TRANSKRIBEERI 🔗
WEBVTT
1
00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:13.100
You can tell a lot about a person by what's in their glass.
2
00:00:13.100 --> 00:00:19.120
Sometimes it says, "I appreciate true craftsmanship." And sometimes it says, "I'm going to explain
3
00:00:19.120 --> 00:00:22.760
my crypto portfolio to you at a child's birthday party."
4
00:00:22.760 --> 00:00:26.000
I'm Tim Fulton, and this is Character Proof.
5
00:00:26.000 --> 00:00:28.600
Tasting notes and character flaws.
6
00:00:28.600 --> 00:00:34.120
In every episode we pour one bottle — bourbon, scotch, tequila, whatever's on the shelf — give
7
00:00:34.120 --> 00:00:40.920
it an honest tasting, and then lovingly, specifically roast the exact person who drinks it on purpose.
8
00:00:40.920 --> 00:00:50.120
So grab a glass, pull up a chair. Let's get pouring.
9
00:00:50.120 --> 00:00:55.100
Yamazaki 12 is, by any honest measure, a beautiful whisky,
10
00:00:55.100 --> 00:00:59.500
and we have to say that clearly up front, because everything else about this episode is going
11
00:00:59.500 --> 00:01:02.500
to be about a man who has never tasted it.
12
00:01:02.500 --> 00:01:06.780
Suntory's flagship single malt, distilled at the foot of Mount Tennōzan where three
13
00:01:06.780 --> 00:01:12.580
rivers meet, matured in a mix of American, Spanish, and Japanese Mizunara oak —
14
00:01:12.580 --> 00:01:17.340
that last one is the magic, the cask that gives Japanese whisky its sandalwood-and-incense
15
00:01:17.340 --> 00:01:19.100
signature.
16
00:01:19.100 --> 00:01:24.380
The nose is peach, candied orange, a little coconut, and that unmistakable Mizunara
17
00:01:24.380 --> 00:01:27.300
sandalwood curling underneath.
18
00:01:27.300 --> 00:01:34.980
The palate is elegant and precise — stone fruit, honey, ginger, a whisper of Japanese incense,
19
00:01:34.980 --> 00:01:38.900
everything in exquisite balance and nothing raising its voice.
20
00:01:38.900 --> 00:01:42.580
The finish is long, gently spiced, and clean,
21
00:01:42.580 --> 00:01:46.900
the whole thing assembled with the quiet perfectionism the Japanese have made a national
22
00:01:46.900 --> 00:01:48.220
art form.
23
00:01:48.220 --> 00:01:54.180
It is worth its money, which is now roughly two hundred dollars, up from about forty a decade ago,
24
00:01:54.180 --> 00:01:59.020
and that number — that trajectory — is the only part of this whisky that Marcus Denning
25
00:01:59.020 --> 00:02:01.340
has ever actually consumed.
26
00:02:01.340 --> 00:02:06.140
Wait — not our Marcus from Episode 1. A different Marcus.
27
00:02:06.140 --> 00:02:10.740
This is the last thing that Marcus, or this show, will let you forget, because this one
28
00:02:10.740 --> 00:02:14.060
goes by his full name, "Marcus Denning,"
29
00:02:14.060 --> 00:02:15.060
always both,
30
00:02:15.060 --> 00:02:17.740
the way a brand protects a trademark.
31
00:02:17.740 --> 00:02:22.180
Marcus Denning is thirty-four, does something with e-commerce that he describes differently
32
00:02:22.180 --> 00:02:25.940
at every party, and he does not drink Yamazaki.
33
00:02:25.940 --> 00:02:28.620
Marcus Denning FLIPS Yamazaki.
34
00:02:28.620 --> 00:02:33.500
At 11:58 on release mornings he has four browser tabs open and a bot he paid a guy
35
00:02:33.500 --> 00:02:38.860
on Discord for, and when the bottle lands he does not open it, does not smell it, does
36
00:02:38.860 --> 00:02:41.340
not so much as photograph it lovingly —
37
00:02:41.340 --> 00:02:42.820
he lists it.
38
00:02:42.820 --> 00:02:45.420
Same afternoon. Three-times markup.
39
00:02:45.420 --> 00:02:49.420
The bottle spends its entire tenure with Marcus Denning sealed inside a shipping
40
00:02:49.420 --> 00:02:54.780
box inside a closet, a hostage that was never in danger, because Marcus Denning would no
41
00:02:54.780 --> 00:02:59.620
sooner drink his inventory than a car dealer would drive the lot home.
42
00:02:59.620 --> 00:03:03.580
And this is the part that separates Marcus Denning from every other collector we've
43
00:03:03.580 --> 00:03:06.180
profiled, and not favorably.
44
00:03:06.180 --> 00:03:10.700
Grayson Wexley hoards Pappy sealed, but Grayson at least LOVES it —
45
00:03:10.700 --> 00:03:15.820
the sealed bottle is a shrine, a sickness, but a sickness of devotion.
46
00:03:15.820 --> 00:03:20.900
Evan chased the Japan of it, the ramen and the selvedge and the eleven-day trip that never
47
00:03:20.900 --> 00:03:25.660
ended, and Evan was insufferable but Evan was in love.
48
00:03:25.660 --> 00:03:28.220
Marcus Denning feels nothing.
