45. Bourbon Jam Session With The Mash and Drum

I mean, there's a lot of bottles in this room, Jason.

Yeah, it's, it's, it's, it's a problem. It's not so much a space problem as it is a buying problem. It is. So you're kind of addicted to the sport. Uh, you know, honestly, I have really, toned down my buying in the last year or so. When I first started, I would buy everything. I couldn't stop because it was, you know, you start getting into something and you just go full bore. Your head's down. You're not looking at anything else except I just have to acquire as many bottles I can because I want to try it all. And then it becomes a collection thing you want to own. And a lot of people are like that in the bourbon, the bourbon world. Right.

Welcome to another trip down the Bourbon Road with your hosts, Jim and Mike. So grab a glass of your favorite bourbon and kick back.

We would like to thank Tommy and Gwen Mitchell from Log Heads Home Center for supporting this episode of the Bourbon Road. Find out more about their fine rustic furniture at logheadshomestenter.com. Hello, I'm Jim Shannon and this is The Bourbon Road and today we are without Mike. Mike and I actually split up this week as Mike went out and did an interview on his own and I did one on my own. Sometimes you gotta make the most of what you have and so Mike went and did an interview with Wes Henderson over at Angel Envy and I'm up here in Columbus today. with Jason from The Mashin' Drum. Jason, do you say your last name or? Yes, it's Jason Kalori. Jason Kalori. Well, Jason, welcome to the show. It's good to have you today. Thanks for having me on, Jim. So, Jason, you have a YouTube channel. Yes. It's called The Mashin' Drum. Correct. And you do whiskey reviews and news and you do live events. You've got quite a a community of followers that watch your show. Yeah, I'm very fortunate to have a great community of viewers that watch the channel, so I love it. Yeah, so you and I have been friends for a while. We've been on some barrel picks together. We've toured some distilleries together. You spent the night at my house. I'm spending the night at yours. So we know each other pretty good. Absolutely. I think one of the things that we have in common is we both respect each other's palates. Absolutely. But I'm not going to spend a whole lot of time right now talking too much about that stuff. We'll get to that in a minute. I'd like to get straight to the whiskey. Always. And you know the format of the show, so we bring a bottle, we introduce you to it, and then in the second half you'll get to introduce us to a bottle. So today what I have for you is a Willett six-year bourbon the coveted purple top. The coveted purple top. And this is actually, just for those people out there that track will it barrels, this is barrel number 2136. It's a six year old estate, family estate bourbon. It's at 62.4% or 124.8 proof. Actually, I got this bottle when I visited the Made South event in Franklin, Tennessee. You're familiar with the Southern Whiskey Society event? Absolutely. Some great guys down there. They got a great event. Anyway, part of the event was the opportunity for VIP ticket holders to get bottles. My wife and I went and we both picked up a purple top. That is not a bad deal. Six years old, your son? Yeah, six year old. And this was actually a short barrel. This one was named cornbread. They had another one named, I think, Sweet Pea. Sweet Pea and Cornbread? Sweet Pea and Cornbread. Those are enticing names. Just kind of makes you want to pop it open. Right. So this barrel actually only had 58 bottles in it. Wow, this is a short barrel. It is a short barrel. And so this is bottle 31 of 58. So I feel kind of fortunate. We're down to about a half a bottle now. I'm going to be sad when this one's gone. I don't blame you. But then we have my wife's bottle. Oh. And I think she has Sweet Pea. Lucky man.

Oh, so you guys had one of each? One of each.

Okay. The other choices were like, they had a Weller foolproof pick. Okay. And I'm trying to think of what else they had. I don't remember right off the bat, but I kind of went for the Willets. I think they might've had a Willet Rye as well.

Yeah, I would probably pick the Willett bourbon too. You just don't see them very often, especially where I live here. And even when you go out and when you do see them, they're usually astronomical prices. So to be able to get one, especially from the Southern Whiskey Society, you know, it's going to be pretty good.

Big shout out to the boys in Franklin. I think if anybody's listening to this right now and has even a thought of visiting their event down there, it's a good time. Absolutely. It's a good time. Well, Jason, why don't we get into this bourbon? Let's do it. No doubt it's Will It, right? No doubt it's Will It.

So one of the unique characteristics I always get in Will It is a kind of a peanut brittle type flavor to it drizzled with caramel. And this one in particularly is very corn and caramel sweet up front on the nose for me.

Yeah. So it's for me, it's definitely got that will it spicy, that, that, that kind of a prickly spicy nose to it.

And, uh, I don't know if you can prickle the nose, but I guess if you could, it'd be a will it, right? Um, a little bit of a peach pear, I think. Apple, a little bit of apple. Yeah. You said pear now. Yeah. The pear is definitely coming through here a little bit. Apple like pear, uh, peel. It's very, it's, it's very, it's almost waxy.

But for being such a high-proof bottle, it doesn't really attack the nose too much with the alcohol, does it?

It doesn't. The alcohol comes through as more, as you mentioned, as spice and flavor rather than pure heat.

These guys definitely do it right. Let's take a sip. Sure. Cheers. Cheers.

Wow. Full flavor, huh? Flavor bomb, as I like to say. This is kind of a sultry palate here. It's so good. What I love to do with a bourbon or whiskey is just let it dance in the front of your palate a little bit. And when you could feel, you set it, the spiciness and that prickliness of it, you feel it on the tip of your tongue right away. And then the flavors just work its way back. Caramel, there's so many layers of flavor in here. caramel, peanut, definitely some of that apple, that pear in there. Then the finish is just all oak and spice and baking spices.

That's what I was going to say. I think the oak, the spice and the oak really come through on this, but it kind of pauses for a moment on the middle and sides of your tongue and sort of just rests there for a minute and says, I'm here. And then presents that more spicy, oaky finish on the back of the tongue.

There's also kind of an after, there's kind of an after finish I'm getting a little bit. It's kind of sneaky. You think it's done and then all of a sudden it comes back and you get some more, more of that peanut comes back a little bit. It's really nice.

So you're getting a little bit of that, a little uncharacteristic sweetness on the back. Yeah. Yeah. So me too. That's one of the things I liked about this is it had that a little bit of that syrupy sweetness on the back of the tongue. A lot of times, sweetness presents itself mostly up front because that's where your sensors are for sweetness, but you get that sense of sweetness on the back. I don't know if you can actually taste sweetness on the back of your tongue or not, but it presents itself that way.

