RobbieTheWagner 
Adam Argyle In today's modern technological world, developers face many difficult questions. Artificial intelligence, autonomous agents, JavaScript frameworks, even CSS. With so much happening so quickly, how can a developer possibly keep up? Simple. Just listen to the world's most important AI podcast. Two experts, countless opinions, zero hesitation. The Internet is complicated. These men are not. Each week they review the latest developments in artificial intelligence and modern web development. This is Whiskey, Web and Whatnot, the world's most important AI podcast. This episode is sponsored by MailTrap, modern email delivery for developers, straightforward integration into your code with native SDKs, security compliant API and SMTP, 4,000 emails monthly in their free tier, MCP and API integrations for your agents and coding assistants, and PS 24 seven support.
You contact people, not an AI chatbot. Try it mailtrap.io today. That's M-A-I-L-T-R-A-P.io. And back to that episode. I can't hear it Can you hear it Robbie? Yeah I can hear it I can't hear it Weird I can hear your voice. I can't hear the guitar at all. Must be some noise cancellation coming through from something. I don't know. Oh, yeah. Well, it's too bad you missed it. I mean, I messed up a couple times, but it was all right. You could definitely recognize the tune. Yeah, dude, this one has killed a zombie already. See, it's called The Zombie Killer. It's covered in blood. It's got a chainsaw around the sides, and there's zombie parts and zombie heads all up in the...
This is a cool banjo. That is very, very cool. Oh, damn, I was going to sing along. Yeah, welcome everyone to the musical stylings of Adam Argyle, also formerly known as Whiskey Web and whatnot. Yeah, we're here. I just started it early because he was playing banjo and I was like, let's just do it. But what's up? We're here. I'm Robbie. He's Adam. We have a guest today. Who is it, Adam? Who do we have on the show today? Oh, our guest today is an entrepreneur, engineer, industrial designer, creative director, and photographer, crafter, and not in the digital realm, but a mastermind. master of the elements and materials of this physical world.
He created a whiskey glass that launched a brand. Forms named it one of the best whiskey glasses on the market, later winning an award in 2023 for the bourbon glass design. And you can't talk about amazing glassware designs without talking about the jet engine style, rotatable wine glass that turns heads whenever it's whipped out. Robbie, did you know that Ryan Reynolds even commented that this was like the best wine glass ever in a Mercedes-Benz article? I did not. But did you love that, Ryan? I know, right? Known for function over aesthetics, but clearly capable of making beauty. Researcher, tastemaker, photographer, distiller, and master of sensory performance.
Denver Cranberry, y'all, from the global glassware brand, Denver and Lylee on the show. What's up? Holy shit. What an intro, man. And what a heart, dude. I need to be a rapper or something for that. That was awesome. What's up? I don't know. I'm ready to drink whiskey. And that was an incredible start before we even got into it, like before we started recording with the banjo and the stories. I'm very much looking forward to this. Same. I've been looking forward to this for a while as well. Yeah, likewise. We got this nice bottle here. They're all mostly the same. Ours is not cast strength, unfortunately, but should be the same otherwise.
Let's see. I bet Denver can tell us a bunch of deets about Starward. I do have some notes about, well, you can tell them, Robbie, about the whiskey, but they're local to you, right? Like, do you know these cats? Do you go high five them? Actually, yeah, yeah. They're the closest distillery to my house. Sweet. I think it's about 4km, 4km or 5km from my house. So, yeah, it's not that far at all. And, yeah, I've known David Vitale since the start, basically. I'm used to distilling an air hangar at an airport. So, yeah, it's pretty crazy. So, he actually gave me this jumper, actually. There you go.
Starwood Jaws Sick Yeah I've known him from the start He kind of helped us with the start of the business Many many many moons ago Oh Yeah him and Like basically Balvenie So David Stewart and Sam Simmons Back then Yeah that was pretty Tough cork to rip out of there but it was worth it A little tight yeah Yeah so this is Let's see My notes are gone. Where did they go? This is from Starward. It is a single malt finished in a Lagavulin cask. It's the collaboration between Starward. I just dropped my cork on the ground in Melbourne. And I already said all this. It's Lagavulin and Starward. It's 48% ABV.
That's ours, right, Adam? Yeah. I think it said all of them, but mine's... Well, cast drinks should be hotter. Yeah, you might be 1 or so. What proof is yours, Denver? Mine's 55. 55. Nice. Oh, you're getting the full flavor, dude. Dang. I don't know. That's subjective, yeah, with proof and stuff. My feeling is actually I'm getting more and more into lower proof stuff. I like that sort of lower barrel entry proof and stuff that Mictus does, for example. And, like, there's many distillers that kind of put way more water in. Colin Scott from... Shivers Regal, I think he does 50-50, so just proof it right down because then you can actually taste it much more.