49
00:03:28.220 --> 00:03:31.260
He cannot tell you what Mizunara tastes like.
50
00:03:31.260 --> 00:03:34.100
He cannot tell you what Mizunara IS.
51
00:03:34.100 --> 00:03:38.980
He knows the release calendar, the resale spreads, the three regional allocation quirks
52
00:03:38.980 --> 00:03:43.100
that let him buy across state lines, and the exact phrasing in a listing that
53
00:03:43.100 --> 00:03:45.780
moves a bottle in under an hour —
54
00:03:45.780 --> 00:03:48.260
"collector's item, sealed, smoke-free home,"
55
00:03:48.260 --> 00:03:54.740
a smoke-free home being relevant to a sealed bottle in precisely no way, but it converts,
56
00:03:54.740 --> 00:03:57.180
and Marcus Denning follows the data.
57
00:03:57.180 --> 00:03:59.200
He is not a whisky person.
58
00:03:59.200 --> 00:04:02.900
He is a logistics event wearing a whisky's clothes.
59
00:04:02.900 --> 00:04:06.180
Ask him what it tastes like and he'll answer with a number —
60
00:04:06.180 --> 00:04:10.340
the last sale, the spread, the projected appreciation curve if he holds through
61
00:04:10.340 --> 00:04:15.300
the holidays — fluent, instant, and entirely about money,
62
00:04:15.300 --> 00:04:20.980
because to Marcus Denning the flavor profile of Yamazaki 12 is a line on a chart that goes
63
00:04:20.980 --> 00:04:23.220
up and to the right.
64
00:04:23.220 --> 00:04:27.140
Here's the honest mechanism, and it's bleak, so we'll be
Load full transcript
quick:
65
00:04:27.140 --> 00:04:33.460
scarcity created a parasite class, and Marcus Denning is a happy, thriving specimen.
66
00:04:33.460 --> 00:04:36.540
The whisky boom made bottles into assets,
67
00:04:36.540 --> 00:04:41.460
assets attract arbitrage, and arbitrage doesn't require a palate, a passion,
68
00:04:41.460 --> 00:04:45.700
or a pulse — just wifi and a restocking alert.
69
00:04:45.700 --> 00:04:49.660
Every bottle Marcus Denning flips is a bottle that doesn't reach someone who'd have opened
70
00:04:49.660 --> 00:04:51.500
it on their anniversary.
71
00:04:51.500 --> 00:04:53.980
He is the reason the shelf is empty.
72
00:04:53.980 --> 00:04:56.820
He is the reason the price is insane.
73
00:04:56.820 --> 00:05:01.340
He is, in the ecosystem of this show, the apex predator,
74
00:05:01.340 --> 00:05:04.740
and the prey is joy.
75
00:05:04.740 --> 00:05:09.020
And here's the affectionate part, because there's always one — except this week we
76
00:05:09.020 --> 00:05:13.540
had to hunt for it, and we're not sure we're going to be graceful about it.
77
00:05:13.540 --> 00:05:14.700
Here it is:
78
00:05:14.700 --> 00:05:17.540
Marcus Denning is going to be fine.
79
00:05:17.540 --> 00:05:22.900
He'll flip Yamazaki until the margins thin, then flip sneakers, then flip GPUs, then
80
00:05:22.900 --> 00:05:24.540
flip whatever's next,
81
00:05:24.540 --> 00:05:29.180
a man permanently one step ahead of caring about anything.
82
00:05:29.180 --> 00:05:34.260
And the tiny tragedy — the only soft thing in the whole episode — is that he's standing
83
00:05:34.260 --> 00:05:39.780
in a river of one of the most beautiful things humans make, moving it hand over hand for a
84
00:05:39.780 --> 00:05:41.060
markup,
85
00:05:41.060 --> 00:05:45.460
and he will die of thirst without ever knowing he was wet.
86
00:05:45.460 --> 00:05:51.780
So flip the bottle, Marcus Denning, both names, sealed and boxed and gone by dinner.
87
00:05:51.780 --> 00:05:55.660
Somewhere a person you'll never meet paid triple and opened it on a Tuesday for
88
00:05:55.660 --> 00:05:59.180
no reason and wept a little at the sandalwood.
89
00:05:59.180 --> 00:06:01.500
That was always the point of the bottle.
90
00:06:01.540 --> 00:06:06.020
You had it in your hands, and you sold the point, and kept the box.
91
00:06:18.140 --> 00:06:21.780
Well, the glass is empty, and the verdict is in.
92
00:06:21.780 --> 00:06:24.780
That's going to do it for this episode of Character Proof.
93
00:06:24.780 --> 00:06:28.940
If you saw yourself in tonight's pour — first of all, we love you.
94
00:06:28.940 --> 00:06:33.940
Second, hit subscribe, leave a five-star review, and send this to the friend whose bar cart
95
00:06:33.940 --> 00:06:35.900
costs more than their car.
96
00:06:35.900 --> 00:06:37.820
Got a bottle you want us to put on trial?
97
00:06:37.820 --> 00:06:43.060
Drop it in the reviews or find us on socials, and you just might be next week's character.
98
00:06:43.060 --> 00:06:49.060
Until next time: drink responsibly, pour generously, and always check your character flaws.
99
00:06:49.060 --> 00:06:49.580
Cheers.