It comes back to me in some of the newer bourbons, especially some of the great bourbons I had this past year in 2019. Kentucky Owl Batch 9 did that for me. The Four Roses limited edition did that where I thought the finish was over and then all of a sudden you got this another little burst of sweetness out of nowhere. Bourbons like that are incredible because it presents such a unique experience.

Now, I think in a general sense, maybe the Will It flavor profile is not for everybody. because it is a bit spicy. It does have that, you know, that spicy prickly nature to it. But for those people that like those kinds of bourbons, pretty amazing. They do it in spades, don't they?

You could see why they're so sought after, especially if you like that Willard profile. I just got a really beautiful cherry, like spicy cherry note on the palate. The more you sip it, the sweeter it's getting now. The spice still lingers on, but I love this cherry flavor on it. Mmm. It's like maybe like cherry and maple syrup a little bit. It's just evolving. So good. And I think that's probably one of the reasons why people love Will It, because especially with some of these single vials, they're so unique, so spicy. They're really doing an incredible job there. And it's hard to get it. I mean, that too.

Yeah. I mean, you have a really hard time finding these. But a lot of these become available as picks through group picks, clubs, restaurants, bars, those kind of things. No, Willet just recently opened their restaurant on the second floor of the gift shop there. Have you been down? I've not been down. I've been in the gift shop though many times trying to score a good bottle, but I haven't been to the restaurant yet. Yeah. So now when you're in the gift shop, I think it's a spiral staircase or whatever. It's a staircase that leads to the second floor and they got a big fireplace going in there and they got a bar and it's absolutely loaded with everything you could imagine. A little on the pricey side, but you know what? It's an experience and it's worth trying.

Well, that's what it's for. I mean, some people, they walk in there and they can't get their hands on this. You have a place you can go and actually sit down, taste it, experience it, figure out that flavor profile. Do you like that spice? Do you not?

I mean, what's your opinion on, you know, pours versus bottles? So, you know, some of these bottles are very expensive. Now, I know this one here. Is probably going for 250 to 300 on the secondary. That's my guess. I don't know. I got this as part of an event, but you know, somebody that doesn't want to spend that kind of money can't actually get the bottle of the store and doesn't want to spend that kind of money. What do you think about paying $40 for a shot?

For me, I think it's based on availability. So if there's going to be a bourbon that I know I can't get, this happened to me last year with the Old Forest or Birthday bourbon. No matter what I tried to do, I just could not get my hands on a bottle. So whenever I saw it at a bar to try to experience it, I would just pay for it. I was lucky enough to try some of the OFC, which is that special release that's an extremely expensive, very rare bottle. Stuff like that, I think it's worth it to pay for a pour, especially if it's going to be something whether you don't want to spend the money on trying to acquire one yourself. Obviously, as you know, it's hard to acquire some of these sought after bottles with the market the way it is today. So I think when you try to get these bottles and you realize, oh, I don't think I'm ever going to get a chance to get it. Why not go and get a pour somewhere? And I think for Willett to do it, because their stuff is so rare, especially the purple top bourbons, that's a great way to get their flavor profile out there. You can't get in a store, come to the restaurant, try it, sit down, be able to experience these bourbons. Obviously they're gonna be a little bit pricey, but when in Rome. That's right.

I mean, if you travel to Bartstown and you find your way to the Willett Distillery, you go to the gift shop and you're hoping they'll have a bottle, and a lot of times they do. Yeah. Let you strike out. There's always that consolation prize on the second floor. That's right. Just make your way upstairs like, I'll just pay for a pour. Twist my arm. Well, Jason, we'll keep sipping on this, but I want to turn to you for a moment because you're the focus of our show here. I'm interested to hear your story, a little bit about maybe your early days. Can you tell us a little bit about where you grew up, what it was like where you grew up, and when you maybe got into your first bourbon?

So yeah, I'm a Long Island boy. I grew up in Freeport, Long Island. Moved out to more half-hollow hills, Huntington Station, Long Island. After that, my mother wanted to get me into a better school system. So we moved out to the Eastern, and the Long Island was a little bit better. After that, I went to high school there and decided I wanted to stay in New York for college. Went to St. John's University. I got my degree in marketing and graphic design while I was there, which became a big part, was a great tool for my channel, which we'll get into later, but loved doing that. Yeah, then as my career went on, really in college is when I was first introduced to bourbon.

I want to get back to that. So when you were in college,

College buddies are going out. And like anything, I drank some awful things in college. Awful things.

Because it's really about the wallet there, isn't it? It's not so much about the quality of the liquor.

So it was all about the college bars, happy hour, $2 beers, night, whatever you can do to save some money and just get some good drinks in you. The first bourbon I had I was introduced to was Wild Turkey 101. It seems to be the ubiquitous bourbon that everybody gets into first or tries in college, both fortunately and also both unfortunately, because I think it puts a stigma on Wild Turkey 101 a little bit. But at the same time, it kind of becomes a good introduction.

Sure. Sure. So we won't talk about years here, but we're definitely talking about pre-2010. Correct. Okay. So yeah, so the Wild Turkey brand has gone through some transitions over the years. Absolutely. They've gone through some changes in barrel entry proof that has caused A flavor profile shift, right? Absolutely. So you were a part of that earlier flavor profile.

I first started mixing with Coke, like most people do. Then it kind of dawned on me. I had a friend of mine who was probably one of the reasons why I got into bourbon, who started drinking it on the rocks. So, I started doing that just because of him. He was a good friend of mine and we started drinking and I did notice all these very, very extreme sweet flavors coming out of it. Now, for me, bourbon in the beginning was very harsh. It kind of comes in like gasoline. That's why I would always mix it with Coke. As I started putting rocks in it and opening up the bourbon a little bit, I just recognized all the, like, how did this get so sweet? Did you put any, I literally asked him, did you put anything in here? Is this mixed in anything? He's like, no, it's just on the rocks. And then that's when kind of my eyes lit up a little bit. So after that happened, a few years went by, I wasn't drinking, I was still having some Wild Turkey 101 here and there, trying a couple different Jim Beam products, stuff like that. kind of broadening my horizons a little bit until probably maybe five, six years after college, I got introduced to a Booker's bourbon at a bar. Luckily, the bartender was a bourbon enthusiast already way before the boom happened. And he's like, oh, you like trying different bourbons? I said, yeah, absolutely. He goes, well, you should try this one. So he pours me a glass of Booker's and I wish I knew what batch it was.

