All the
hullabaloo at Beervana over the label for Upright's bottles of Four Play reminded me of a beer label I spotted a few months ago at Belmont Station, this "Before-After Triple Bock", which turns out to be from a Lithuanian brewery called
Rinkuškiai. It didn't cost much, and I didn't have much hope for an allegedly 12% ABV Baltic bock that I'd never heard of, but it I figured the somewhat humorous nature of the label made it worth a couple bucks.
See how pretty the girl is
after you drink this beer? You should have seen her beforehand (see the side-by-side picture at the bottom of this post). Talk about beer goggles. The beer was pretty bad, by the way: syrupy and one-dimensional. Dave
described it as: "Like syrup from canned fruit cocktail with fluorescent cherries". It gets a generous "C" on
Beer Advocate.
Back to
Ezra's label for this year's Four Play. Commenters at Beervana and the New School have complained that the painting of a partially undressed woman on a couch objectifies women. Good lord. It's a stylized piece of art, and while I think the artist has portrayed an attractive, fit young woman, it's not necessarily a seductive pose. She might be waking up with a hangover, for all the picture conveys. To the complaint that the label panders to "stereotypical hyper-masculine, heterosexual males", Ezra replies that there is no indication of masculinity or heterosexuality in the picture at all: "the lack of presence of a male could mean the opposite".
To my mind, the Before-After label is more offensive than the Four Play label. It's a clever drawing, and good for a titter or two, but it sends an even bleaker message about women than Ezra's pin-up art. First, it says that a woman is only interesting if she has a particular kind of youthful beauty. A second implication is that if you can just get drunk enough, you'll be ready to hook up with any woman. But look, even though I said the label was more offensive than Four Play's, it's not worth throwing a snit about either one. Lighten up, people. Next you'll be complaining about the
St. Pauli Girl (this year's is a trained architect and kick-boxer who speaks five languages and is developing her own make-up line!).
Judging from the website, Rinkuškiai markets a much more staid image in Lithuania. But trolling the internet I found a couple more labels where they strive for prurience in strange and ineffective ways:
Lobster Lovers Lager and
Werewolf Dark Ale.
One more thing. Why is it that, in a town full of beer lovers, any little glitch is greeted with a chorus of "Boycott!"?
To my mind, the Before-After label is more offensive than the Four Play label. It's a clever drawing, and good for a titter or two, but it sends an even bleaker message about women than Ezra's pin-up art. First, it says that a woman is only interesting if she has a particular kind of youthful beauty. A second implication is that if you can just get drunk enough, you'll be ready to hook up with any woman. But look, even though I said the label was more offensive than Four Play's, it's not worth throwing a snit about either one. Lighten up, people. Next you'll be complaining about the St. Pauli Girl (this year's is a trained architect and kick-boxer who speaks five languages and is developing her own make-up line!).
Last month I listed the Reel 'M' Inn tavern as a stop on a Division Street pub crawl, despite never having been in there myself. That didn't seem very prudent, so I stopped in recently at lunchtime to try the tavern's signature chicken and jo-jos. If you're wondering what the heck jo-jos are, they're quartered potatoes, battered and deep fried. Mmm mmm!