wasn’t whiskey guys.

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[SPEAKER_00]: So my guess is that this pub had just gradually acquired whiskey over the years and then whenever the landlord I met took over it, he inherited them.

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[SPEAKER_00]: I don’t think they’re collecting them himself.

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[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, because always, I mean, I remember them coming in with the book and trying to sell you stuff.

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[SPEAKER_01]: They’re like, well, you know, if you get this, then we’ll give you this and I don’t like, but we don’t, I won’t be able to sell that, right, no, like I know it’s free, but like I just it won’t work.

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[SPEAKER_01]: So I just, you know, like looking now at the just the huge selections that you that we see traveling globally, like it’s pretty wild like that was a predecessor.

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[SPEAKER_01]: Okay.

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[SPEAKER_01]: So so now you’re now your whiskey is is itching like what happens next.

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[SPEAKER_00]: The next on my head.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Next up I head to university, same story.

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[SPEAKER_00]: I need a job to pay for having fun at university.

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[SPEAKER_00]: got super lucky to work in what was quite a leading cocktail in gin bar at the time.

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[SPEAKER_00]: This is like it right in the midst of the gin revolution 2011 or so.

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[SPEAKER_01]: Okay.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Got in there.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Finally, had like mentors.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Had people that could teach me to appreciate experience in a proper way.

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[SPEAKER_00]: First came across brand education.

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[SPEAKER_00]: I met Jared Brown, a station miller from Sipsmith, and immediately like Fedon Love for them.

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[SPEAKER_00]: They’ve been mentors ever since I was literally texting them this morning.

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[SPEAKER_00]: That was the place that I finally got an education about how a spirit is made, how do appreciate spirits?

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[SPEAKER_00]: What is the right way to make and balance a cocktail?

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[SPEAKER_00]: And how do you do proper hospitality?

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[SPEAKER_00]: Like I was always a good host, but this place really taught me that the fundamentals of how to do it properly.

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[SPEAKER_00]: And there was an amazing woman there called Kate, who was the general manager and kind of another mental figure for me.

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[SPEAKER_00]: She had the opportunity to go over and run a five star hotel, which had three cocktail lounges.

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[SPEAKER_00]: And she very kindly, but basically took me under her wing and brought me with her.

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[SPEAKER_00]: And that was where that hotel called the Edge baston.

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[SPEAKER_00]: And the owner of that place, Guy called Darren Insol, as well as the two bar managers, Guy called Rob Wood and Mattie Shatloss.

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[SPEAKER_00]: These, these, this group of people between case and those three guys taught me that the true depth of the whiskey world.

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[SPEAKER_00]: They had around 800 spirits in that hotel, different spirits.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.

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[SPEAKER_00]: I, of which I reckon probably 500 to 600 were whiskey’s a huge range from all over the world and a great degree of trust in the basket.

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[SPEAKER_01]: And then as you talk, you’re talking 2011.

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[SPEAKER_01]: So

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[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, I mean, that’s so the cock the gin bar was 2011 to 2014 and then I moved into the edge baston 2014.

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[SPEAKER_00]: And yeah, that was, I mean, dude, we were talking, gosh, what was some of the, there are some ridiculous examples of pricing.

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[SPEAKER_01]: Because you remember like, you remember like, McAllen 18 was like 35 to 50 bucks.

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[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.

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[SPEAKER_01]: like that’s what it was here in the viewer and it all said it was 85 me like wait what happened it didn’t change like how are we doing this how are we doing these in the math now oh that’s what demands as it’s supposed to be all right we we we were in the really lucky position where we had a pretty decent Japanese whiskey collection I think we had around 40 or 50 Japanese whiskeys when I first started

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[SPEAKER_00]: And we opened just before the Jim Murray Yamazaki Sherry cask best whisky in the world kind of for a moment.

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[SPEAKER_00]: And we went from being pretty quiet to suddenly much busier because people were literally just traveling in because Japanese whisky had suddenly turned this corner.

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[SPEAKER_00]: And we were the barber actually stalks the stuff.

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[SPEAKER_00]: And that was the real moment that I noticed there was something special not just for me, but in the kind of wider world of Japanese whisky.

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[SPEAKER_01]: It really, I mean, it is kind of mind-blowing.

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[SPEAKER_01]: So how long were you there for?

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[SPEAKER_00]: That quite a long time, I think, three and a half years four years.

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[SPEAKER_01]: Okay, so now that’s now the whiskey.

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[SPEAKER_01]: Revolution or re-innovate, it’s in full throng.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Absolutely.

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[SPEAKER_00]: And that’s, I basically, in that first, so I remember before we even opened the hotel, they did a really good job of training the team.

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[SPEAKER_00]: So they had a sister hotel, like in Kenneworth, we went there for tastings.

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[SPEAKER_00]: And they hosted both the Nika Brown Ambassador and Zaraan Perich, who remains our international Brown Ambassador for some Tory.

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[SPEAKER_00]: And they just brought with them an incredible,

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[SPEAKER_00]: range of Japanese whiskeys.

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[SPEAKER_00]: We taste them all and on that day, I remember saying to myself, like, this is my safe space.

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[SPEAKER_00]: If I have a niche within the world of alcohol, this thing is me.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Like, Japan is what I’m all about.

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[SPEAKER_00]: I love their whiskeys.

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[SPEAKER_00]: I love the vibe of these companies.

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[SPEAKER_00]: They seem to have a great ethic and so on and so forth.

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[SPEAKER_00]: And I literally remember deciding, like, if I’m going to be an expert in this place, I want to be a Japanese whisky expert.