I was going to ask you.

Oh, I wish I knew. I just didn't know enough back then to ask. Booker was involved. Booker was involved and I didn't know enough back then about Booker's to even realize what batch it could be. So he slid me the glass and I tasted it. I mean, mind blown. Like, what is this? Like, I just couldn't. The flavor, the intensity, the proof, the finish, everything about it just lit up my senses. So is that what they call a gateway bourbon? I don't know if Bookers is a gateway bourbon, but for me it was.

Yeah, that's what I'm saying. Gateway bourbon is the one that sort of opens your eyes, right?

The one that says, oh my gosh, what have I been missing? Yeah, I feel like everybody has that aha moment with bourbon where you just, you try that one pour that just makes you want to keep trying more. And for me, it was a neat pour of Bookers. And yeah, I'll never forget it. And my friend who was with me at the same time, he was like, I've never tasted anything like this. It's crazy. And then after that, just a light bulb went on. And that's when the whole the whole journey started off.

Now, you and I both drink our bourbon neat. We like to have it neat and a-glint, Karen. Yep. But I have had bourbon in cokes. I've had bourbon in diet cokes. I've had bourbon in AL8-1. You know, a number of things and I think it's fine for me anyway. Oh, absolutely.

I'm totally on board with the idea that however you want to drink and enjoy bourbon, drink it the way you like it.

And a lot of people will say that putting ice in your bourbon will shut it down, will close it down, and it does close the nose down, right? Absolutely. But it opens up the palate a little bit because of that water. It does.

Once you add some ice to it, it definitely closes it up, constricts all the aromas in there so you don't get as much on the nose, but it will open up some different flavors on the palate. That's one of the reasons some reviewers like I do and some others, they'll add a few drops of water to it, see what happens.

In fact, I think the people who are doing tastings inside distilleries, they do it for a job. They're proofing down about 40 proof. because that really lets them access those flavors without being overwhelmed by the proof of the alcohol.

Absolutely. That's a reason why I really like bowel-proof bourbons and whiskeys a lot, too, because you can proof it down and find your happy medium.

So those of you out there adding ice to your bourbon, those of you out there having bourbon and cokes or bourbon and L8-1 or ginger ale, keep doing it because it makes that coconut ginger ale taste so much better. That's right.

And I'll say this too, the thing about that is if you want to pour, if me and you were sitting down and having meat and a Glencairn, somebody else wants to sit down, get in on the fellowship and the conversation of sipping a bourbon. But the way they can do that is by basically getting Coke. I don't mind if you're sitting here having a conversation, enjoying the fellowship of bourbon and having a good time. And that's what it's really about.

That's right. Absolutely. Well, Jason, let's continue on down this path. So you were in New York and then somehow you ended up in Columbus, Ohio.

Yeah, so I moved here for a good job opportunity in marketing. So I did that. I came here. And it was, you know, kind of when you move into a new city by yourself, because, you know, my mom, my grandmother, my family is, you know, either back in New York. And they're all still back in New York. Well, my mother, my grandmother are back in New York. The rest of my family are kind of scattered. Most of them are in Florida, some are in Indiana. I still have family in Italy, too. So they're kind of scattered everywhere. So moving here was kind of a scary thing. I hadn't lived anywhere else besides New York my entire life. So coming to Columbus, Ohio was a little bit of a...

So what did you think about, before you came, what did you think about Columbus, Ohio? What do you think about Ohio in general? I mean, it's kind of a New York city guy, you know, Queens.

Yeah, it was definitely quieter, definitely more laid back, not nearly as much traffic. People seem to be nicer. But before I moved here, I was kind of going back and forth for job for because I was working remotely in New York for about a year before I wanted to before I decided to move here. And I was just getting bored because I'm kind of a people guy. I like to collaborate and I just wasn't getting that while I was sitting at home. So yeah, the opportunity was given to me to come here and I had been traveling back and forth monthly and just spending more time in Columbus and kind of acclimating myself until the circumstances were right for me to make the move out here. So when I finally got here, it was just a matter of time before I kind of got to know the town, Ohio State football, which is a religion here. It was the first thing I needed to learn about, apparently, once I moved here.

Yeah, my grandmother lived in Columbus, and she recently passed away, but she was 96. She had a good long life, and the Ohio State players were her boys. So whenever I would come up, she would say, well, I'm watching my boys.

There you go. That's right. So I learned about that real fast coming here. And my co-workers gave me some Ohio State gear. It's like, if you're going to live here now, this is what you have to wear. I'm like, OK. I like red. It's not a big deal. So yeah, so did that. And it took me a couple months to get acclimated here. I did get a little lonely, a little homesick a little bit. And that's when I started watching whiskey and bourbon channels. And once I started doing that, that's where... Because I'd already been tasting bourbons in different whiskies for a few years before that. So once I started doing that, I kind of found a something I could, it's like, all right, well, I'm not making, I don't have too many friends here yet. You know, what can I do? So I started going to some local tastings in Columbus. There was a good bourbon community here, good whiskey community, mostly beer, very big beer community here as well as a lot of brewers locally. I started going to some bars and going to some events and trying different bourbons and whiskeys. And then, Then because I kind of lived by myself, I had really nobody here. I started immersing myself in YouTube and history of bourbon, learning about where it comes from, and I kind of immersed myself in the history of bourbon.

What were some of the early YouTube, I don't want to say channels, but shows or whatever that kind of inspired you?

Probably Scotch Chess Dummies. I love those guys, Scott and Bart. They were one of the first. Chad and Sara, it's Bourbon Night. I watched every Friday because at that time that's when I released their things, their videos. Who else? I did watch Daniel and Rex because they were just very entertaining from whiskey vaults.

They also have whiskey biscuits, right?

Yeah, that's kind of about their distillery, which is great. They're two great guys. Got to meet them just this past year. Yeah, those were kind of the ones I kind of watched a lot coming into Bourbon. There were a few other There were a few other good channels that I watched here and there. I was trying to learn a little bit more about Scotch Tube and mainly bourbon, so I was shifting my attention there. Right.

So you got the bug. Got the bug. Some light turned on in your head, I guess, right?

