Before I accidentally became a beer writer, I always wanted to be a music journalist. Ever since I was tiny, music has moved me in ways that are often delightful and occasionally scary. I have thousands of CDs in boxes in the cellar, behave like a teenage fanboy when certain bands release a new album, and I can’t write unless I have something on in the background.
Even now, when I write about beer, I’m constantly using musical analogies. Thornbridge and BrewDog are The Beatles and the Stones. Multi-national brewers are major labels and microbrewers are the indies. Even when you get into the music itself, synths and chiming guitars feel like the high notes of hops, while deep, dark malts are the backbone, the percussion.
To me beer and music have always been natural bedfellows. And it seems I’m not the only one who thinks so. I was having a conversation recently with a former record-company-exec-turned-author who told me the current, tedious debate over the definition of craft beer reminds him in many ways of a furious online debate about the meaning of ‘indie’ a decade or so back.
I’ve recently been commissioned to write two features for leading music magazines on the similarities between beer and music, by ale-loving editors who feel the passion has gone out of music, and see in the current beer boom the same vision and creativity they loved in 1977, post-punk’s ‘Year Zero’ and the birth of so many new musical movements.
Next month’s Beer magazine from the Campaign for Real Ale will carry an interview I conducted with Elbow, my favourite band and composers of the main music for the Olympics, about how and why they brewed a beer with their local brewer Robinsons to help promote their latest album. Both band and brewery seemed genuinely delighted by the results, and the effect on sales was mutually beneficial.
Just over the border in West Yorkshire (near Castleford), the Revolutions Brewing Co specialises in cask ales that are inspired by classic hits from the post-punk era. If that sounds obsessively specific, Kraftwerk Braun Ale and Clash London Porter demonstrate how beautifully well the connections work. With pumpclips resembling the sleeves of old 45s, they make any bar look achingly cool.
This year, one beer-loving music industry executive has taken the idea a step further. Sam McGregor, who used to be in a band, says: “A lot of people in bands love their beer, but when you’re on the road you get no choice in what you’re given. I physically could not drink another warm can of weak lager.”
He believes fans don’t have it much better, and after attending one gig where he had to drink awful lager, (“the bigger the gig, the crappier the beer”) he decided to do something about it.
McGregor runs a music marketing agency specialising in digital communications, so he spoke to industry contacts and soon had a few bands interested in putting their name to special releases of interesting beers. Titanic came on board as a contract brewer, and Signature Brew beers were born. “We’re not interested in talking to anyone who doesn’t want to take a full part in the brewing process,” says McGregor, “Our musicians visit the brewery and taste lots of beers, and they pretty much design the beer that has their name on it.”
First up was indie rock band The Rifles — whose manager once ran a pub — and they created The General, a 3.9% ABV session beer. Next was The Hold Steady’s Craig Finn, who created Clear Heart, a golden ale. The newest release is from London rapper Professor Green, whose Remedy is a beautifully hoppy pale ale.
“Beer and music. Like two star-crossed lovers exchanging furtive glances in front of a stage, these two have long been destined for a happily ever after,” reads the intro to Signature Brew’s website. And it’s true. Not only do beer fans and people with good music taste form a big overlap, research by Heriot-Watt University has shown the right music can actually make a beverage taste better.
This is why I’ve started running a ‘beer and music-matching’ event that pairs classic albums with great beers. To my surprise, it works!