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[SPEAKER_00]: And it basically just progressed from there that the owner of the hotel trusted me,

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[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, I’ve not looked back since, really.

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[SPEAKER_01]: I mean, at this point, you know, cocktails are still existing, but now all of a sudden you have these people that are coming in and they’re like, we just want neat pours, neat pours, neat pours.

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[SPEAKER_01]: I’m going to try a whole bunch of stuff because like it became like candy land.

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[SPEAKER_01]: And I remember like my bartender’s going like wait a second.

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[SPEAKER_01]: I used to bust my ass on an old fashion in Mojito.

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[SPEAKER_01]: And now I can pour the guy a $50 scotch and

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[SPEAKER_01]: put the check down right with it and walk away and I spent seven seconds.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.

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[SPEAKER_00]: And the conversations I would have with those guests was so much better because I personally really enjoyed the whole mixology revolution that happened.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, in that kind of time frame, I was one of those fancy bartenders doing competitions.

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[SPEAKER_00]: And if I could have grown a mustache, I absolutely would have done.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Unfortunately, my face does not grow hairs like that.

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[SPEAKER_00]: No, I mean, for me, it was just being out of like

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[SPEAKER_00]: like how a cocktail is made or something.

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[SPEAKER_00]: I could just sit down and have a much more just organic chat with whiskey drinkers and that was something that really appealed to me.

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[SPEAKER_01]: Well to me it’s always it’s like the geeking out on the history and like where did this come from and what did they do and how did it get here?

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[SPEAKER_01]: You know it just it never gets old.

13:14.785 –> 13:22.947
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, it’s just never does, you know, it’s a bizarre, it’s a bizarre foray, which I just don’t see slowing down anytime soon.

13:23.207 –> 13:26.848
[SPEAKER_01]: So how is the next step from their working for Centauri?

13:26.868 –> 13:27.988
[SPEAKER_01]: Or is this step before that?

13:28.368 –> 13:35.150
[SPEAKER_00]: Not quite, so this is still a little while before, so then I took a bit of a break from that place and had a bit of a burnout moment and

13:35.970 –> 13:50.538
[SPEAKER_00]: Long story short, basically, a lot of bad things happened for me in space of about a year, lost a grandparent, and all sorts of different bits and bobs, hated where I was at with my studies, and I was just in the first year of a PhD, and it’s not enjoying that world of academia at all.

13:51.198 –> 14:01.204
[SPEAKER_00]: And I would post it on Facebook, which was still a thing back then, to ask if anyone I knew had a good job in Asia, because I just decided, you know what, I’m out of fear, I don’t want to be in the UK anymore.

14:01.744 –> 14:06.691
[SPEAKER_00]: And another friend of mine came back and was like, hey, everyone knows you’re the Japanese whisky guy.

14:06.711 –> 14:10.477
[SPEAKER_00]: You’re obsessed with Japanese culture and cocktails, like why don’t you just go to Japan?

14:10.817 –> 14:14.162
[SPEAKER_00]: And I said to her, like, cherry, I don’t know anybody in Japan.

14:14.262 –> 14:17.066
[SPEAKER_00]: So, like, I don’t think I’m going to be able to do that.

14:17.527 –> 14:19.289
[SPEAKER_00]: And she literally was like, don’t worry.

14:19.469 –> 14:22.231
[SPEAKER_00]: I’ve got you just just wait a couple of days and we’ll see what happens.

14:22.411 –> 14:25.554
[SPEAKER_00]: And the following day, I get a phone call from Hittersuga Weno.

14:25.574 –> 14:30.818
[SPEAKER_00]: So Weno Sam from Bar High Fight, one of the most iconic bars in the world, based out in Ginsa, in Tokyo.

14:31.219 –> 14:34.421
[SPEAKER_00]: And he phones me and he’s like, hey, Cherry says you’re great and you’re looking for a job.

14:34.822 –> 14:36.343
[SPEAKER_00]: When’s the earliest you can get here?

14:36.603 –> 14:45.431
[SPEAKER_00]: And so I literally put down the phone, quit my PhD, quit my job, handed in my contract for my lease and moved out to Japan a week later.

14:47.001 –> 14:47.869
[SPEAKER_00]: Holy shit.

14:49.917 –> 14:50.678
[SPEAKER_00]: And it was amazing, man.

14:50.758 –> 14:59.644
[SPEAKER_00]: I spent a couple of seasons out there and came back to the UK, started up with a good friend of mine called Alex and he had a really lovely, small, fine dining restaurant.

14:59.664 –> 15:09.470
[SPEAKER_00]: So I partnered up with him and we opened a bar and a restaurant together and had a good couple of years of creative, kind of, and shopping-neurial chaos, but wonderful, wonderful fun through all of that.

15:09.971 –> 15:15.054
[SPEAKER_00]: And then eventually I just realized that I was coming close to another burnout, didn’t want to have a second one.

15:15.374 –> 15:18.677
[SPEAKER_00]: And basically got phoned from a friend of mine saying,

15:19.337 –> 15:24.141
[SPEAKER_00]: I don’t think you’re looking for a job right now, but you are ideal candidate to come and be the Santori brand ambassador.

15:24.661 –> 15:26.082
[SPEAKER_00]: If it’s not you, who would you recommend?

15:26.102 –> 15:28.584
[SPEAKER_00]: And I was like, actually, man, I am looking for something.

15:28.724 –> 15:40.153
[SPEAKER_00]: And this guy Dan Derv, he’s running global bartending now, just hit me right up with the managing director of Santori, went for a burger with him, did a little interview session, and next thing you know, I’m getting the best job of my life.