Yeah, it was basically because I became such a bourbon nerd, and I love the history behind it. that not a lot of the channels that I saw really got into the history. They didn't really get into who was making it, where it came from. They would kind of do a quick overview and read it from the bottle, but I really wanted to take a deep dive into where these distilleries started, where they came about, who George T. Stack actually was, who Uh, Booker actually was, you know, Booker know what was his philosophy. How did he, how does bourbon from the 1980s and nineties, why does it taste so different than it does today? So I really wanted to do that. Not a lot of the channels were doing that. So I felt like between my, uh, just kind of my light bulb, as you mentioned, to go on to not only start a channel, But I'm like, I think this is something I could bring to a YouTube channel and that'd be a little bit different.

Right. So you, you're kind of an amateur historian, becoming a professional, a professional history, bourbon historian, I guess, right? I mean, I don't know. You're familiar with Michael Veach. So Michael Veach is kind of the, the, the de facto bourbon historian. Yes. Yes. But yeah, you know, some people gravitate towards that wanting to know more about how things were.

Yeah.

And I'm one of those guys too. So I guess that might've been one of the reasons why I was drawn to your channel at some point.

Yeah. I just, I felt like if I'm going to talk about a whiskey or a bourbon, I want to talk about where it came from, who's making it. You know, sometimes obviously the history. Take Willett, for instance, if I'm reviewing a Willett bottle and I review the rye and then I get into the bourbon. You don't always want to repeat the same historical context every time. But I just feel like every time I go back and I research just to make sure I'm doing my due diligence, I always find just some nugget that maybe I missed or something else to learn. And I think that's the beauty of the history of bourbon.

You decided to start a channel. You kind of had this idea in your mind of what you wanted to do, what your format would be. What kind of a task is it to sort of get all the gear and the equipment and set up the space? I mean, is it a pretty big undertaking?

Well, I think if you do it right, if you're thinking of starting a YouTube channel, the one thing you have to do is look at the competition first. And even though it is a, they call it whiskey tube. So it's kind of its own community. It's become its own living thing almost. and we all collaborate and we all there's a lot of us that collaborate talk to each other we're all really good friends and it's weird because you do it virtually you see each other online all the time especially when you collaborate on a live stream or something like that and then when you meet up in person it's like you never really it's like you've always known that person wow so it's kind of it's a really cool community so what i did though is is when you I was I was in this weird time when you we had some new channels popping up and then I popped up and then after me there was a whole nother explosion of channels I came in. What I was noticing at the channels before me is that they had really good audio, really good lighting, really good video, really good sound. And I just said, if I'm gonna do this, you have to come in these days with all of that checked off and high quality. You can't really. There's an expectation there. There's an expectation. You're gonna start a channel. You have to make really compelling content. And not only compelling, but it has to look. And then listen, I had my challenges. I had a lot of audio challenges in the beginning. You know, I kind of have this whiskey room that you're sitting in now, and it wasn't really finished. I didn't really have a lot of stuff down in my basement. So it was echo-y. So I was battling that and learning how to mitigate all those. I always had a great camera. Obviously, that's going to be your bread and butter. You got to have a great camera and great audio. So once you do that, it's all about the content.

Right. Yeah, so I guess, you know, it's a learning process. You start at some point and then you grow over time. And, you know, I've noticed that you guys kind of, you are, you do band together a little bit. You do collaborate a lot. Yes. And I guess as a new channel comes in and they introduce themselves, kind of sometimes take them under your wing a little bit, don't you?

Yeah, that's a That's something I love to do, especially for newer channels. When a newer channel is starting up, because there's so many channels now, and I think Varieties of Spice of Life, as with bourbon and whiskey, you have so many now, it's kind of good to have that in YouTube and WhiskeyTube nowadays because Like you said, you can gravitate to a certain channel that you like or you dislike. Maybe you feel like that palette that you're watching matches up with yours a little bit. Right. Because you could find that out as you go along. If a channel says, you know, get this whiskey, get this bourbon and you try like, oh, this is terrible. You kind of lose trust in them. And you move on to someone else. And you could do that more easily nowadays. And it's not just, you know, it's publications, it's reviewers, it's everybody.

And it's not because they're wrong, they're just different, right? Exactly. They're just different. You can't, you know, everyone's palette's different.

Everyone's palette's going to evolve in a different way. I try to review based on what I'm experiencing when I have the bourbon or the whiskey. It's not so much, yeah, I'm going to tell you if I like it or not, if it's really good. But when I'm literally tasting it and trying to analyze it, I try to give you the best the best analysis for experience as I can, what it's going to do with the front of your palate, what to expect mid palate, and then the finish. And then after all that's over, I kind of give a overview of do I think it's worth it or if it's good or not, what to expect. But I kind of analyze it in a different way. I don't just sip it and say if it's good or not. I like to really get a deep dive

Right. Speaking of deep dives, I think that's what we want to do in the second half. We want to kind of take a deep dive, talk a little bit about the whiskey room here.

Yeah.

Kind of, you know, some of the some of the episodes you've had, a little bit about what you got going on this year, things that are coming up. We'll go ahead and enjoy the rest of this, will it? And when we come back from our break, I think you've got a bottle for us, don't you? I got something a little special for you, buddy. I'm ready. All right. We would like to thank Tommy and Gwen Mitchell from Loghead's Home Center for supporting this episode of the Bourbon Road. Loghead's Home Center, nestled in the hills of Kentucky, is an industry leader in building handcrafted rustic furniture. Family owned and operated, they take pride in offering only the very best for their customers. The Logheads, and that's what they like to call themselves, are skilled wood crafters who are passionate about creating rustic furniture for people who appreciate the beauty of natural wood. Owners Tommy and Gwen don't just sell the rustic lifestyle, they live it. And you can be sure that Loghead's furniture will always be handcrafted in Kentucky by artisans who embrace the simple way of life. Loghead's rustic furniture is made from northern white cedar, a sustainable wood that's naturally rot and termite resistant. Its beauty and quality will add warmth to your earthy lifestyle for generations to come. Be sure to check out everything they have to offer at LogHeadsHomeCenter.com and while you're at it, give Tommy and Gwen a shout on Facebook or Instagram at LogHeadsHomeCenter. All right, we were back and as we took our break there, we finished off that well. That was pretty special, wasn't it?

If that thing wasn't halfway finished, I'd drink more, but I feel bad. We might talk you into leaving you a sample of it. Yeah, that's special stuff. That's really good. And for six years, it's so flavorful. It's amazing. Well, let's talk a little bit about this room we're in. So this is your studio. This is where you shoot every video that you have, at least the ones that are local.

You do go out on the road from time to time. I do, yes. But this is called the Mash and Drum Whiskey Room. And it's been a labor of love, right? It really has.

