DFW Readers: Hear Me Talk About Loony Liquor Laws

If you missed my talk on "Loony Liquor Laws" last month, here is your second chance. I will be speaking on the same subject at the University of North Texas this evening, courtesy of Young Americans for Liberty. The discussion will include Jester King Brewery's successful First Amendment challenge to state restrictions on beer marketing. Among other things, those rules forced the Austin brewery to censor the names of its beers (see right, where the word strong in "Thrash Metal Farmhouse Strong Ale" is blacked out) and barred it from telling customers where they could buy its products.

The details: 5 p.m., Thursday, March 15, Wooten Hall, University of North Texas, 1121 Union Circle, Denton, Texas.

Comments

[End Child Unemployment]

It is plain to me, as it should be to anyone with any sense, that the brand name Jester King is a decidedly unmetal moniker.

The first portion, Jester, brings to mind the mascot image of In Flames, who have decidedly become false after Anders Frieden decided it would be a great idea to try to sing like Jonathon Davis.

[End Child Unemployment]

Also, I wonder if their Black Metal Farmhouse Imperial Stout intentionally tastes like shit.

[Apatheist ?_??]

MMmmmmmmm had some of that Thrash Metal this weekend.

[Solanum]

Is that Warty or Steve Smith in the logo?

[SugarFree]

Warty is completely hairless because he tried to freebase Nair in high school.

[Warty]

That's only technically correct, you asshole.

[SugarFree]

But that's the best kind of correct, jerkface.

[T]

So, I'm hearing a thumbs up for Thrash Metal and a thumbs down for the Imperial Stout. Any other votes?

[Apatheist ?_??]

I like many of their beers though none of them are my favorite among Texas breweries in any one category. Until recently there were that many big bottle beers from Texas breweries beyond specialty seasonals but the competition has really exploded. By my count there have been about 10 new breweries this year including several here in Houston. Needless to say I haven't bought a beer from outside Texas (besides Lagunitas) for a while just to get through them all.

[End Child Unemployment]

My post was not a comment on the flavonoid content of the Black Metal brew, as I have not had it. It was a metal inside - I don't care for black metal (the [alleged] music) at all.

[Gray Ghost]

Per a recent visit to the brewery outside Austin, they recently changed their yeast and the guy giving the tour seemed to take pride in their inconsistent flavor, batch to batch.

I don't care for the changes, but Black Metal is still a tasty IS, if not quite as good as it used to be. Evidently there is a difference between the Farmhouse IS and the regular IS. I'm not sure if "farmhouse" is just a label to affixed to all of their beers going forward, or if it has some particular meaning. Their Petit Prince, now available, is a tasty mild. I also liked their Noble King, while an ale, it's a spitting image for a crisp dry Czech-style pilsner.

[Warty]

Remember when In Flames was awesome?

This is as good a place as any for a metal thread. I'm super into Hail Spirit Noir right now.

[End Child Unemployment]

I still have Whoracle on speed dial. Couldn't get into the second one though. Same complaint as pretty much every other black metal feel music I've tried to listen to - it sounds to me like they wanted their guitar tone to sound bad.

[Warty]

I'm also really into the new Sigh record, which is just absolutely batshit bonkers.

[End Child Unemployment]

You seem to be really digging this whole progressive check it out we have church organ sound keyboards thing.

I've been really digging This song even though they don't really do anything different than Katatonia. I think the video is interesting, and for some reason their songs get stuck in my head.

[notalentassclown]

the thrash metal is delish... the black metal was good, but there are way better imperial stouts out there...

but i like what Jester King is tryng to do, bringing a little something different to the Texas beer market, and obviously, advocating for good causes

[Brandybuck]

Off topic, but when the tell are they going to make home distilling legal? Where's Jimmy Carter when you need him?

[ClubMedSux]

Probably not for a long time. Still a ton of misinformation about exploding stills and moonshine that makes you go blind.

[T]

You're a libertarian, fuck the man and do it anyway.

However, as I know I can't make anything as good as Garrison Brothers, I ain't gonna try.

[Brandybuck]

Trouble is getting the still. I've looked, and apparently your name gets put on a list when you buy one. You can get them from Australia instead, but then US Customs gets involved.

[Killazontherun]

My copy of the constitution must be incomplete. Where is the part that excludes commercial speech from protection?

[Night Elf Mohawk]

If they can do that to "no law" the commerce clause never had a chance.

[Your Congresscreature]

Commerce Clause, biotch!

[Killazontherun]

Oh, here it is! Commerce clause, 'everything else in this document is null and void.' So embarrassed that I never noticed that before.

[Your Congresscreature]

Don't you forget it! And don't even think of voting me out!

[R C Dean]

Where is the part that excludes commercial speech from protection?

The commercial speech exception is right next to the porn exception. Duh.

[Rich]

Serious question: Why is otherwise-somewhat-leaning-libertarian Texas loony like this?

[R C Dean]

Fucking backwoods Baptists.

[Rich]

Thanks, R C. You're always good for a straight answer.

Any parts of Texas sufficiently free of fbB to live in?

[Gojira]

Avoid the suburbs. I tried to attend a few TP meetings here just north of Dallas when that whole thing first kicked off, and while the TP movement at large may have become compromised, the rich Texas suburbs TP started off that way and never looked back.

I kept trying to bring up the economic aspects of everything, but they were solely interested in how we can stop Big Gov't from forcing us to tolerate the existence of non-straights and non-christians.

[Rich]

Wow. Trust the food was OK, though.

[Gojira]

Oh yeah, some Grade-A bbq.

[Aresen]

Conservative =/= libertarian. Just ask any innocent person making a clemency appeal to Rick Perry.

[Apatheist ?_??]

As much as I like to piss on Perry when he's down, this is pretty much out of his hand. By law he's not even able to consider clemency/pardons unless the Texas Board of Pardons and Clemency recommends it.

[Proprietist]

Yeah, we have an AG that tried to crack down on sex toys. Also, our Tax Freedom Day is sitting next to Oregon in the middle of the pack. I wouldn't call Texas libertarian, although like much of the South, it's fairly federalist.

[Pope Jimbo]

If you need any more depressing examples, here's one from Sunny Minnesota.

Here we have a lot of brew pubs, but they aren't able to sell their beer in liquor stores or other restaurants because of our old blue laws (and even if they win this battle, they still won't be able to sell on Sunday).

"This isn't cupcakes, it's not pastries, it's not bread we're talking about. This is booze," said Frank Ball of the Minnesota Licensed Beverage Association. "We really do support folks in the craft brewing industry. We love their product. But we also have to be mindful that this is a controlled substance we're dealing with."

[Apatheist ?_??]

That's the same here in Texas. It was the one part of the lawsuit that the judge didn't support the plaintiffs. Unsurprising since Jester King's coplaintiff was a distributor who probably wasn't pushing very hard for that change.

[Cameron]

I really wish you would announce these earlier than the day they are occurring.

[Apatheist ?_??]

They did, this is a re-post, see the earlier posts above.