15:41.115 –> 15:45.138
[SPEAKER_00]: Oh my god, I did, it’s like, I mean, it’s a weird thing to say, it was almost like a fairy tale.

15:45.218 –> 15:48.241
[SPEAKER_00]: Thank you, like with the fuck, yeah, I thought of it like that.

15:48.601 –> 15:51.744
[SPEAKER_01]: Drinking this, you know, from Yamazaki 12, to there you go.

15:52.424 –> 16:01.752
[SPEAKER_01]: So what’s so, so I would imagine just based on how the whiskey is with Centauri, the the whole training and everything the preparation is just pristine.

16:02.942 –> 16:03.122
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.

16:03.342 –> 16:06.926
[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, it was it was an interesting time in some stories history.

16:06.966 –> 16:10.369
[SPEAKER_00]: They were, you know, it’s about as soon as they’re in 2019 or something.

16:10.889 –> 16:17.175
[SPEAKER_00]: They were kind of at that point where so I keep getting notifications and I have no idea how to turn off how the sound for that.

16:17.195 –> 16:17.936
[SPEAKER_00]: So my apologies.

16:19.766 –> 16:25.090
[SPEAKER_00]: But yeah, so they’re in a position where 2019, we’re in the middle of the supply and demand crisis.

16:25.971 –> 16:30.054
[SPEAKER_00]: And Roku has just been launched, Haku has just been, or about to be launched rather.

16:30.615 –> 16:34.558
[SPEAKER_00]: And they were kind of ready for that next stage of expansion from her.

16:34.978 –> 16:42.645
[SPEAKER_00]: marketing perspective, but we simply didn’t have that much whiskey, especially, I mean, the US had a pretty good allocation, but Europe was really struggling for liquid.

16:43.185 –> 16:48.490
[SPEAKER_00]: And so they just said, look, we just trust you, you seem like an expert, what do you think we need right now?

16:49.071 –> 16:53.755
[SPEAKER_00]: And they allowed me to create some really cool immersive experiences with the limited whiskey we had so that you weren’t just

16:54.175 –> 16:58.899
[SPEAKER_00]: seeing it as an asset, because a lot of people back then were seeing Japanese whiskey as a thing to flip.

16:59.099 –> 17:06.526
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, something that it was so, when I was in, when I started buying Japanese whiskey, it was $20,000 of $20,000 of $15,000.

17:07.066 –> 17:07.266
[SPEAKER_01]: Right.

17:07.287 –> 17:12.351
[SPEAKER_01]: So, you know, my first big purchase was the Yamazaki sherry, the sherry cast.

17:12.751 –> 17:39.625
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, that was my first big purchase for like seven hundred bucks was six eighty five, you know, unlike a secret Facebook group and I was the admin of one of the secret Asian whiskey only Facebook groups and we had this woman Jocelyn, I don’t know if she was a woman or that was a Facebook name, I didn’t doesn’t matter to me, but she was in and out of Narita and that’s how I was able to get the limited 25s, you know, the hawk, the 30 and the yama

17:40.105 –> 17:45.529
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, and it was a thing and they weren’t a lot of us in America, but like I was buying as investment.

17:45.569 –> 17:47.450
[SPEAKER_01]: I’ve never sold any of them yet.

17:47.851 –> 17:55.976
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, but the flipping was pretty insane because she would be like, hey, I got, I got a Hibiki 30 for 2,200 and it would be like boom, Ben.

17:56.377 –> 17:58.978
[SPEAKER_01]: And the next thing you’d see it up, you know, for sale for 3.5 grand.

18:00.119 –> 18:02.561
[SPEAKER_00]: You know, this is all 15 16 17 18.

18:02.601 –> 18:22.616
[SPEAKER_01]: So yeah, you’re you’re coming in where like yeah, it was like it was a huge commodity because There were these rare bottles that were being limited and I think about like all the originals that I bought The original Mizunara is from like 2011 and stuff like that and I’m just like like there was just there was a lot of vintage whiskey sitting around

18:23.296 –> 18:31.761
[SPEAKER_00]: 100% man and it was it was an amazing time, but it was also like for me a slightly sad time in the Japanese Wistie history because people weren’t enjoying what it was meant to be.

18:31.781 –> 18:32.501
[SPEAKER_00]: They were not drinking it.

18:32.521 –> 18:33.762
[SPEAKER_01]: They were not drinking it.

18:33.782 –> 18:34.663
[SPEAKER_01]: They were not drinking it.

18:35.043 –> 18:43.107
[SPEAKER_00]: And like when they were talking about it, they were talking about it as an asset class, not as a like fantastic piece of cultural cultural provenance or whatever.

18:43.127 –> 18:47.870
[SPEAKER_01]: And if you come to my house and and I would point I would blind taste him on, you know,

18:51.232 –> 18:54.577
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, and they would swear up and down that y’all my 18 was a single mom’s watch.

18:54.657 –> 18:54.978
[SPEAKER_01]: Scotch.

18:55.518 –> 18:55.719
[SPEAKER_01]: Right.

18:55.739 –> 18:56.260
[SPEAKER_01]: Like now.

18:57.361 –> 18:58.242
[SPEAKER_01]: Like here it is.

18:58.303 –> 18:59.204
[SPEAKER_01]: Like no way.

18:59.224 –> 19:02.489
[SPEAKER_01]: This is what I’m like Centauri just does it different.

19:03.069 –> 19:03.270
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.

19:03.943 –> 19:05.164
[SPEAKER_00]: And I was that was my theory man.

19:05.184 –> 19:10.190
[SPEAKER_00]: I was like that this blind tasting thing is what got me into whiskey in the first place because I didn’t know what I was drinking.