It was my goal as soon as I moved in here to build a whiskey room. little did I know it was going to become a studio. But once once the pieces started coming together, I wanted to call it mashing drum just because I am a drummer as well. I do. I've been playing drums for a very long time. So music is a big part of my life and growing up. And I wanted to incorporate something both with music and something with whiskey. So the mash for bourbon mash and then the drum. I just thought, I've always seen a lot of bars, Irish bars, called pipe and drum or fife and drum or something like that. I'm like, let's do mash and drum. That'd be kind of cool. I also wanted something different that would stand out on YouTube because everything has bourbon in it or whiskey in it. So I thought the mash and drum was kind of unique.

Yeah, I think. I think it's important to stand out and do your own thing. I think you've definitely done that. But in this room here, I mean, I don't know how many bottles are here. We'll certainly put some pictures out on the blog. But I mean, there's a whole lot of bottles in this room, Jason.

Yeah, it's a problem. It's not so much a space problem as it is a buying problem. It is. So you're kind of addicted to the sport. You know, honestly, I have really Toned down my buying in the last year or so when I first started I would buy everything I couldn't stop because it was you know You start getting into something and you just go full bore your heads down You're not looking at anything else except I just have to acquire as many bottles I can because I want to try it all and then it becomes a collection thing You want to own and a lot of people are like that in the bourbon the bourbon world, right?

So I've kind of gone through the same Mm-hmm transition. Yep for me I think it's not so much about the money as it is about the realization that there's a lot of really great bourbons that don't have to be chased. Correct. So, for what was your reasons? Same?

Same. And I felt like the market for me has been, even though there's tremendous growth in the bourbon market and I think the secret's out, from a consumer perspective, especially from a marketer's perspective, the secret's out. With so many barrels aging now and so much great whiskey out there, they know that they can bottle something 6, 7, 8, 9, 10 years old, put a limited edition sticker on it, put it in a special bottle, and it's going to sell. And I think with that comes some and I think in 2019, when I look back on the year and saw how many limited editions came out, how many special releases, not only from the big boys like Beam and Four Roses and have usual Buffalo Trace, but even from the craft distilleries coming out with special releases on top of their just their regular releases, you kind of start figuring out that there are some great whiskeys just sitting on the shelf that has been overshadowed by this boom for so long. It's kind of Kind of good, it's almost a wake up call to go back and start tasting and start exploring those bourbons again that we forgot about that are just sitting there on the shelf.

So let's talk a little bit about that because, you know, there's a lot of listeners out there who are just getting into this bourbon journey. They're just getting into this world that we live in. And they're like, well, what do I have to do to enjoy a good bourbon and not spend a fortune? Now you just recently launched a new series on your show. Correct. Can you tell us a little bit about that? Sure. It's called What's on the Shelf Wednesday.

So every Wednesday I'll be reviewing a bourbon or whiskey. And this is going to range between bourbon, rye, whiskey, scotch, Irish whiskey. It's going to kind of go through a whole range of just stuff that's on the shelf. Now, obviously, everyone's market is a little bit different where they live. So I'm trying to pick out different bottles. And I know universally when you walk into a store, you're going to find them. They're going to be there.

So when you say universally, you mean all 50 states? At least as many as possible.

At least as many as possible. OK. You know, so you have your Woodford Reserves of the world and a lot of stuff from Old Forrester. There's a ton of Irish whiskeys and scotches you can just walk in and find the shelf. How many episodes of this new series have you had so far? Just two. Okay. Well, no, I'm sorry. I filmed two, but I've only released one. Okay, so tell us about the one you've released. So the one I released was for Old Granddad Bonded. Okay. Now, there's a ton of bottom bonds that have released in the last few years and old granddad bonded has been always a stalwart on the shelf. Right. And I did include it in a series I did last year, my March Madness, where I did a bunch of bourbons that were between 25 to 30 bucks. And that was in that shootout. And then when I went back to that, I realized, wow, I never really, I forgot about that bourbon because there's so many good ball and bonds out there and new release ball and bonds that you kind of forget about that one. So I was going to the store and I was just kind of taking a gander at the shelves and. It just kind of dawned on me like, wow, I haven't had that in a while, haven't had that in a while. I remember that. Have I had that in a long time? And I'm like, you know, I need to just focus on a series of bourbons and whiskeys that people could just go in and because I love, you know, nobody loves finding a unicorn and reviewing it and getting it out there more than, you know, reviewers do, especially me. But yeah, you always have to remember for the new or even the seasoned bourbon drinker, some of those are really hard to find. So even if you have the funds, sometimes that doesn't matter. You just can't find it. You just can't get one. Or sometimes they're allocated for people that either have better relationships with stores or they'll maybe only get one or two bottles and they'll go to someone else that's ahead of you. Now we have the point systems that come into play. So there's a lot of factors now with getting those hard to find allocated bottles, but I think there are so many great, and you said it, there's so many great bottles sitting on the shelf. I think that deserves a little bit more of a spotlight again.

Well, I'm going to segue, but it doesn't segue into a bottle that kind of is available on the shelves. You've brought something for us for the second pour and I didn't want to waste too much time getting to the second burping because they're all waiting to hear about it. Yes. So what have you brought for the second pour, Jason? So this is the Elmer T. Lee 100 tribute. The 100 year tribute. Now Elmer T. Lee in itself. is a fine bourbon from Buffalo Trace.

It is. It's at its core. It's about a $40 bourbon, single barrel from Buffalo Trace. It's their Mash Bill 2, which is considered their high rye bourbon. Now, Elmer, whoever doesn't know what Elmer T. Lee was, his middle name was actually Tandy. That's what the T stands for. So it's Elmer Tandy Lee. He was born in 1919. So as a tribute to him, Buffalo Trace released this special release in 2019 to celebrate his 100 years of life.

Okay.

But Elmer passed away some time ago. Elmer passed away, but he was the creator of the Blanton's that we know and love today. Right. He was the one that created that. He created the single barrel. A lot of people say that that beam did it before they did it, does that back and forth when you go back historically, but I think Elmer Teeley kind of gets the fanfare for that a little bit.

But that was kind of that period in the 80s when the real master distillers were trying to recover the business from almost a crash that occurred in the 70s, right?

