I love the combination of long, elegant structure and ripe, rich fruit that winemaker James Hook gets into his wines, and this is a great example of it.Rich blackberry, plums and chocolate flavour, an integrated, smoky oak edge pitching the wine terrifically. Top echelon McLaren Vale shiraz.
Drink: 2008-2018. 94 points.
Philip White on Shiraz Viognier 2006
James Hook, the vine scientist, wrangles this California Road vineyard, mostly for a local refinery that which uses the fruit as a strengthening essence. Nothing industrial about James' share: fanatical environmentally concious attention to detail growing, minimal watering, and on through all the traditional winemaking you can think of at Redhead Studio. I wonder how much that shagged dancer has drunk; this sets MY feet tapping. It's beautiful, wholesome, dense shiraz. And quite rightfully, the few percent viognier adds only the fine tannin, not the sickening peach syrup some boofheads insist on. A year or two of dungeon will see this glory really glow.
Cassoulet. 93 +++ points.
Gary Walsh on Shiraz 2006
I am not lazy really, just a bit short of time, but this wine put a bit of a spring in my step. Half way through tasting I slipped into my tights and did a grand jeté across the lounge room. Invigorating.
Rich and full with aromas of blackberry, chocolate, plum pudding and coffee oak. On the palate full bodied, mouthfilling and thick with plenty of extract and chunky chalky tannins spreading along the mouth like a steamroller flattening warm tar. It has flavours of plum and blackberry, chocolate, coffee and some earthiness with excellent length of flavour.
A big wine offering big value. 94 Points
Jeremy Pringle - Wine will eat itself - 2006 Shiraz Viognier.
Sellick's Hill (Shiraz) Blewitt Springs (Viognier) McLaren Vale SA
14.9% Diam $20- Tasted 29/6/09
"I walked down to the ocean
After waking from a nightmare
No moon, no pale reflection
Black Mirror, black mirror"
- Arcade Fire
Mirror Noir indeed. I was privileged enough to procure 2 bottles of this wine made with obvious passion and in very small quantities by James Hook. He lists his vineyard as "somewhere on Culley Road, in the foothills" on the back of the bottle, and for once the back of the bottle is not just a commercial blurb designed to capture the passer by's attention enough to grab a bottle of something on the way home to slug back with dinner. The image on the front of the bottle is quite stunning too. It pricks me in the way Roland Barthe's speaks of in "Camera Lucida", as does the wine. I am not entirely sure what to make of it, I certainly can't "capture" it in words, yet is does seem to invite me to look into its mirror and find meaning. Mr Hook is excellent with a camera too.
"Shot by security camera
You can watch your own image
and also look yourself in the eye
Black mirror, black mirror"
So what did I make of this wine. Well I should begin by telling you that Mr Hook told me the wine was red and contains alcohol, and indeed, as well as being dryly witty, he tells the truth. But obfuscates it at the same time. Possessing synethesia, as did the late and great Jimi Hendrix (who instructed his various bands that this song should be more "purple" to make his point), I would say that the Lazy Ballerina is a "black" wine. A "black" wine which does not hide its alcohol but is certainly more than capable of containing it.
"I know a time is coming
All words will lose there meaning
Please show me something that isn't mine
But mine is the only kind I relate to
Le miroir casse
The mirror casts mon reflet partout
Black mirror, black mirror"
I opened a bottle of this on a sombre and somewhat depressing night, hoping that it may cheer me up. But that was not the wine's aim. It sat silently with me long into the eve, but its dense and heavy presence did comfort me. A complex, black and mournful wine.
"The black mirror knows no reflection
It knows not pride or vanity
It cares not about your dreams
It cares not for your pyramid schemes
Their names are never spoken
The curse is never broken"
The wine did not want to tell me everything in life was fine. It knew everything in life was far from fine. And I realised I did not need platitudes to cheer me up, I needed someone to sit with me, someone who understood how I felt. There were fruit flavours here, black and red and apricot. It made me think of blood and iodine too, whether they were present as flavours in the wine, I do not know.
"Un! Deux! Trois! Dis: Mirror Noir
Black Mirror!
Un! Deux! Trois! Dis: Mirror Noir
Black Mirror!"
Bu the viognier component (not sure of percentage, the bottle mentioned throwing a few buckets into each fermenter, for extra effect) did add extra effect. It seemed to suggest that along with a black and mournful character was a longing for beauty and happiness, the carefree nature that adds "a few buckets of viognier" on a whim, and a very intelligent whim at that.
Do youself a favour and head over to the Lazy B. website. Have a good look around. Check out Wine Fight Club. What Mr Hook is doing in writing up McLaren Vale's history, vinous and otherwise is very important. As was this wine. I can't score it, it scorched me.