19:10.210 –> 19:12.373
[SPEAKER_00]: I say I had no branding education in that part.

19:12.413 –> 19:22.524
[SPEAKER_00]: I was even though I could see the label is effectively blind tasting because I didn’t know what it was I was putting my mouth and I was just want my whole theory was let’s get as many people just.

19:23.105 –> 19:30.971
[SPEAKER_00]: properly drinking this, like actually tasting it, and actually enjoying it, and then build Japanese experiences around that, that allow people to understand more about the culture.

19:31.091 –> 19:43.800
[SPEAKER_00]: Because I don’t know, for me, the best way to understand the difference between like foods and different places, music and different places, is to understand they don’t come from a creative void, but these things are part of a wider cultural context.

19:44.380 –> 19:59.731
[SPEAKER_00]: And let’s build that experience so that our silly Westerners have at least like an inkling of what was going on in the minds of the blenders when they created that flavor So yeah, I think that’s why I always geek out on all the deconstruction experiences I’ve had with with you guys

20:00.531 –> 20:02.713
[SPEAKER_00]: Dude, I mean, that’s, that was one of the coolest things.

20:02.733 –> 20:09.619
[SPEAKER_00]: Like my first, my first couple of weeks, you know, tackies, he’s now our global whiskey director, but back then he was running education.

20:09.639 –> 20:11.220
[SPEAKER_00]: He’s basically doing the job I do now.

20:11.641 –> 20:14.703
[SPEAKER_00]: He was doing back then or something similar but more senior.

20:15.103 –> 20:20.628
[SPEAKER_00]: And so he comes into London and he just brings with him this absurdly tattered cardboard box.

20:21.069 –> 20:23.651
[SPEAKER_00]: And kind of opens it up and inside it’s just a chaos,

20:25.152 –> 20:28.193
[SPEAKER_00]: jumble of bottles and that’s all the component whiskey.

20:28.253 –> 20:32.535
[SPEAKER_00]: So like the five components you’ve been together to create Hibiki and so on and so forth across the range.

20:32.975 –> 20:50.761
[SPEAKER_00]: And he just hands me this box and he’s like, yep, all right, go and taste these and then come back and tell me about our whiskey and it was one of the best learning experiences ever because he didn’t even try to guide me, he just trusted me to understand the way that whiskey comes together, trust my palate and build out like how I would talk to people about some touring.

20:50.781 –> 20:51.962
[SPEAKER_00]: It’s been a great journey

20:53.262 –> 21:01.532
[SPEAKER_01]: It’s really, it’s really, I mean to me, it’s like in the geeky sense of it, it’s like such a fuddy experience, drinking Santori whiskey.

21:01.553 –> 21:08.962
[SPEAKER_01]: Because you get to play with all these beautiful elements in a deconstruction and then realize how hard the work is to put that all together.

21:09.563 –> 21:11.124
[SPEAKER_00]: Right, exactly.

21:11.985 –> 21:27.675
[SPEAKER_00]: For me, it always reminds me of Spanish food, or to be honest, any food that’s really simple, it’s just if you have great ingredients and you have a sensitivity to how flavor’s layer together, you can create something that’s incredibly complex, despite actually ultimately being fairly simple.

21:27.695 –> 21:30.117
[SPEAKER_00]: And that’s really how we make whiskey at Santori.

21:31.521 –> 21:32.722
[SPEAKER_01]: No, it’s been wild.

21:32.762 –> 21:39.147
[SPEAKER_01]: I mean, I took looking at all the different releases and stuff like that and obviously seeing some of the new stuff that’s coming out.

21:39.728 –> 21:41.810
[SPEAKER_01]: Everyone who comes to my house is just blown away.

21:41.850 –> 21:43.431
[SPEAKER_01]: They’re like, whoa, like this isn’t saying.

21:43.451 –> 21:44.072
[SPEAKER_01]: This isn’t saying.

21:44.092 –> 21:49.656
[SPEAKER_01]: I mean, I got hold of a Hakushu Sherry cast 2014.

21:49.676 –> 21:53.800
[SPEAKER_01]: There was a gentleman here in San Diego who would buy that.

21:53.840 –> 22:00.005
[SPEAKER_01]: He bought a Hakushu 25 and he had literally take like two pores out of the bottle and then sell me the bottle as an open bottle.

22:01.363 –> 22:10.330
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, I was just like, oh my god, like that, the hawkishu Sherry cast is always blew me away until I tried the components, right?

22:10.691 –> 22:15.875
[SPEAKER_01]: In all the, even like, you and I day with a cheetah, you know, I’m just like, wait a second, like this is insane.

22:17.583 –> 22:17.803
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.

22:18.083 –> 22:28.005
[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, for me, Hackishu, when it’s in a sharing task, is like one of the most interesting sharing task expressions I’ve tasted because it’s such a bright and like green fruit forward whiskey.

22:28.665 –> 22:40.687
[SPEAKER_00]: And for me, like I don’t automatically associate that with the dried fruits that you get in a sharing task, it feels just like intuitive, like it shouldn’t work, or at least that maybe the sharing task would just completely overwhelm all of those fresh fruit flavors.

22:40.927 –> 22:44.228
[SPEAKER_00]: And then you taste it, you’re like, wait, no, it’s just done something completely different

22:47.008 –> 22:49.529
[SPEAKER_00]: I just have to accept, so I don’t understand how the flavor works.

22:49.949 –> 22:54.670
[SPEAKER_01]: It is a so beautiful, so beautiful in there, and it’s so deep.

