Dramface Podcast Thirty-Five

A Write OffWhile we meander off the whisky path a little more than usual, we kept this one intact - as was your wish. Don’t judge us, you asked for less to be left on the cutting room floor. Now you can witness some of the nonsense that you’re often spared. Still, we think this is a goodie, even at two hours.A middle-aged chat over various challenges gives way to rants on brand positioning and general attitudes in whisky. I finally bring things around to our topic, specifically aimed at getting inside the writer’s head to work out their methodologies. Hence, the ‘write off’ theme.Then, behold the glory of redemption on the I Am A Distillery challenge. We really hope you enjoy.See you soon for episode forty!Gregor and the team

The Distillery Bracket BattleThe editing of the Colonials’ lost podcasts continues unabated! Their lost-and-found episode #13 puts some drama and direct competition in play to uncover what the Colonials believe to be the best Scotch malt distillery.  Rob examined Dramface’s Top 40 list from the website, and created his own head-to-head bracket from what he gleaned to be the best thirty-two distilleries, from his Colonials perspective. He then diabolically put them into four brackets, and had Stu, Mike, Justin, and Adam duke it out - one pairing at a time. As with bracket battles, it is mano y mano…head to head…survive and advance!  The gents had some very tough decisions to make, some big surprises come about, and after all was said and done some of our lads were left a bit chapped that their favorites did not advance as they had envisioned.Come aboard for some fun – as this is the very first Dramface play along podcast!  Go to Dramface.com, go to the podcasts page, and find the brackets there in .pdf form so that you can download and play along! Let us know in the comments which head-to-head was the most provocative and how your bracket ultimately compared to ours.  This episode was a ton of fun, and we think you’ll have great fun with us.Cheers! Rob & The Colonials Team

A Wider Lens.After the editing gnomes returned to their tasks, they found some more rather…er, dated…materials. Let’s call them ‘lost and found’. And thus we have Colonials Podcast #12. This, as it turns out, is an unintended double-anniversary effort. The podcast was recorded in August 2025, which marked the one year anniversary of the first Colonials podcast recording. And, now, due to the editing gnomes’ strike, we have the anniversary marked by its release one year after recording. For goodness’ sake…Regardless, the genesis of this particular episode was to provide the Dramface listeners and viewers a wider lens. The recording was made before the announcements for the 2025 OSWA nominations were released, and the Colonials wanted to chime in from our perspectives outside of the UK. This episode reveals what the Colonials believed to be the best finalists – from their perspectives from various corners of the globe – for the OSWA categories of Best Value World Whisky, Best Value Scotch Whisky, Best World Whisky, and Best Scotch Whisky. Polls were taken from all the Colonials prior to the recording, and the finalists were crowned during our podcast. To be sure, yes, this is a lengthy effort, but we wanted to take the time to shine a light on, and give some love to, some distilleries and expressions that are not common from a UK vantage point. Also, we wanted to give our own thoughts about Scotch whiskies.Rob, Chuck, Justin, Stu, and Cleon wax eloquent – and sometimes less than eloquently (our apologies in advance) – about these whiskies, their perspectives, and the desires to provide expanded viewpoints.This podcast can certainly be enjoyed in one sitting, or perhaps divided up into sections. However you choose to listen or watch, we thank you for your time and grace and we look forward to hearing in the comments which expressions you would have picked, if you have had any of the world whiskies debated, and your thoughts as a whole.Looking forward and beyond this episode, with the editing gnomes hard at work (and absent some unforeseen happenstance), the next five Colonials podcast recordings that had been sitting on the shelves will be edited, polished, and released throughout the following months. Many thanks for your patience and understanding.The lads are very glad to be back in the saddle to share some Colonials insight and laughter.Slainte!Thanks for your patience again and hope you enjoy!

Community Matters.In this follow up to the last podcast, we’re continuing on the theme of community, especially digging into the sample picks. Whisky discussion powers on before we’re immediately arguing about the best Brit-flick: Four Weddings or Love Actually. Order is restored with tales of gifted bottles and incredible community generosity.Order is somewhat the theme as we take a steady meander through maturation versus climate, bottle bans and acceptance of our desire to enjoy the purchase of certain things, living remotely, the importance of local community and bonding through whisky.Then Gregor almost destroys everything by asking AI to generate an I Am A Distillery. It doesn’t seem to go down too well.This is a long one, but we owe you.

