Springbank 16 Year Old Local Barley Whisky Review!

The mighty, legendary first release of the current Springbank Local Barley series, the 16-year old. Despite being released only six years ago (but it feels more like a decade ago), this whisky has become almost mythical in the last year or two!

Nostalgia in whisky can be a cruel mistress. We whisky lovers tend to look at the past through rose-tinted glasses, whether they're aimed at closed or dead distilleries, older limited releases, or older and/or discontinued core range bottlings. Some are underappreciated at the time, and to paraphrase about twenty 1980s power ballads, sometimes "we don't know what we've got 'til it's gone". Sometimes these whiskies are immediately appreciated in smaller circles, but the distillery responsible then explodes in popularity and can't keep up with demand, making them near impossible to find - which brings us to Campbeltown stalwart Springbank. For quite a long time this quieter distillery was something of a "deeper cut", as in it was really only recognised by hardcore whisky fans and often spoken about in hushed tones. Springbank and it's three different spirits have always been harder to find than the more commercially-oriented, marketing-heavy brands, generally requiring more effort than simply walking into your nearest supermarket/supermarket-owned liquor store or bottle shop and grabbing one from the shelf. And it still is harder than that, except it's now gotten to the point where the usual sources have all but dried up, and most of the stock never reaches shelves of any description before it's completely sold out and allocations are exhausted. Importers themselves are selling out of entire shipments before they'd even sent their allocations to other retailer, thus narrowing the pool even further. In a way, we've brought this on ourselves - we should've all kept our mouths shut about this brilliant old-school distillery and their brilliant old-school whiskies. But in the current & continuing whisky boom, both sustained & accelerated by the pandemic, it was inevitable that the spotlight would finally shine on the "wee 'toon" that is Campbeltown. It's a shame that the region's three small distilleries never had any real chance of keeping up!

One specific iteration of Springbank that has really catapulted in demand is the Local Barley series, distilled from barley grown on the Kintyre peninsula. Prior to the sixth bottling in the series, the 10-year old sherry cask matured release from late 2020, the "LB" series was slowly on the rise in popularity, but once that dark-coloured sherry cask hit the interweb in the middle of the pandemic-induced wave of insanity that is still continuing, the entire series was propelled into the stratosphere. Now there has been another release of 10-year old Local Barley Springbank, this time from 100% bourbon casks and the largest release to date of 15,000 bottles, which in theory should make it a little easier to source than its predecessors since it won't have the same appeal to the flippers and speculators. Although something tells me I may be dreaming there! Ignoring the older releases from the late 1990s that are now unicorn bottles, this 'modern' Local Barley series started back in 2016 with the 16-year old release that we're looking at today, which is the oldest in the series by a significant margin, followed by the 11-year old. If you're wanting to buy a bottle of this 16-year old Springbank here in 2022, you'll be looking at over £2,000 GBP at the latest overseas auctions - which has almost doubled in only a few months on the same auction site. For those of us playing on the other side of the planet, that would come to something like $5,000 AUD once Australian customs have had their way with you. Truly an insane amount of money for a teenaged whisky with a relatively high amount of bottles released (9,000), and only six years ago. Here's the kicker; the original retail pricing was around £95 GBP and around $220 here in Australia, which was widely considered to be too expensive at the time, particularly in Europe. Those naysayers have certainly been proven wrong since. I did say that nostalgia in whisky was a cruel mistress!

Given those astronomical and frankly stupid current values, the source of today's review may come as something of a surprise. I actually won this 30ml sample via an Instagram giveaway during a "like & share" promotion from Australian online retailer The Old Barrelhouse, who believe it or not actually gave away four of them! Before you start sharpening your pitchforks, there was no special treatment involved, all four winners were chosen by randomiser, nor was there any obligation whatsoever to review said sample here, or to mention where it came from. In fact I debated what to do with it for quite a while! With 30ml of this modern-day unicorn whisky in hand, which is now basically unobtainable, I could either a) drink it, b) share it with a friend, or c) review it here. As you can probably tell by now, I've gone with option C, although I was leaning towards the slightly more philanthropic option B until I realised that this would only upset the friends that I didn't share it with. So I'm going to upset you all instead, by singing this whisky's praises all over the internet. Now that I think of it, I suppose option C does also contain shades of option A...

The 16-year old Springbank Local Barley was distilled in 1999 from Prisma barley grown on Low Machrimore farm on the Kintyre Peninsula, a few miles from the distillery. That barley was of course floor-malted on-site at the distillery, lightly peated to roughly 15 ppm and distilled 2.5-times in the usual Springbank fashion. It was matured in 80% ex-bourbon casks and 20% ex-sherry casks, and bottled in January 2016 at a cask strength of 54.3%. As with everything from Springbank, it is non-chill filtered and no colouring has been added. Fire up the DeLorean, doc!

Springbank Local Barley 16-year old, 54.3%. Campbeltown, Scotland.

Distilled in 1999 from Prisma barley grown on the Kintyre Peninsula, floor-malted and lightly peated at the distillery. Matured in 80% ex-bourbon and 20% ex-sherry casks, bottled January 2016. Non-chill filtered, natural colour. 9,000 bottles. 

Colour: Medium gold. 

Nose: Soft, minerally, malty. Peeled red apples, wet stone (flinty minerality), touch of old galvanised sheet metal and a little minty around the edges. Lovely golden malted barley, lightly grassy. Zesty lemon peel and a little honey-roasted nuts. Earthy, dusty dunnage warehouse floors, touch of fennel and white pepper. Grapefruit, clean wax and olive oil with more time. 

Texture: Medium weight. Rich & oily, malty & zesty. No heat at all. 

Taste: Clean engine oils, touch of petrol, gentle ashy peat smoke. Loads of lemon peel, even more grassy malt. Drying minerality (damp stone / flint), grapefruit and white pepper again. Dusty, earthy dunnage floors, but not as dank & musty as some can be! 

Finish: Medium-long length. Grapefruit & lemon again, dried lemon now though. Dusty grassy malt, a touch of hay, soft ashy/sooty smoke and that subtle metallic note. Earthy dunnage floors again with clean industrial oils and a subtle touch of salt. 

Score: 4.5 out of 5. 

Notes: Just delicious. Very "old school", with great maturity and character. But it's not as "funky" as some Springbank can get (which can tend to fade with maturation time), instead it's very malty, oily, citrusy and mineral. And there's very little obvious cask influence. Which is just what we want in a local barley Springbank! There's a nice industrial side here too, particularly on the palate and finish, but again it's not as dirty or dank as you may expect. Loads of character though, and it certainly doesn't feel like anything is missing or lacking. Not at all! 

This 16-year old Local Barley Springbank has to be one of the most "old school" whiskies that we've seen in modern times, particularly given the lack of overt cask influence of wood impact getting in the way of that lovely malty spirit. It's still the king of the current iteration of the Local Barley line-up if you ask me, but really you can't go wrong with any of them. Even the sherry cask from 2020/2021, albeit in a completely different way. These guys do not skimp on quality! 

Thanks to The Old Barrelhouse team for generously giving this sample away via Instagram - again, at random and with zero obligation whatsoever - when they could've easily sold the four samples for substantial amounts of money. This whisky deserves its legendary status - less so the current asking prices, though. 

Cheers!