22:55.150 –> 22:58.311
[SPEAKER_01]: I’ll be like, some of these things are like a consummate.

22:58.531 –> 22:59.931
[SPEAKER_01]: They just settle well together.

23:00.511 –> 23:05.772
[SPEAKER_01]: And then you’re like, wait, how could this one spoonful of the soup, be the best thing I’ve ever had this broth?

23:06.392 –> 23:09.433
[SPEAKER_01]: And if you look at some of these hawkish shoe expressions, you’re like, okay, I get it.

23:10.689 –> 23:10.989
[SPEAKER_00]: Right.

23:11.709 –> 23:12.089
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, man.

23:12.109 –> 23:18.551
[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, the Hakishu 100th anniversary, the 18 year old piece of art, my favorite.

23:18.971 –> 23:21.592
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, I honestly, I mean, it’s been so lucky in my career.

23:21.632 –> 23:28.973
[SPEAKER_00]: Same as you with tasting whiskeys and I remember, I mean, you’ve met Shinji Shinji’s sister and he’s the most humble guy ever.

23:29.353 –> 23:33.014
[SPEAKER_00]: And he just kind of paused us to drown and says, like, yeah, I think this might be quite good.

23:33.374 –> 23:36.615
[SPEAKER_00]: And then we all tasted it and our room just goes silent for about 10 minutes.

23:36.655 –> 23:39.636
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, all of us just kind of compute how insanely complex

23:40.836 –> 23:49.000
[SPEAKER_00]: it’s also like the biggest deal ever right now because we did the world’s worst job of marketing it so it’s like significantly right now.

23:49.340 –> 23:56.484
[SPEAKER_01]: I mean Danie, can we just talk about the hundred year 20 Hibiki 21 that I’ve bought and the worst marketing ever on that thing.

23:56.504 –> 24:00.226
[SPEAKER_01]: So like this is not just 21 and a wooden box guys.

24:00.826 –> 24:01.567
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, what that is.

24:02.615 –> 24:05.176
[SPEAKER_00]: Oh yeah, this has been a fun journey as well.

24:05.196 –> 24:18.120
[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, we’ve we’ve been on a journey with Centauri where this this company has has faced things that’s never faced before in the last decade because no one had heard of Centauri and so 2014, 2015 and really like it’s actually like later than that.

24:18.160 –> 24:23.161
[SPEAKER_00]: Those of us that are whiskey dogs like you and I, we might have heard of it through 2010 through 2015.

24:23.641 –> 24:25.062
[SPEAKER_00]: Most people it was a kind of

24:26.368 –> 24:50.855
[SPEAKER_00]: frankly it was the 100th anniversary that made it a bit more like super mainstream and that’s only a few years ago and suddenly now we have to change our entire way of doing business so we’ve been on this awesome kind of communication journey with Japan around like what can we share like how transparent we actually be about these whiskeys and the good news is that they’re well up for it like there’s a new product coming out in October that’s even got the details of like

24:53.876 –> 25:04.626
[SPEAKER_00]: and like what’s what are the official tasting notes that the original distillery manager put down on that car’s much more openness about how we make whiskey which for me is just it’s so refreshing and so exciting.

25:05.607 –> 25:10.392
[SPEAKER_01]: Well I mean listen the more education you give the more committed the person is to the product.

25:11.892 –> 25:13.113
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.

25:13.253 –> 25:25.378
[SPEAKER_01]: It’s the disappointment of the guy that you, you know, that you, you know, you poured him the Glenn Rothis, you know, it’s like, hey, wait, you messed up that thing, you know, now you’re like, wait, I, I know exactly what you want here it is.

25:36.057 –> 25:36.237
[SPEAKER_00]: Right.

25:36.377 –> 25:39.039
[SPEAKER_01]: And then they’re like, oh, I get it now.

25:39.099 –> 25:41.500
[SPEAKER_01]: I’m like, yeah, you understand like all these components.

25:41.980 –> 25:43.501
[SPEAKER_01]: Like this is not an easy feat.

25:44.021 –> 25:47.803
[SPEAKER_01]: No, you know, he’d be a 21 like just like people come there just like blown away by it.

25:48.389 –> 25:48.589
[SPEAKER_00]: Right.

25:48.829 –> 26:01.135
[SPEAKER_00]: And that’s, I mean, to be fair, like, that’s, I think, one of the coolest things about what Japanese Biscuits done for the, the wider industry is that the marketing of single malts are just taken over, like no one respected-bended whiskey for, for about two decades.

26:01.695 –> 26:07.938
[SPEAKER_00]: And then suddenly, Habeke comes round and is, like, winning all these awards, like, blowing people to mines in terms of its complexity.

26:08.498 –> 26:11.760
[SPEAKER_00]: And the assumption was, well, if it’s this good, it must be a single malt whiskey.

26:12.260 –> 26:37.042
[SPEAKER_00]: And then you explain, no, no, it’s just that blends can actually also be fantastic if they’re well made and suddenly this is this is I think genuinely changed the wider industry because it’s a whole bunch of new Japanese producers making maybe, you know, younger, less high quality single months, people are tasting blends and going, wait a second, there’s some magic in here that I never even knew about and that’s that’s been fun to see, but I’ve enjoyed watching the conversations change throughout the last decade.

26:38.078 –> 26:45.064
[SPEAKER_01]: Oh, I definitely, and I think now the travel release has got a lot of buzz and you know the new stuff that’s going to be coming out, I mean it’s going to be pretty wild.

26:45.944 –> 26:48.226
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, I mean we had the new hippie to welcome out a couple months.

26:48.246 –> 26:48.947
[SPEAKER_00]: You’ve tasted that yet.

