The Murtaugh Rule in Beer

As a member of that particular age group I can attest that my initial appeal for the NEIPA style was that intense, soft, juicy flavor of which you speak. At first, it was because they were
such a stark contrast to the bitter bombs I had chased down previously. Looking back, the IBU wars at least offered more variety.

As the NEIPA craze continued, I came to notice less and less flavor variation between beers unless there was an adjunct of some kind involved, which, when combined with double dry-hopping only served to obliterate my palate. The "let's have fun with this," one-off or experimental variation in a brewing rotation has become the norm, and it's forcing every other brewer to go to the nuclear option in a opaque arms race that to me is dissimilar from the IBU competition of years past. As I said earlier, at least there was variety in flavor and approach there.

Worst of all, it seems so unsustainable. In a world dominated by the effects of climate change, we now have to have more hops harvested to meet increasing demand, which is jacking up prices (in addition to the fact that people will pay stoooopid money for shit beer). We've already witnessed a market correction with mergers and buyouts, I'm worried that
COVID and Hazebros will force more than just bankruptcies. This could be a sea change in what we consider beer to be, and, perhaps more insidiously, this could grant macros a chance to gain even more market share via their access to resources (hops) and ability to market to trend chasers.

 

And as long as people are willing to pay BIG BUCKS the breweries will charge BIG BUCKS.

A win-win!?!

Cheers!

 

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That’s too bad. It’s one thing if the beer tastes bad but another if it makes someone sick. No bueno.

 

I’m sure that has a lot to do with it. Young new drinkers can pretty much bypass the BMC beers that some of us started sneaking out of our parents refrigerators and choked down because they can get beers like the ones you mentioned for the reasons you mentioned. Unfortunately, That Usually means they also bypass the progression of craft that some of us old timers went through (starting with ambers and working towards stouts and what were traditional IPAs) after we got sick of bmc beers. Or maybe not. Either way, Regardless of how I feel about milkshake/pastry/kettle sour beers, I’m still of the attitude of drink what you like but it really Is starting to become at the expense of the endangering of traditional styles.

 

I agree with you here but...

I am not too concerned about other beer styles totally going away ("endangered") but these juicy/sour/pastry/whatever new beers are very much crowding the shelves which limits the selections of the other beer styles. I would prefer there be a broader selection of beers that taste like beer.

Cheers!

 

Breweries are business and will brew what makes money.

 

I like this framing and it fits with an observation we are all aware of but I'm not sure gets the attention it deserves in these discussions: the number of breweries more than quadrupled over the past decade-ish. In that context it doesn't seem surprising that beers with familiar flavors gained traction when the alternative was convincing hordes of folks in a very short period of time that they wanted to drink pine trees, or cloves, or dark bread, or citrus rinds, or horse blankets, or whatever.

An obvious familiar flavor for craft breweries to offer up was AALs and light lagers, but for a long time there seemed to be a cultural resistance to going that route in a lot of places. I think it's notable that once that seal was broken they have become yet another familiar flavor that craft breweries are selling the shit out of.

 

Agreed. That’s pretty much what I was getting at or meant.

 

Some enterprising brewer needs to start packaging NEIPAs in 12oz juice boxes, complete with little bendy straws you punch through a foil hole in the top. They would make a killing.

 

Unfortunately I think lots of neipa addicts wouldn't appreciate the joke. I've found them to often consider themselves sophisticated beer connoisseurs. That's why all the houses of neip make fancy goblets with 90s pop culture spoof art on it

 

I don’t drink pastry stouts.

I don’t like MOST Haze OJ bombs, but I like enough to risk a single can buy depending the date. Never a 4 pk untested. I don’t consider the older style NE IPAs like Heady to be in this class, or HF, etc.

I’d really prefer a resurgence in WC IPAs.

I really like the introduction of new Pils into the marketplace, ya know beer that tastes like beer. No gimmicks, nothing extra, just a nice easy drinking beer.

I’d rather drink an AAL than a shitty craft beer, simple beers that are just beers.

 

Dale, I agree with you there.

I agree one mo' time here.

And another agreement - a trifecta.

To use an old saying: I like the cut of your jib!

Cheers!

 

I don’t mind the exploration, but I’ll sample and either buy or pass. You never really know what’s going to be a hit. I could even do without BA Stouts sometimes, some are great, some are soy sauce, don’t drink soy sauce. I love Kalamazoo Stout, that tickle of licorice is amazing.

 

Maybe it's just me, but, "intense" is NOT a word I'd ever link with the style. Now that they've been around a while, and any brewery that wants to has taken a crack at them, the words I most closely associate with them are bland, dull, boring, and sameness. Except for the very best of the style, they're just all so damn similar.

YMMV.

 

I completely agree, the sameness is certainly right there. Why, because they copy from each other I suppose. I’ve had Trilliums many years ago , many, before the NE ipa craze, I wouldn’t equate what I drank to beers along the line of say Tired Hands efforts, not there at all. Perhaps they changed their lineup, never had a Treehouse beer, so no comment on them. I find most NEIPAs to be difficult to drink after about 8 Oz.