Head In The Clouds
Santa Monica Brew Works

 

Pours slight haze with nice tall white foamy crown from tall can to pint glass. Notes of bursting tropical juicy fruit including passion fruit and guava, with soft finish that tickles the tongue! Really nice local craft DIPA.

 

Appearance: pours a translucent orange color with some golden hues. A thick, billowey white foam head. Quite sticky and retentive.

Aroma: citrus juice, overly ripe candy orange.

Taste: citrus and sweet malts, well balanced. A bit hearbal in the background. Mild bitterness. Finishes fairly clean.

Overall: This is a tasty brew. Dangerously drinkable.

 

 

 

If you want hazy, this is the ale for you. Pint can, freshness hard to judge since there's no date. Points off for that.

Look - Solidly opaque, turbid with tannish orange color. Thick white head that persists with some lacing down to the bottom of the glass.
Smell - generic IPA
Taste - Website describes this as a juicy IPA and the fruit element is obvious. Alcohol has a bit of a bite. The citra hops dominate without much in the way of hops persistence after each sip. Very enjoyable.
Feel - easy to drink.

Overall - good, but not compelling. There's a lot of competition these days and I can't see myself unhesitatingly picking up a 4x of this.

I feel this is really under-rated. Undated can bought off a room temp shelf on about 10/8/21 then refrigerated and consumed from a tall tulip glass on 10/15. Pours a burnt orange with voluminous head (at least 3 fingers) that is off-white and fairly stiff and long lasting. Some haze. Leaves only a token amount of lacing. Smells fruity (tropical/citrus) when poured and in the glass. Taste follows nose. Medium body with fine carbonation in the mouth. Detectable but not high bitterness. Overall one of my favorites.

 

Can pour - dirty dark orange juice with foamy white head leaving significant foamy lacing. Nose is lots of citrus. Taste follows with some earthiness and a slight bite. Finish leans toward dryishness.

 

 

 

 

 

There's a thin line about IPAs, where the bitterness turns into a unpleasant aftertaste ,and I think that this beer just crosses it. It could have hedged that with a bit more alcohol and kick, but it didn't. As it is, it ain't bad, and has all the citrusy and grapefruit notes, but something in the back of throat bothers me about this one. Unfortunately.

Outstanding imperial ipa. Hazy color. Citrusy aroma. Juicy mouthfeel. Awesome beer on a Sunday afternoon in Santa Monica.