Finishing & finishesThe addled and distracted editing gnomes have finally ended their strike for more and better benefits. Much celebration ensued when the leader of Editing Union #89 announced the gnomes would return to the editing floor once they were guaranteed access to Blackberry Crown Royal at their desks and have the previous dress code eased to enable polyester jump suits.First out of the vault, the editors dusted off the Colonials’ episode #11 from a number of months ago when they waxed eloquent about cask finishes and maturations.The formerly locked-away episode came back to life when dusted off and put in the old reel to reel. Rob, Angus, Mike, Chuck, and Adam talk about whether they look for finished malts – are finished malts preferred? And, as they chat, discussions about the master distillers’ decisions and intentionality are covered. They also speak to the processes leading to the making of cask finished amber liquid. What are the intentions behind different finishes? Could it be done better? Could Colonials even suggest such heresy? Oh, it appears they can.Seriously, though – the lads are very glad to be back and glad to share some Colonials insight and laughter.Slainte!Thanks for your patience again and hope you enjoy!

The Community / food Wan.In this episode, we attempt to ‘catch up’ on so many long-lost recordings and community messages and questions, from embarrassingly long times ago. No matter, like always we get there in the end.Sort of.Because no matter how hard we try to faithfully respond to the community questions, we are continually distracted by discussions of food. From Twiglets to toasties, we can’t seem to take our minds off our stomachs. We almost manage some fun distractions involving the fear of samples, conflicts of interest, musical covers (again) and moving bottles at scale. We finish off with an I Am A Distillery from Menno.

The State of the CollectionWith half the team still struggling with colds and flu after the Glasgow shenanigans, they’re able to focus on topics that don’t require much sensory function, but it does place a tax on cerebral processing: what are the flavours of all the Monster Munch variants and what to do with our inevitable over-accumulation of bottles.After an exercise to establish the tallest and shortest official scotch whisky bottles (they miss two of the shortest - see if you can catch them) we then go on to share how we organise our individual collections. As we do so, we realise they’ve evolved over the years, perhaps directly reflecting our palate evolution.It’s worth dwelling on my point that - bottles aside - the real ‘collection’ is the people we’ve met along the way. Don’t worry, it doesn’t stay serious for long, we’re soon discussing sausage mastication after a quickly-guessed I Am a Distillery from Roy.This is (we think) the last time we’ll use StreamYard for the recording. Back to the old-fathful software for cleaner edits next time. Thanks for indulging the long pauses, burps, farts and erms…Remember we’re LIVE on YouTube, 9pm tomorrow - the 29th January. A first for the Dramface Podcast. Maybe the last. We’ll give it a go.

The Glasgow WanWe recorded this in summer. But our software lost half of one of the tracks. In a huff, we tried another software. It’s proven to be a better-the-devil-you-know scenario. This isn’t as ‘clean’ as usual and we think having all four of us on screen is a little distracting, but it’s recorded and we’re not trashing another - so we go. Hopefully, it’s still worthwhile, certainly should be acceptable as an audio podcast.Anyway, in this one we decompress after the Glasgow Whisky Festival Weekend. It’s always about the people. But this is a good one for those who are still to attend such an event or perhaps feel they’re yet to master it. Some of us are longer in the tooth and have worked out the best ways to get through an entire weekend of festival events. Spoiler: slow down, be mindful, take it easy. Not rocket science right?Anyway, the good news - Podcast Thirty Six is already recorded. The bad news - it was recorded the same way as this. Ah well, you’ll have it soon enough. We hope you enjoy this one!

The Introspective CrossoverIn an effort to let everyone have a wee peek at just how messy things actually are at Dramface Towers, the Colonials request the presence of the messy clown at the helm. He’s eventually asked to explain why it takes six months from recording to release, which he fails to do. In the end, however, this introspective pod ends up being a very genial affair, with lots of chat about whisky and even more about Dramface itself; which nicely betrays the general positive vibes around the place. It’s whisky and it’s meant to be fun. Serious fun, but fun. TL;DR - everyone is happy and you get to see the Colonial on video for the first time.Oh, and if you enjoy it let us know. We may release Colonials 11 on video too.

Or 'The Coffee Wan'It’s inevitable that whisky folk spend their time in more than one rabbit hole; it’s our inquisitive nature, perhaps. In the Dramface team we see a huge overlap, believe it or not, with coffee.I don’t. I don’t really drink much coffee. But I get it. What really struck me is the synergies and parallels we can draw between coffee and whisky. This episode does actually talk about whisky too, but the coffee chat renders it an excellent Coffee 101 guide for beginners. And, to the delight of Rob, Stuart, Chuck, Adam and Cleon, it has an unexpected effect on the whisky too.I’ll admit to almost spending far too much on a bag of beans and a grinder. A third listen may force it. A particularly revealing and insightful episode. Perhaps their most sober too.