Country Club Malt Liquor
Pabst Brewing Company

Wow, a blast from my teenage years in Florida. I bought this on the wrong side of the tracks at a gas station in southern Virginia. When I cracked this quart bottle the first thing I noticed was the skunky aroma. the flavor was traditional ghetto malt liquor. which I grew up on. with that said, the brew was ok, but lacked carbonation to match the flavor. not completely horrible; but you get what you expected with this beer. A cheap buzz with little complexity.

 

If this bottle has a genie, he's a greasy extrovert of a genie, probably wearing lots of bling and parachute pants.

Long ago, I helped a stranger who was struggling to unload some heavy items from her car. Afterward, she thanked me by handing me a can of Country Club, chilled in a cooler in her trunk. This is how an '80s gas station tastes. I haven't seen it again, but I recall it vividly, even now: wet dog, corn, and alcohol, with a modest armada of grit afloat. Astounding. It did have a nice sort of metallic can note, to be fair.

If I see it again, I'm gonna try it, just to remind myself of the benchmark. Nothing -- not Coors, not Keystone, nothing -- could be as quintessentially awful. The label is a perfect predictor of everything inside. If they stop making Country Club, there will still be plenty left unsold in the gas stations of 2237.

 

 

 

There’s nothing like a nice classy Country Club 40oz in the morning, before work, during work, after work, and after a nice classy 40oz of Country Club. Heck I’m country clubbed up right now if I do say so myself, the relaxing crips taste, the smooth feel down my throat, the nice refreshing smell, and that beautiful gold and white logo is enough for me to responsibly enjoy at least five Country Clubs a day. 5/5 good beer.

 

 

I remember this one from "back in the day," and found it, a rare find around here, at a backwoods convenience store. I just had to try it again. Malt liquors were first marketed to white men back in the 1960's, believe it or not, and my Grandpa Bennett would always crack open an 8-oz. Country Club or two after work. My mom reportedly gave him holy hell when he was caught giving me a few sips as an 18-month old. I guess that he was just checking to see if the Irish parts of my body, i.e., those that are involved in processing alcohol intake, were working properly. And thus my ghetto taste in beers, apparently. Anyway, I was not too impressed, overall. It was flat and corny-tasting, with a weird, psuedo-metallic aftertaste. As I bought cans, I can't blame any skunking for the less than par experience. Still, I will give it the benefit of the doubt, the six I bought could have been sitting in the cooler for years. Wouldn't try it again, though.

 

 

40oz clear glass bottle with a branded screw-top. No ABV listed on the label. "America's premium malt liquor."

Pours a clear pale copper body with a good 3 fingers worth of off-white foam sitting atop.

Aroma yields pale malt and cheap corn, lending this some sweetness but seemingly not too much.

Taste is of pale malt and a bit of cheap corn adjunct, which isn't bad when coupled with the smooth, wet, light to medium-bodied mouthfeel. I always fear budget malt liquors will be syrupy and sticky, but this avoids that.

Drinkable albeit forgettable inoffensive fare. I doubt I'll ever try it again unless I'm after a cheap buzz. More insipid than anything else.

D (2.18) / NOT RECOMMENDED

***
"Lucked" into another clear 40oz bottle of this. Pricetag reads $3.00 (USD). The white and gold label design looks like something out of the Reagan era.

Pours three fingers/7-8ish cm worth of off-white foam. Frothy and billowing. I can't knock it, and the retention is pretty nice at 6+ minutes. Body is a clear thin watery dark urine colour. No visible yeast or sediment; it's obviously filtered.

Aroma brings notes of creamed corn and inoffensive pilsner malt along with a cheap grassy hop character. Diacetyl and DMS are indicated, and it seems too sweet. More of a grainy aroma would be nice. Average aromatic intensity.

Taste is creamed corn, DMS off-flavour, and pilsner malts with some cheap syrupy sweetness dragging it down. Too sweet, though not egregiously so, and I've had more syrupy more thick malt liquors. Obviously, it's unrefreshing, but its creamy softness on the palate warrants commendation. Smooth and wet, and not as overcarbonated as many budget malt liquors.

Overall, it's an inoffensive brew that drinks best at colder temperatures and will satisfy casual drinkers after a cheap buzz. I liked it better this time around than when I initially had it; I imagine these clear bottles sitting around in seedy Brooklyn bodegas are at high risk for being lightstruck. Not a terrible beer, but I can't recommend it even at this budget tier (see Ballantine XXX for a more worthwhile choice for budget drinkers).

High D (2.24) / NOT RECOMMENDED

 

 

When you drop that beer in the return slot the next day. That's the appearance. Sweet, corn aroma, nod bad for what it is.

Woof, this gives the big fusel alcohol feels. Not even that strong, but it amps it up on your breath. Its some high bitterness low hops, high alcohol, corn malt bill type of malt liquor, but without the punch, even though its mouthfeel kinda makes you think maybe otherwise.

I am a gross fat monster and so I've been looking for Country Club for years.

I read somewhere once that it was the first high-ish ABV beer that was directly marketed a malt liquor, and I've come across more than a few old print ads showing fifties-era frat boys pouring this stuff out of what look like pudding cans while coeds stumble in the background. It would be another decade plus until ads came along that were brazen enough to directly implicate malt liquor with date rape (thanks, Billy Dee Williams!), but we still got Country Club to thank for that trend. Needless to say, this beer has long been on my must-try list.

Forties were just sitting at the bottom of the cooler in some gas station in the middle of upstate New York. I jokingly told the clerk that I thought they stopped making it in the 70s. He said they might have, considering how poorly they sold at this particular location, so that didn't bode too well for its freshness.

Untwisting the cap, however, I pick up only a faint whiff of skunk, which is actually kinda complimentary in a weird way (some green bottle Euro saisons milk this effect quite well). The skunk is almost exclusively aromatic, however, as the flavor is neigh indistinguishable from MIckey's. Trust me, I've drank a lot of MIckey's, and this is just a skunked Mickey's.

Which isn't bad, in my book, even if it's not exactly good. I wouldn't drink Mickey's so goddamn often if I truly disliked its flavor. It's not for beer geeks, yeah. But as a malt liquor served in 40s, it gets the job done and is absolutely inoffensive.

 

 

I had been seeking this out for a long time. I found it at a liquor store in Waltham, MA one summer day in 2012. It was found in the customary 40 ounce bottle, just sitting there with a gaggle of other 40's; as if to scream out "take me home." I bought it and took it to where I was staying. I cracked open the bottle to find wafts of skunk, but these skunky scents did not deter me from enjoying this malt. The taste was something else, like a classic malt liquor should taste: sweet malts and a hint of adjunct.

I was able to consume the 'Club. Overall I'd have this again. Since that day however, I have been unable to find it; s though the beer gods seem to have said "only once."