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You can tell a lot about a person by what's in their glass.
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Sometimes it says, "I appreciate true craftsmanship." And sometimes it says, "I'm going to explain
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my crypto portfolio to you at a child's birthday party."
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I'm Tim Fulton, and this is Character Proof.
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Tasting notes and character flaws.
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In every episode we pour one bottle — bourbon, scotch, tequila, whatever's on the shelf — give
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it an honest tasting, and then lovingly, specifically roast the exact person who drinks it on purpose.
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So grab a glass, pull up a chair. Let's get pouring.
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Yamazaki 12 is, by any honest measure, a beautiful whisky,
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and we have to say that clearly up front, because everything else about this episode is going
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to be about a man who has never tasted it.
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Suntory's flagship single malt, distilled at the foot of Mount Tennōzan where three
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rivers meet, matured in a mix of American, Spanish, and Japanese Mizunara oak —
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that last one is the magic, the cask that gives Japanese whisky its sandalwood-and-incense
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signature.
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The nose is peach, candied orange, a little coconut, and that unmistakable Mizunara
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sandalwood curling underneath.
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The palate is elegant and precise — stone fruit, honey, ginger, a whisper of Japanese incense,
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everything in exquisite balance and nothing raising its voice.
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The finish is long, gently spiced, and clean,
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the whole thing assembled with the quiet perfectionism the Japanese have made a national
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art form.
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It is worth its money, which is now roughly two hundred dollars, up from about forty a decade ago,
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and that number — that trajectory — is the only part of this whisky that Marcus Denning
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has ever actually consumed.
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Wait — not our Marcus from Episode 1. A different Marcus.
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This is the last thing that Marcus, or this show, will let you forget, because this one
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goes by his full name, "Marcus Denning,"
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always both,
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the way a brand protects a trademark.
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Marcus Denning is thirty-four, does something with e-commerce that he describes differently
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at every party, and he does not drink Yamazaki.
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Marcus Denning FLIPS Yamazaki.
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At 11:58 on release mornings he has four browser tabs open and a bot he paid a guy
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on Discord for, and when the bottle lands he does not open it, does not smell it, does
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not so much as photograph it lovingly —
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he lists it.
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Same afternoon. Three-times markup.
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The bottle spends its entire tenure with Marcus Denning sealed inside a shipping
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box inside a closet, a hostage that was never in danger, because Marcus Denning would no
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sooner drink his inventory than a car dealer would drive the lot home.
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And this is the part that separates Marcus Denning from every other collector we've
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profiled, and not favorably.
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Grayson Wexley hoards Pappy sealed, but Grayson at least LOVES it —
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the sealed bottle is a shrine, a sickness, but a sickness of devotion.
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Evan chased the Japan of it, the ramen and the selvedge and the eleven-day trip that never
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ended, and Evan was insufferable but Evan was in love.
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Marcus Denning feels nothing.
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He cannot tell you what Mizunara tastes like.
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He cannot tell you what Mizunara IS.
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He knows the release calendar, the resale spreads, the three regional allocation quirks
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that let him buy across state lines, and the exact phrasing in a listing that
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moves a bottle in under an hour —
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"collector's item, sealed, smoke-free home,"
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a smoke-free home being relevant to a sealed bottle in precisely no way, but it converts,
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and Marcus Denning follows the data.
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He is not a whisky person.
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He is a logistics event wearing a whisky's clothes.
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Ask him what it tastes like and he'll answer with a number —
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the last sale, the spread, the projected appreciation curve if he holds through
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the holidays — fluent, instant, and entirely about money,
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because to Marcus Denning the flavor profile of Yamazaki 12 is a line on a chart that goes
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up and to the right.
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Here's the honest mechanism, and it's bleak, so we'll be
Load full transcript
quick:
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scarcity created a parasite class, and Marcus Denning is a happy, thriving specimen.
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The whisky boom made bottles into assets,
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assets attract arbitrage, and arbitrage doesn't require a palate, a passion,
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or a pulse — just wifi and a restocking alert.
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Every bottle Marcus Denning flips is a bottle that doesn't reach someone who'd have opened
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it on their anniversary.
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He is the reason the shelf is empty.
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He is the reason the price is insane.
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He is, in the ecosystem of this show, the apex predator,
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and the prey is joy.
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And here's the affectionate part, because there's always one — except this week we
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had to hunt for it, and we're not sure we're going to be graceful about it.
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Here it is:
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Marcus Denning is going to be fine.
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He'll flip Yamazaki until the margins thin, then flip sneakers, then flip GPUs, then
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flip whatever's next,
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a man permanently one step ahead of caring about anything.
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And the tiny tragedy — the only soft thing in the whole episode — is that he's standing
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in a river of one of the most beautiful things humans make, moving it hand over hand for a
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markup,
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and he will die of thirst without ever knowing he was wet.
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So flip the bottle, Marcus Denning, both names, sealed and boxed and gone by dinner.
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Somewhere a person you'll never meet paid triple and opened it on a Tuesday for
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no reason and wept a little at the sandalwood.
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That was always the point of the bottle.
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You had it in your hands, and you sold the point, and kept the box.
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Well, the glass is empty, and the verdict is in.
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That's going to do it for this episode of Character Proof.
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If you saw yourself in tonight's pour — first of all, we love you.
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Second, hit subscribe, leave a five-star review, and send this to the friend whose bar cart
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costs more than their car.
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Got a bottle you want us to put on trial?
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Drop it in the reviews or find us on socials, and you just might be next week's character.
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Until next time: drink responsibly, pour generously, and always check your character flaws.
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Cheers.