Correct. Everyone was drinking vodkas and they didn't want to drink bourbon. They wanted to drink vodkas and something different than their parents and their grandparents were drinking. So that's when vodka took off. And that's when you saw the wine coolers took off and kind of the sweeter things took off. But there was a market for people who wanted more, I guess, special or limited release. And once they figure that out, there was a market for it. Then Small Batch started and Booker No, then he said, I don't want to do single barrel because it could be too much variation between barrel to barrel. So let's do, I want to do Small Batch. And it just became a different way to market their bourbon and to get specialized spirits out to the markets from a bourbon perspective. And I think that's really what kind of saved the bourbon industry in its own way.

So now Elmer T. Lee in itself, the normal release of Elmer T. Lee is kind of hard to find. You said it's about a $40 bottle retail, but if you were to find it in a store now, it's going to have a price tag of

probably anywhere from 100 to, I've seen it as high as 200 in some spots, unfortunately.

And that's probably too much of a price for me to pay for a bottle of that. I think so. But I definitely think it's worth a pour to bar at an elevated price if you can't afford the bottle. But this, what you've brought today is a little something special.

Yeah. So this, so normally Elmer T. Lee is bottled at 90 proof. It's a 90 proof Mashable 2 bourbon. This for the, for this release, this hundred year tribute celebration bottle, they decided to bottle this at a hundred proof to kind of coincide with the hundred years. So it's a hundred proof. It's got a little bit more flavor to it, a little bit more heft on the palette. It's also, I think, I think you get a little bit more spice on here too, from that higher rye mash pill, from the mash pill too. So you don't want to go for the nose here?

Let's check it out. Yeah.

Well, it's got a little bit of fruit on that nose, doesn't it?

Absolutely. Now, is this a little bit older, you think, than the traditional release?

I think so. I also think it was, you know, these were obviously probably specially selected barrels. They probably picked some real honey barrels for this release. And I think you caught it spot on. There was a very, very strong, I always say juicy fruit gum. It smells like... Yeah, juicy fruit.

Juicy fruit. Yeah, absolutely. You're right on. Now, you've been sipping on this bottle a little bit. I can see it's down a little bit. This is the first time I've had that opportunity.

This is a real treat for me. Thank you, Jason. No, absolutely. This is what it's about. I didn't get this bottle to look at as much as I do like to look at it, but it's all about sharing and... You know?

Yeah, that is. Oh my gosh. I see. I'm not sure I could have called out juicy fruit. I would have been searching for that and searching for that, but that's exactly what it is.

It's juicy fruit gum.

Wow. There's a little bit more maple syrup in here too than I get from a regular El Martili as well. All right, let's taste it. Cheers. Let's go for it. Oh, that is a fantastic bourbon. Isn't it? That is really good. It is that is Elmer T. Lee amped up. And you know what? A little bit of that juicy fruit makes it to the palate just on the back. It's kind of amazing. That's different than anything I've ever had.

I still think you get the Buffalo trace to me. I always get this beautiful toasted pecan flavor. And I get that in here on the back end once you pass all the fruit characteristics and you get this slight little nuttiness right on the back end, but it's so intense and so sweet and I absolutely love it. Yeah, this is a bottle to cherish, no doubt.

So I hope this lasts you a long time. You visit it on rare occasions.

Rare occasions. I'll definitely take this bourbon out for people who want to try something special and also anyone when family comes over. These are the types of bourbons I like to share and celebrate with. Well, Buffalo Trace hit it on the nose with this one, no doubt about it. This is a Buffalo Trace. release I can get behind this. I really love this bourbon. I wish the regular Elmer T. Lee was this good, honestly, but I think they really picked some special barrels with this one.

Do you think there's a day coming when bourbons of this caliber are readily available, like really readily available? I hope so because right now they're just out of touch. They're out of reach You just can't get to them or if you can it's it's occasionally And because you have relationships with stores and things like that, correct and I feel like for me that's the best way to get harder to find bottles is building those relationships and

You know talking to your store owners and even sharing some pores with them if you can get the chance to do that That's it's kind of a good way to for them if not only to get a not only to get a chance to buy a bottle But even to just for them to tell you hey, we got this coming in, you know, keep an eye out There's there's good ways to do that. But to go back to your earlier question I Think the reason why it's I think there's there could be a trade-off there and Because we have so many limited releases that are out of touch, it's because of the bourbon boom now and the whiskey boom in general. If the whiskey boom and the bourbon boom goes away, Do we keep seeing these limited releases all the time or are they going to hedge back their releases to try to keep making the money on their regular releases because it's not as popular now? I think as we go along, I'm very curious and I'm keeping a close eye. I'm kind of a nerd about this stuff. I'm really keeping a close eye to see how the how the behaviors of buyers and consumers are becoming. Do we still want to wait out online to try to get a bottle of bourbon? Is that going to die off anytime soon? Is there a next big thing coming? Is it rum? Is it Armagnac? Is it something else?

Right. So yeah, Armagnac, you mentioned that. Armagnac is something that I think people don't go for because of that price difference.

It's a little more expensive, right? Absolutely.

But there's a lot of people that really appreciate Arminiak and it could be the next big thing. Who knows? But the price is a little bit out of reach. But as bourbon prices grow, it sort of opens that door.

Yeah. And another thing you have to factor in too, as we go along this year are the tariffs on scotches. Now scotches is another category that I've gotten to get better at and learn and taste. And there are some scotches that are absolutely amazing, delicious that I find. Because you're the mash and drum whiskey room. You're not the mash and drum bourbon room. Exactly. You're drinking scotches as well, Irish whiskeys. Yeah, so I'm trying. I'm bourbon focused, but everything else curious. So I think that's a part of my channel that I really like to put forth is, you know, I'm still kind of on my Scotch journey. There's a lot I haven't tried, but I have found that I do like some of the peated stuff and I kind of. I ended up liking that way more in the beginning than I thought I would. I just think it's a little bit more complex than just a regular bourbon-aged Scotch. I think it has more complexity, more depth. But with the tariffs now on Scotches and some of the Scotch prices going up 20%, 25%, Well, those people turn to bourbon now because there's more affordable options in bourbon. I'm just curious how that's going to play out.

It's kind of the idea, right? Yeah. I mean, that's kind of the goal of it all, I guess. Absolutely. Is that it turns people towards local products or national products.

Yeah. And with over 1,800 craft distilleries now across the country, there's plenty of whiskey to be had.

Yeah. So let's talk a little bit about how your show has changed since the beginning, kind of some of the things you've learned. How you've kind of tailored the show to your listenership. Can you kind of go into that a little bit?