26:49.607 –> 26:49.948
[SPEAKER_01]: I haven’t.

26:50.008 –> 26:51.369
[SPEAKER_01]: I just got my bottle yesterday.

26:51.769 –> 26:52.209
[SPEAKER_00]: Okay.

26:52.390 –> 26:52.970
[SPEAKER_00]: I did.

26:53.130 –> 26:53.991
[SPEAKER_01]: I was so bummed out.

26:54.011 –> 27:00.916
[SPEAKER_01]: I was trying to get it through Australia and we had family flying in, but they were stopping in Hong Kong and so they couldn’t do it.

27:00.976 –> 27:01.297
[SPEAKER_01]: Take it.

27:01.989 –> 27:06.290
[SPEAKER_01]: Um, so I have to unfortunately go back to good old Facebook and grab a bottle of there.

27:06.750 –> 27:10.171
[SPEAKER_01]: And now actually, so I’ve got, I just picked it up yet the other day.

27:10.271 –> 27:15.313
[SPEAKER_01]: So I want to open that because I just secured two more bottles in London when I arrived there in three weeks.

27:16.253 –> 27:17.934
[SPEAKER_00]: Damn mates, you’re doing it right.

27:18.314 –> 27:19.714
[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, I’m pretty impressed with that blend.

27:19.734 –> 27:26.436
[SPEAKER_00]: It was nervous one because I think a lot of people, I think myself included were fairly in love with the old Hibiki 12.

27:26.496 –> 27:27.676
[SPEAKER_00]: That was the one that was made with the

27:30.372 –> 27:31.253
[SPEAKER_00]: from the cure casks.

27:31.713 –> 27:38.517
[SPEAKER_00]: This new expression doesn’t use lies those casks, because some story stops using those casks like a decade ago or something.

27:39.298 –> 27:40.158
[SPEAKER_00]: I was super nervous, man.

27:40.178 –> 27:57.869
[SPEAKER_00]: I was like, damn, maybe this is gonna have lost its essence, but if anything, it’s returned to the thing that I love most about Hibiki, which is where you get like, not only perfect balance, but the perfect amount of Mizonara kind of like peaking through and kind of peasing you, flirting you a little bit, like kind of waving through the window.

27:59.430 –> 28:07.835
[SPEAKER_00]: I don’t know man, Hibiki 17, the first time I tasted it was really open my mind so what was genuinely Japanese about this whisky.

28:09.016 –> 28:10.797
[SPEAKER_01]: No, I’m excited for that whole thing.

28:10.817 –> 28:11.958
[SPEAKER_01]: I think the next one.

28:12.318 –> 28:15.220
[SPEAKER_01]: I’d love to see how Kishu Sherry casts come back out.

28:16.220 –> 28:23.388
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, I’ve not seen much in terms of new products and developments on Hacker Shoot, but I think, well, let’s see, man.

28:23.768 –> 28:29.794
[SPEAKER_00]: I’ve seen some cards I have to hold to my chest, but next year it’s going to be interesting on the single models.

28:29.914 –> 28:33.218
[SPEAKER_01]: I mean, I’ve been definitely trying to pick up our auction, the oldest cast.

28:33.918 –> 28:36.341
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, because I just I love those.

28:36.741 –> 28:46.530
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, I was like, where is the bar in the world that has like 25 of them and I can spend three days in town and just creep through them at a very patient Put you know, pace.

28:47.150 –> 28:49.613
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, I mean, we’ve got to be spent some time in Japan together.

28:49.633 –> 28:50.694
[SPEAKER_00]: I know we’ve talked about it.

28:50.774 –> 28:52.015
[SPEAKER_01]: I know I got a call.

28:52.035 –> 28:57.260
[SPEAKER_01]: I mean, the closest I get is the Hong Kong whiskey festival Because you know, I think I had like seven of them last year.

28:57.300 –> 28:59.522
[SPEAKER_01]: This year wasn’t wasn’t a big turnout of them

29:00.233 –> 29:00.914
[SPEAKER_00]: Okay, mate.

29:01.034 –> 29:17.790
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, if you come out, I’m going to show you some of the my secret spots where you can, you can, you can go in and see, like, even beyond owners costs, there are, there are like secret bottleings that were done for, like, there’s a ballet company out in the mountains in the Aminashi, they have a bunch of special editions from us.

29:18.210 –> 29:21.714
[SPEAKER_00]: There’s all sorts of like weird little niche things that were just done is kind of.

29:22.294 –> 29:38.080
[SPEAKER_00]: one of favors or marketing campaigns or something, but they are single costs of some Tory whiskey, which it’s just mind-boggling when you get to sit in a bar and see like holy moly, this place has like 50 single costs because if you am a Zacchaean here, and I just get to sit here and they also cost like 10 bucks for a glass.

29:38.320 –> 29:38.600
[SPEAKER_00]: Let’s go.

29:38.620 –> 29:45.423
[SPEAKER_01]: I mean, that’s the other part that you know, the minute you leave the mighty USA and go out there, the pricing changes significantly.

29:45.923 –> 29:46.203
[SPEAKER_00]: Oh, yeah.

29:46.764 –> 29:47.084
[SPEAKER_00]: Oh, yeah.

29:47.144 –> 29:51.829
[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, if you make it out to Asia, I think there’s a gosh, I can’t have it’s in Singapore or Hong Kong.

29:52.350 –> 29:54.011
[SPEAKER_00]: I’ll take a look at my Google Maps.

