When will Heady Topper be overtaken as #1?

Living in Minnesota, I too am partial to Abrasive over Heady. Glad to see my hometown bias might not be bias after all. Cheers from MN to AZ.

 

Haters... HT is a damn good beer. Whether it tops our personal list is just that personal. Over the course of many tastings its number one, overall. I get it. My personal top is Perm Funeral, but that is just me.

 

I'd much rather try Lawson's beers. That brewer really intrigues me.... However, I'm very happy with the choices I have available just around the corner from my house - Double Jack, Double Trouble, DFH 90.

 

I've noticed it still sells out on delivery days but not as fast. Love me some heady but Fiddlehead is awesome and their offerings such as Second fiddle or Mastermind are just as good if not better.

 

To me, heady is just a hype beer... Dont get me wrong its really good, but i have had so many ipas that blow heady out of the water including stuff from trillium, HF, and Treehouse. Yet they arent even close to that #1 spot.

 

It's interesting to me how, over time, beers start to fall victim to their own popularity. There is no doubt in my mind that if Second Fiddle had been around for several years, labeled the gold standard of VT DIPAs, and ranked #1 on BA -- and then Heady Topper came along -- many people would be saying that Second Fiddle has been eclipsed by Heady.

I remember in elementary school when it was really cool to like Vanilla Ice, and then all of a sudden it was really not cool to like Vanilla Ice. Well... Vanilla Ice didn't change, we did.

 

I was originally going to pick up a case of Second Fiddle on the 4/11 release but extenuating circumstances wouldn't allow it.. 14 star was also quite impressive I think I had 3 or 4 of their brews while I was up there and everything was quite good.

 

You'll be waiting a while for KBBS to overtake the #1 spot if it needs 120-150 more ratings. It won't be released again for at least another year and a half.

 

Maybe if Alchemist put a bunch of oats in their Double IPA like Abrasive, it might be more drinkable. But do you think a world class brewery with the numero uno beer needs to copy a style from the beer that is much lower rated? What you guys are basically doing is this, "<Insert Beer I like> is better than Heady Topper". I've had most of the beers touted as better than Heady Topper that you guys been mentioning, while good, they just don't have the "It" factor like Heady Topper does. Also, some of them aren't even close in the ratings.

The respectful thing to do would be to attempt to get beers in the top 10 and compare them to Heady Topper. Because when you are saying that a beer is better than Heady Topper, you are indirectly implying it beats out all the top 10 beers. I've had most of the top 10 and top 50 beers and I know that Heady edged them out by fair means.

 

For what it's worth ...

Abrasive rAvg: 4.53
Heady rAvg: 4.73

I wouldn't exactly call that "much lower rated". To each their own when it comes to personal tastes, but figured I would let you in on those numbers. Cheers.

 

It is partially rated on hype. When a beer is fairly difficult to obtain, some folks tend to rate highly because they feel privileged to get the beer. Want proof? The high ratings on "appearance" clearly demonstrate that people are not judging it objectively. People should be willing to say "It is not the prettiest IIPA but I don't care - It's great anyways", but then give it an honest "appearance" rating. It does not have a good appearance for its style, yet people desire to rate the beer highly so they fudge the obvious truth. And if they are fudging the truth on appearance, it stands to reason that they are simply being influenced, in general, by hype.

 

I agree with you here, while I think there is a place for a beer so highly thought of as KBBS, I actually wish the equation were more weighted against beers with such low rating counts than it is.

 

You might need to talk to the people in my area who are expecting shipments of it in the next few months.

 

Spent a weekend in Shelburne and attended a party. Brought 1 case HT and 1 case Mastermind. At the end of the night there were 4 cans of MM left and 16 HTs. Science! (kind of)

 

Double Sunshine could move into the number 1 spot and I wouldn't put up any argument at all.

 

I don't care whether a year-round released beer enjoyed by many or a whale tops the list. The list is not catered to accessibility.

If accessibility is an issue, check out the beers of fame. Did a quick glance and note while i've only had 2 of the #10 from the regular, I have had 7 of the "Beers of Fame" and with effort, could bump that up to 9. The only unicorn on the list is Younger, which is pretty much a mythical being outside of California and those lucky enough to be around Monk's Cafe when/if they tap a keg.

As for Heady Topper itself, it's hard to say it's the best beer because there are so many good DIPA out of New England now. What I do know is that every time I open a Heady Topper, I remember why every trip to VT ends up with me buying more, and every VT trip is coordinated with a "heady run" as I call it. Going to Lawsons and HF over the weekend and my friend and I are still getting Heady Topper. You will be hard pressed to find more drinkable beer, and that's with over a dozen double IPAs in new england. I've compared it with most, and to its great rival Pliny the Elder and it always wins me over.

I do however recommend trying other stuff in the area. Second FIddle is often comparable, and Sip of Sunshine (yeah yea brewed in Connecticut by 2 Roads, but Sean and the main brewery are still in Warren doing the bottles! )

And with a 4.72 weighted rating and years in its place, can over 10,000 BAs all be wrong?

 

you are cute when you're angry

 

I think when most people are rating on hype, it ends up being rated more negatively than it should be. So what you're really saying is that heady is better than perfect. I think we're seeing eye to eye now!

so it's NOT cool to like vanilla ice any more? Wtf??? I just spent the winter getting my 5.0 ragtop ready for rolling. Looks like I'll just be wearing mc hanmer pants again.

 

Or, maybe that murky appearance and unfiltered look was preferred by the rater. Personally I prefer an unfiltered and murky DIPA in that regard.