Yeah, in the beginning, I think one big thing I learned is not to review a whiskey from a neck pour. Okay. Because I would go back to, I found out that when I would go back to certain whiskies that I did not like when I reviewed it, once it opened up and got some air, I added a couple drops of water to it, it really got a lot better over time.

So let's back up for a minute here. We might have some listeners out there who they don't know what a neck pour is. Can you kind of tell us what's a neck pour?

So that's basically doing a review from just opening the bottle right there on screen and pouring it. So the liquid that's actually in the neck when you first open it is that's basically what's in your glass. Right. Once the liquid gets down past the shoulder of the bottle and out of the neck, that's when some air gets to go into the bottle and it starts changing up the flavors a little bit in the whiskey. It's the same idea as when you let a bourbon just sit in your glass. Whether it be water, whether it be air, some of those factors are going to affect the flavors a little bit, especially air. Because you get some more air into that whiskey, it opens up some more flavors and things come out. And I think just trying a whiskey that's just stuck in the neck, things are a little bit more condensed in there. Once it gets down past the shoulder, that's when you start to learn and get to know a whiskey a little bit more.

So you did some early reviews and maybe you feel like you might not have been as accurate as you could have been. Correct. And when you revisited that whiskey, you're like, oh, wait a minute, apologies.

Yeah basically so I kind of changed up my format and then I started whenever I got a new bourbon I would sit and spend a couple days with it get to know it get to love it get to you know just kind of spend a lot of time with it like a good roommate you just want to check it out and see if everything goes good and see how those flavors evolve over time, see how those flavors become, do they stay consistent? Do they die out a little bit? So, and then I felt like when I got to know that bottle enough, then I was gonna review it. There are some exceptions because you want to, sometimes there are bottles that, I'll be honest, there are some bottles you just want to get out on YouTube before anybody else does. Sure.

So that you get that first look. You want to get that first look out there.

Yeah. I can understand that. Yeah. So for me, last year was the four rows of small batch select. When that came out, I had a good friend help me get that bottle for me and get it quickly so I can get it out because that was one of the ones I was really looking forward to. ended up being one of my favorite perms of the year. You know, $60 bottle, non-chill filtered, 103 proof, delicious stuff from Four Roses.

And still largely undiscovered, I think.

Yeah, I just don't think it's available enough everywhere. Is that what it is? Too much just yet, I think.

Because, you know, I've gone into some stores, particularly one of the stores we know, Liquor Outlet in Kentucky there, in Louisville area. You know, they've got cases and cases sitting out on the floor and they're having trouble moving to get it $54. So what's the story there? Local market? Well, I think it's either a local market or it's either over saturation.

Yeah, it could be over. Because they've made a lot of that bourbon. Exactly. Yeah. I mean, look at the selection that there is today.

Yeah.

There's a lot of great bourbons, a lot of great whiskey out there, and some of it's more affordable than others. Whereas you and I, we try a bunch of different bourbons, and we may have our flavor profiles. you know, let's be honest, sometimes our profiles are a little bit in the upper tiers of pricing that people will spend. But I got to tell you, going into a store, even here in Ohio, I'll be waiting online to try to get that allocated bottle of something. There's at least four or five people that just walk in and they buy a 1.75 of Jim Beam White label, take it right off the shelf and they're out the door. And they're happy. And they're happy. And I'm like, man, I wish I could be as happy as that guy right now.

Yeah, so I guess it's, you know, that's kind of true. So we walk into a store here, we might, well not here, I'm in Columbus now, but in Louisville, if we were to walk into a store and see 20 cases of four rows of small batch slacks sitting there at $45 or $55. It's the same thing as somebody out in Texas saying, we got Weller coming out of our ears. That's right. Or somebody else saying, Eagle Rare's everywhere here. Why can't you get it where you're at? Exactly.

It's kind of a regional thing. It is. It is regional. And you notice that even when I travel back to New York, and I go back home, I've made some really good relationships with a couple stores there. They help me get bottles. And some of the selections that they have are completely different just based on location. So it's really, you kind of have to play to your market. Wow, this Elmer tea is just amazing.

It's so good. Thank you so much for turning me on to this.

And it's so velvety too, I think than the regular one. It really has a great mouth feel to it. I was thinking silky, but velvety. Yeah, velvety, silky.

Okay, so we've talked a little bit about your new series about readily available bourbons, but you've done some some visits to distilleries where you've interviewed some people. Can you talk a little bit about some of the interviews you've had? Yeah, those were so much fun.

That's kind of something I want to focus on for this year some more. I have a series called Off the Still where I get to sit down with some master distillers and some of the people who create the bourbon and really get nerdy with them a little bit. Elizabeth McCall from Woodford Reserve, who is amazing. Also, Caleb Kilburn from Peerless. and Charlie and Andy Nelson from Greenbrier Distilling, you may know them as the company that creates Bell Mead bourbon. Right, exactly. Yeah, we had a little Bell Mead tonight, did one before the show. Yes, we did. Their special brandy cask, which is dessert in a glass.

Oh my goodness. So, just a heads up, people out there, if you can get your... Now, what's this one called? It's the Belmead Brandy. Belmead Brandy. Brandy cask. Absolutely delicious.

Yeah, those barrels were curated from World War II. So these are old barrels.

So these are barrels that are 60 to 80 years old. Correct. And then they've rehydrated them and then put bourbon into them. Correct. Rehydrating so they'll not leak. Exactly.

And then put bourbon in them to...

Yeah. Now that's not a bourbon that you're going to drink. It's not a daily drink or kind of bourbon. This is something. It's a dessert.

No, that was definitely a dessert bourbon because it was very fruity. It's very rich. We were, we were saying a fig Newtons and grapes and a little, the little hint of chocolate there, but it's very, very rich and sweet. So yeah. Yeah. It's a kind of great big league two meets red man.

Absolutely. But not in a bad way. No, not in a bad way at all. Very good way. Very good way.

I think Bell Meat has kind of mastered the art of blending. They have their sherry, their cognac, their Madeira. They do their brandy casts. They do a lot of great things.

So who's in your headlights, Jason? All these new distilleries that are popping up, some of them rise up above the others a little bit.

Who's in your headlights? For me, Wilderness Trail, who you've talked to. You've talked to Patrick. I love what they're doing. I think they're brilliant just talking to them, just hearing their interviews. They are on that same pathway as I am, completely being a nerd about whiskey. They are. Going through everything from yeast strains to cleaning techniques to sweet mashing to everything, aging, low-inchy proof. I want to get immersed in all that. Kind of doing everything right.