29:54.231 –> 30:01.859
[SPEAKER_00]: There’s like a kind of less well known whiskey bar in one of those two cities that I’ll send you the details for, because they’ve got some pretty ethical, single-cut

30:01.919 –> 30:03.941
[SPEAKER_01]: Well, I just, I mean, Japan, I want to do with you.

30:04.181 –> 30:06.823
[SPEAKER_01]: I was supposed to go COVID here and everything fell apart.

30:06.843 –> 30:07.843
[SPEAKER_01]: So I’ve still never been.

30:08.244 –> 30:09.565
[SPEAKER_01]: And you mean, you’ve spoken about this.

30:09.585 –> 30:17.791
[SPEAKER_01]: So like, I think, 2027, I’m going to pull back on all U.S. activity to be honest, because I’m just kind of not excited by it.

30:18.271 –> 30:19.913
[SPEAKER_01]: And focus on foreign,

30:20.893 –> 30:29.922
[SPEAKER_01]: Far and fun that makes sense, you know, like on Kong’s been such a good friend to me the last three years It was just a show in Singapore last week that I’m interested in going to next year.

30:29.942 –> 30:35.628
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, I think Japan just has to be done and done right with somebody knows like I’m not good at figuring anything out

30:36.353 –> 30:37.834
[SPEAKER_01]: I’m a really good copilot.

30:37.854 –> 30:38.994
[SPEAKER_01]: I’m definitely not the pilot.

30:39.574 –> 30:39.954
[SPEAKER_00]: No, too.

30:40.234 –> 30:40.915
[SPEAKER_00]: I’m keen for this.

30:41.175 –> 30:59.341
[SPEAKER_00]: I’ve been kind of gently tapping my colleagues on the shoulder that can control the person’s to try and get a group of Japanese whisky loving friends, like maybe six of us to head out there and yeah, hit some whisky bars, maybe hit some ski slopes and just like properly indulge ourselves in what the Japanese whisky world is like when you’re on the ground.

30:59.912 –> 31:00.732
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, I can’t wait.

31:00.792 –> 31:02.113
[SPEAKER_01]: Jimmy, we’ve pressed the time.

31:02.133 –> 31:06.356
[SPEAKER_01]: I want to ask you one more big question, and you probably have a couple.

31:06.796 –> 31:10.398
[SPEAKER_01]: But like, what are some pinch me moments in your career so far?

31:10.438 –> 31:12.419
[SPEAKER_01]: Were you like, well, you should, I can’t believe I’m doing this.

31:13.130 –> 31:38.757
[SPEAKER_00]: Oh man, I’ve had so many, I mean you’ve had so many, I’ve had so many, I’ve had so many, I’ve had so many, I’ve had so many, I’ve had so many, I’ve had so many, I’ve had so many, I’ve had so many, I’ve had so many, I’ve had so many, I’ve had so many, I’ve had so many, I’ve had so many, I’ve had so many, I’ve had so many, I’ve had so many, I’ve had so many, I’ve had so many, I’ve had so many, I’ve had so many, I’ve had so many, I’ve had so many, I’ve had so many, I’ve had so many, I’ve had so many, I’ve had so many, I’ve had so many, I’ve had so many, I’ve had so many, I’ve had so many, I’ve had so many, I’ve had so many, I’ve had so many, I’ve had so many, I’ve

31:39.557 –> 31:48.111
[SPEAKER_00]: I think the first time I had an extended private chat with Shinji, where we got to taste all the bits and bobs in the blending room, that was a pretty remarkable one.

31:48.947 –> 32:00.552
[SPEAKER_01]: And yeah, I mean, I, you know, I got to spend a little bit of quality time that night, you know, when the launch of the 40 in LA at the Disney concert there, like we spend a lot of one on one time with him and like just what a guy.

32:00.792 –> 32:03.053
[SPEAKER_01]: I mean, you know, obviously I’ve met him in Paris before hung out.

32:03.093 –> 32:08.195
[SPEAKER_01]: That’s why I’m really looking forward to obviously spending time with you guys at the end of the month in London.

32:08.715 –> 32:09.576
[SPEAKER_01]: Absolutely, man.

32:09.856 –> 32:12.297
[SPEAKER_00]: So you, you in London, on Paris or just in London.

32:12.317 –> 32:13.597
[SPEAKER_00]: So I land on Sunday.

32:15.218 –> 32:21.063
[SPEAKER_01]: So last day of Paris, and I’m this Sunday to Sunday, you know, I’m I’m primarily there for the whiskey show.

32:21.404 –> 32:26.828
[SPEAKER_01]: You want to check that out and obviously now I have a whole network in in London.

32:27.369 –> 32:33.434
[SPEAKER_01]: I mean, I have I’m picking up, you know, I bought the 30 year old artist edition, your Hibiki artist edition.

32:33.794 –> 32:34.075
[SPEAKER_01]: Nice.

32:34.435 –> 32:37.960
[SPEAKER_01]: So she, unfortunately, it is, is she put me to buy it in London.

32:38.241 –> 32:38.421
[SPEAKER_01]: Yep.

32:38.541 –> 32:41.766
[SPEAKER_01]: I have I have a 21, you know, waiting for me in London.

32:41.826 –> 32:46.132
[SPEAKER_01]: I have two more of the UD-3 12 year old waiting for me in London.

32:46.753 –> 32:49.277
[SPEAKER_01]: So for me, it’s like I got to London once or twice a year.

32:49.837 –> 32:50.918
[SPEAKER_01]: Spend time with friends.

32:50.978 –> 33:03.130
[SPEAKER_01]: I wanted I always liked a time it around something fun So this was the whiskey show and I’m like great and then that’s when I started toy to wrap and he’s like everyone’s in town And then talk to you that the day he’s texting me He’s like wait, are you in London in Paris?

