TWEET US YOUR FAVOURITE SONGS (#laddify) FOR WORLD WHISKY DAY – SATURDAY 18TH MAY 2013

The Laddie Digital team is working with World Whisky Day and Laddiefans  around the world to create a unique soundtrack/playlist on Spotify starting Friday evening at midnight GMT and running for 24 hours.  We hope to fill it with tracks that you have sent in as tweets with the hashtag #laddify and every hour we will give away a lovely Wee Laddie to encourage you to participate.  It will be your chance to contribute to WWD wherever you may be in the world - and you may even get lucky and be able to look forward to receiving one of these lovely little bottles.

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Colin Tocher, who now works at Bruichladdich in the Harvey Hall, started his career as a coppersmith at McMillans of Prestonpans near Edinburgh in Scotland where he served his time as an apprentice.  Back in 1973, Colin installed spirit still #1 in our still room – which is enjoying its 40th anniversary this year.…

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Murray McDavid, the independent bottler of single malt Scotch whisky has been sold to ‘UK based Scotch Whisky Suppliers’ Aceo Ltd. Murray McDavid was established in 1996 by Mark Reynier, Simon Coughlin, and Gordon Wright and the company was named after Reynier's grandparents, Harriet Murray and Jock McDavid.

The new venture soon became known for challenging whisky industry conventions, replacing the bland and rather stuffy industry style tasting notes with informative and irreverent label text together with its Gaelic logo ‘Clachan a Choin’ (which translates as ‘the dog’s bollocks’)…  All its bottlings were unchillfiltered and colouring free and in particular only the very best casks were bottled. They later moved on to marrying great spirit with great wine casks from all over the world which they called ACEing (Additional cask evolution). It’s ‘Leapfrog’ bottlings are now legendary!

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Another look at one of our uber-provenance Barley releases from the inimitable @whiskydude over on Instagram.  Enjoy!!

Bruichladdich Bere Barley 2006 - Kynagarry Farm, Achaba, Achfad Fields. Unpeated Islay Single Malt - 50% alc/vol. Bottle # 4227 / 7650.  now this is something else, i went into this knowing little to nothing about the "bere" variety of barley, you can read up about it on the internet. the quick facts: it's britain's oldest cereal and it's yield is less than half of that of regular barley varieties. i bought this along with the islay barley, figuring they were in some way siblings. in a way they are, but more as an idea, this guy has been spawned from a completely different seed. i have seen reviews covering both ends of the spectrum, people loving this and people not liking this. well here's my 2 cents....

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Our Islay Barley 2006 bottling seems to have tickled our friend Whiskydude over on Instagram who wrote this mouth-watering review. We're rather partial to this one ourselves here at the distillery - single farm, single field, single year's vintage and a wonderfully rich and oily dram (though we say so ourselves). Pure Bruichladdich. Thanks whiskydude! Glad you enjoyed it!

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It has been an enjoyable and productive week working with Carney Turner and Mohamed El-Fatih of Crows Nest Films.  We first came across Mr Turner a few years back when he put together a short documentary style video for us in magnificently moody monochrome - a production of which we remain inordinately proud and which is immortalised in Laddiespeak as 'The Carney Video'.  You can take a look at it here.

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We are delighted to have won no fewer than two of the coveted ‘Drammie’ awards this year, as ‘Best Whisky Distillery’ and ‘Most Exciting/ Innovative Whisky Producer/ Bottler.  We think this is excellent news, not least because they are voted for by you good people who actually go out there and buy the stuff - as opposed to industry insiders.

There is nothing that could mean more to us. Thank you.

The Drammies website says: "The Drammie Awards were the brainchild of "For Whisky Lovers" contributing editor Kevin Erskine in his previous role as the unofficial voice of the whiskey consumer, via his industry-first The Scotch Blog.  In much the same vein as the People's Choice Awards,  the mission of the Drammie Awards is to put the power of “recognition” in the hands of the whiskey enthusiast."

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We were delighted to host students from the 'Lycée Jules-Ferry', a public
secondary and higher education school located in the 9th arrondissement of
Paris today. Bruichladdich Master Distiller Jim McEwan enjoyed a lively
session with the young academics during which he was asked a wide range of
questions about how distilling impacts on life on Islay including: what are
the benefits that the distilleries bring to the island? What is their
impact on the local economy? What opportunities do the distilleries offer
young people who wish to stay and work here?

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Television production company MacTV visited Bruichladdich this week to shoot some sequences for a programme about the David MacBrayne freight boats that served the Western Isles, including Islay, prior to the advent of the Ro-Ro ferries that we have become familiar with today.  The programme is to be presented by Professor Donald Meek, who is acknowledged as perhaps the world’s leading authority on the history of Scotland’s iconic ferry company.

The show will also feature Peggy MacEachern, who was born and brought up in Bruichladdich and worked for a number of years as a clerk in the office at Bruichladdich Pier.  The Gaelic language programme, which only has a working title at present, is expected to be aired in the Autumn on BBC Alba.  The small freighters that called at the pier back then had names such as Loch Broom, Loch Ard, Loch Dunvegan and Loch Carron.  They were an essential part of the social and economic life of the islands back then – and vital for the maintenance and supply of Islay’s whisky industry.

Many thanks to Dr. Peter Martin, Director at the Agronomy Institute, Orkney College (University of the Highlands & Islands) for sending us this photo of bere barley being planted for us at Watersfield Farm on 5th April.

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