Wet. The smell of rain is the most prominent note, and surprisingly photorealistic to the petrichor on a grey fall day. You can smell the wet earth and the green of the grass, but there’s a damp darkness keeping it from pulling too bright and clean — this isn’t a beachy aquatic, this is thunderclouds rolling in over the Great Lakes. The applejack is not the sweet, fruity gourmand I usually lean toward; it’s muted, like smelling the skin of an apple instead of biting in, and with a touch of astringency from the alcohol — I almost get a witch hazel note, just a hint of earthy spice.
They definitely hit what they’re trying to evoke here, and in a way that keeps me putting my nose to my arm. It’s dark, it’s stormy, it’s an old sailor sitting quietly with the last of his applejack, it’s the muddy fields of an abandoned orchard on a day too grey and cold for apple picking. It’s the story of fall dying into the darkness of winter, bottled, and it’s delightful.