33:03.190 –> 33:04.432
[SPEAKER_01]: And I said London he’s like great.

33:04.492 –> 33:08.295
[SPEAKER_01]: See you there And then you and I’m like, oh my god, this is going to be awesome Yeah, mate.

33:08.315 –> 33:09.897
[SPEAKER_00]: This is going to be an amazing weekend.

33:09.957 –> 33:12.680
[SPEAKER_00]: We’ve got I’ll be met Simone our French brand ambassador as well

33:13.240 –> 33:13.801
[SPEAKER_00]: I don’t know.

33:13.821 –> 33:15.983
[SPEAKER_01]: I don’t think I’m so, I’m only good at faces.

33:16.603 –> 33:17.044
[SPEAKER_00]: All right.

33:17.184 –> 33:18.485
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, we’ll have a little whiskey.

33:18.605 –> 33:20.707
[SPEAKER_00]: Whiskey friends nights out and go and see.

33:20.727 –> 33:25.331
[SPEAKER_00]: Because he’s been around the French, Whiskey Japanese Whiskey Market for about 15 years.

33:25.351 –> 33:27.654
[SPEAKER_00]: So he’s going to show us his secret spots as well as I reckon.

33:28.274 –> 33:28.835
[SPEAKER_01]: Oh, hell yeah.

33:29.327 –> 33:31.308
[SPEAKER_01]: Well, I can’t thank you enough for coming on dude.

33:31.328 –> 33:31.928
[SPEAKER_01]: I love you man.

33:31.948 –> 33:33.768
[SPEAKER_01]: I love spending time with you I love it.

33:33.808 –> 33:36.729
[SPEAKER_01]: I love the passion like you are just like boom.

33:36.829 –> 33:37.329
[SPEAKER_01]: This is it.

33:37.669 –> 33:39.930
[SPEAKER_01]: This is my DNA Yeah, I get it.

33:40.690 –> 33:41.371
[SPEAKER_00]: I would like.

33:41.411 –> 33:41.731
[SPEAKER_00]: I’m in.

33:41.971 –> 33:50.733
[SPEAKER_00]: I’m in Dude, we’re gonna be drinking Japanese whiskey on our on our couch is when we’re 70 years old having the best time I know there really is nothing better man.

33:50.833 –> 33:52.714
[SPEAKER_01]: There really is nothing better

33:53.294 –> 33:55.296
[SPEAKER_00]: Honestly, it’s really it’s wild.

33:55.817 –> 34:04.886
[SPEAKER_01]: It’s wild with everything out there just the level of everything that goes into the Centauri is just Never ceases to amaze me.

34:05.627 –> 34:07.569
[SPEAKER_01]: I can’t thank you enough for coming on dude, seriously.

34:07.589 –> 34:12.473
[SPEAKER_00]: Thank you for having me do it on your busy This is the best sort of thing to fill my afternoon with.

34:12.534 –> 34:15.717
[SPEAKER_00]: I’m much happier doing this than tapping away at an Excel spreadsheet

34:16.548 –> 34:17.969
[SPEAKER_01]: Well, I’m glad we can make it happen.

34:17.989 –> 34:19.709
[SPEAKER_01]: I can’t thank everyone enough for listening.

34:20.209 –> 34:20.850
[SPEAKER_01]: Follow James.

34:21.190 –> 34:23.030
[SPEAKER_01]: He leads a beautiful life.

34:23.411 –> 34:28.572
[SPEAKER_01]: And he gets to work with some of the most amazing liquid in the world and is truly passionate.

34:28.712 –> 34:30.473
[SPEAKER_01]: And we need more James as in the world.

34:30.973 –> 34:37.196
[SPEAKER_01]: But to be honest, Santori’s just done such a great job that like everyone’s like you in the most positive way.

34:37.236 –> 34:43.338
[SPEAKER_01]: And I’m saying it’s like, I’m blown away with brand representation for Santori every single time

34:44.477 –> 34:45.598
[SPEAKER_00]: people from Centauri.

34:46.239 –> 34:47.340
[SPEAKER_00]: Man, we have the best team.

34:47.800 –> 34:55.487
[SPEAKER_00]: If you say about pinch me moments, the number one moment was our brand ambassador training camp last year, I had 35 brand ambassadors with me in Tokyo.

34:55.808 –> 35:06.638
[SPEAKER_00]: They like all wrote me these personal little letters of note to thank me for an experience and bought me a watch and I’ll just sat around like that’s feeling of pride and love in your team is just like the nicest thing ever.

35:06.698 –> 35:07.959
[SPEAKER_00]: So that’s that’s my best moment.

35:08.903 –> 35:11.166
[SPEAKER_01]: All right, I’ll see you in two weeks.

35:11.206 –> 35:12.387
[SPEAKER_01]: Thank you very much for listening.

35:12.728 –> 35:15.290
[SPEAKER_01]: Another great addition of the Rolex Whiskey Passion Project.

35:15.811 –> 35:17.012
[SPEAKER_01]: The podcast keeps going.

35:17.032 –> 35:20.817
[SPEAKER_01]: I think we’re on a 140 guests who are all passionate about Whiskey.

35:20.897 –> 35:22.298
[SPEAKER_01]: So thank you everyone for listening.

35:22.659 –> 35:23.740
[SPEAKER_00]: James, I’ll see you in a few weeks.

35:23.760 –> 35:24.621
[SPEAKER_00]: Thank you for coming on.

35:25.362 –> 35:26.063
[SPEAKER_01]: And that’s a wrap.