They are. They're doing everything right. And, you know, they're not just making a little bit of whiskey.

They're producing in excess of 220 barrels a day. Yeah, which is insane, you think, for a...

It's huge. Yeah. So I don't think it's fair to call them an artisan or craft distillery.

No, I think that's actually funny that you brought that up. That's a discussion I was having. When does a craft distillery cease becoming a craft distillery?

Yeah. If you ask Michael Veach, he kind of says they're all craft distilleries. He likes to call them artisan distilleries, the smaller guys, the new up and comers. But Shane and Pat, they're a major player now. They're making a lot of juice. They're building rick houses. Absolutely.

And I think the quality that you see in there, I mean, think about their first release. It was a bottled and bond, weeded bourbon, single barrel. For that to be your first release, that's pretty bold. And they hit it out of the park, I think.

I think it's great stuff. And news release, if anybody doesn't know, their weeded bourbon reaches six years old this year. So they're releasing a six year version.

Yeah, which I think even their four year old stuff I thought was pretty good. So as their stuff gets older, I think it's going to be unbelievable stuff. I mean, I've even had some of their barrel picks are still that are just about that five year old range. There's a huge difference in flavor profile, how much better it got. Yeah, so Wilderness Trail is up there for me. I would love to talk to Jackie Zichen from Old Forrester. She's amazing and I think Old Forrester, we talked about it, Old Forrester just knocking it out of the park right now with everything they're doing. They are giving the consumer everything they want.

I think they've got an open ear to the market and they're listening because there's a lot of ways to say it, knocking it out of the park, firing on all cylinders, whatever you want to say. Between Campbell Brown and Jackie's icon, those guys are really in tune with what people want and they're changing their expressions and introducing expressions to match that. Absolutely.

I mean, the rye was my value whiskey of the year last year because not only is it a great value, it's available. It's high quality. It's got a unique mash bill to it. It's higher barley than it is corn besides the dominant rye grain. Works great in both bourbon and rye cocktails, traditional rye and bourbon cocktails. You could use that in anything.

Very approachable price. It's an approachable price. It's just, I mean, it's an amazing whiskey.

And now what do they do? They flip their single barrels on its head by now offering a barrel proof, a hundred proof varietals. I mean, it's what the market wants. It's amazing stuff.

You know, Mike and I chose the 1910 as our bourbon of the year. Yeah. And you know, a lot of people might say that the 1910s, eh, it's not the best bourbon out there, but you have to remember who Mike and I are. You know, I'm Mr. Spicy and he's Mr. Wheat. So we had to agree on something. If you think about it, 1910s kind of writing that.

Can you please change your podcast name to Mr. Spicy and Mr. Wheat?

Well, Jason, what, what can we expect from you this year? What do you got on? What do you got in the works? What are you thinking? What's coming up? You know, um, you know, what can people expect from the mash and drum whiskey room?

Uh, well definitely more great, uh, in, in depth reviews. That's always going to be my bread and butter. I want to connect with my viewers a little bit more this year, thinking about doing a couple of meetups. I want to connect with more master distillers this year. I think for me as a reviewer, as much as I love doing the videos, I want to become a little bit more of a figure, especially in Louisville, Lexington and Kentucky in general. I want to be kind of closer to the action and get to know some of the distillers and just be kind of more, I don't know how to say the word here, not more of a spotlight. It's not like I'm looking for a spotlight, but I want to be closer and talk to the creators of the bourbon more. You want to be plugged in? I do. I want to be plugged in more to that entire industry and learn as much as I can.

All right. Well, you know, you've got a place to stay when you're down there. I appreciate that, yes. So Jason, why don't you take a minute, we need to kind of wrap up now, but as we drink this Elmer tea, why don't you take a minute and tell everybody how they can reach you out in social media, on your YouTube channel, whatever else you have going on. Sure, yeah.

If anybody is on YouTube, just look up the mashing drum. You could probably find it just by searching those terms, the mashing drum. You don't have to type the mashing drum whiskey room, the only mashing drum on there. But look up The Master and Drum, definitely give me a subscribe. I put out about two to three videos a week, basically reviews. I have my What's on the Shelf Wednesdays coming up. I also have a series called Double Bass, which is kind of a drumming term for two bass pedals, where I literally put two whiskies head to head. Love that. Yeah. So one I have coming up will be John Jay Bowman, out of John J. Bowman's single barrel out of Virginia against Blanton's. So that'll be an interesting match up. Since they're both Buffalo Trace. Since they're both supposedly Buffalo Trace juice.

Yeah.

But there's an interesting history of that, but you have to watch to find out the history. All right. So I have that series coming up. Also definitely look for my off the still episodes as I hopefully get some more interviews. Michter's is another one I want to talk to as well. I love what they're doing. You can find me on Instagram at the underscore mash underscore and underscore drum. and on Twitter at TheMashAndD.

All right. Well, Jason, it's been a pleasure having you on the show. It's always fun to hang out with you. We've been doing it a while. Finally got you on the show again. I think the last time we did this, we had a big group and we had quite a fest.

Yeah, that was a hell of a night of drinking.

I do remember nailing the winner, so I was happy about that. You did. Well, folks, if you want to follow The Bourbon Road on social media, we are at The Bourbon Road. You can find us on all those social medias at that name. We also have a closed Facebook group called The Bourbon Roadies. And in order to join, just come to our Facebook page, ask to join our group. Three simple questions. We just want to make sure you're 21 and you like bourbon and you can come on in and hang out with us There's a lot of good conversation there. We're trying to build a community and we're having a lot of fun doing it So Jason again, thank you so much for coming on. Thank you so much for having me and we'll see you down the bourbon road. Absolutely We do appreciate all of our listeners and we'd like to thank you for taking time out of your day to hang out with us here on the Bourbon Road. We hope you enjoyed today's show and if so, we would appreciate if you'd subscribe and rate us a five star with a review on iTunes. Make sure you follow us on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram at The Bourbon Road. That way you'll be kept in the loop in all the Bourbon Road happenings. You can also visit our website at thebourbonroad.com to read our blog, listen to the show, or reach out to us directly. We always welcome comments or suggestions. And if you have an idea for a particular guest or topic, be sure to let us know. And again, thanks for hanging out with us.