I think there was a bit of a trend there a few years ago, like people just wanted to keep on going higher and higher, like 60. I think I had a stag or something last time I was in the States, which was like early 70s or something. Like ridiculous. What's that for? I think I can clean my car with that. Yep. You can use it for if you have some surgeries you need to do. It's good for that. But yeah, so this is, I'm just reading what Adam wrote, so I assume this is correct. There's three years in a red wine barrel and finished for 18 months in the Lagavulin cask. No age statement specifically though.
Um, and yeah, let's, let's get it. I think it's like, yeah, I've got a feeling it's around sort of six, five, six or something. Um, but yeah, remember the like different aging is different in different countries. So. Right. Yeah. I said Melbourne's got the Four Seasons climate, which I'd never heard of before. I know there's like climates that go up and down or we have some in the States that are really hot. And so you get the more angel share that happens. But what do you know about the, tell us about the Four Seasons that are striking your distilleries there? Yeah, there's even songs written about it.
Four Seasons in One Day by, I think it's Crowded House. But, yeah, basically in Melbourne, occasionally you get these days that are like it can be really hot in the morning and it'll be fucking freezing by the evening, like in the same day. You get full sun, you get like shorts and stuff, but you need to be prepared for anything on some of these days. So it can really, really, really change in Melbourne. Yeah, it's bizarre, but like, I don't know, I was born here, so I'm very used to it. And then I go overseas and then everything's stable all the time. boring yeah that's why California sucks it's stable I call it two seasons it's like hot and then kind of hot I'm like that's boring four seasons is way better hot and kind of hot yeah yeah oh it's a bit different in places like in Central America like you have the rainy season and the wet season they're like yeah
and people say seattle rains a lot i'm like tell me about where you're from and how you got weather that's all chill like yeah i think it's a lie it's a lot all right so tell me about this whiskey like yeah i'm smelling i'm smelling some spiced apple cider mixed with grape high chew anyone else getting that well somebody went to university The grape high chew is pretty spot on. There is an initial juice that is just super good, super different. You can taste the wine barrel in there, but the finish, it goes from leather to the delightful peat that comes from the Lagavulin barrel. And then it just stays kind of peaty, but then the sweetness pops back in and it's just like, I am not gone yet.
And then rides out for kind of the rest of it. So I'm quite excited by this. I'm just a peat monster right now. And this is fresh. This is very exciting. Yeah, I got to try to source a bottle of the sanded one when it came out and it sold out in Australia like that. And then I ended up flying through Dubai to go to something and I saw some bottles there and I picked up two and then I brought them back to Australia. And then one of the guys at work, one of the really, really wanted it. So then I never actually got to... taster properly. I had like one dram ever before today since its release. But I find this like, I'm a massive Isla fan.
So combining that with like red wine casks, I think is super, super interesting. Like I'm feeling this changing as we're drinking it. It's pretty crazy getting that sort of briny sweetness. Like it just keeps on telling a story after you've sipped it. which is that's what I pay attention to these days. I don't like the sort of single facet whiskey so much anymore unless I'm just socially drinking and then I don't have to think about it. But if I'm like with people that really appreciate whiskey, I want a whiskey to tell me a story, a taste story and a smell story. Yeah, absolutely. It can change every time.
When I was in Amsterdam, I had one that did that and I was describing it to the bartender. I was like, I'm on my fourth sip and it's an entirely new journey every time. And he's like, that's how you know it's good. And I was like, this is a thing is to go on like a taste journey over time. I'm like, I'm here for this. I think it was a bricolade that I had and I was just, it just kept changing into delightful seasons every time. I was so happy. Brook Lutty is speaking my language. They released their latest Octomore, and this is the glass that they... I love Octomore. They used... They did? Oh, that's amazing, dude.
Yeah, sit on there. Yeah, through all their socials and everything, this is what they used. Wow. Octomore is like... That is my... It's one of my top threes. And there's like a bar here in Seattle that's got all sorts of them, and I've tried a few at this point. And I'm just like... It's called Canon. Ken and I haven't been there yet. And they have a wildly huge selection of whiskey. Robbie and I went there and then I've gone back. Like 4,000 bottles, I want to say. Something like that. And whiskey from like the late 1800s, early 1900s. They've got some wild, wild. I mean, you can also get a dram there for a grand, a one grand dram.
They should probably call it that. And they had multiple to choose from that were over a thousand bucks for just a pour. What's one of those grand dram? Oh, I'd have to look it up. But they were ones that were, you know, 100 years old type of deal. Yeah. If you guys could have one dram to end all drams of anything, what would it be? And then my following up question is if you had one bottle of whiskey, an unlimited bottle of whiskey that was piped into your coffin that you could have for the rest of time, what would that be? With what album? So we'll go with the first one. One grand to end them all.
Like any prize one. Yeah, I think it's going to be less exciting than you think. I'm not complex. My answer is probably the same for both questions. I like Rye a lot, and I think Sagamore does a great job of Rye, and their standard one is just, like, at that price point, it's like the best thing you could possibly get, in my opinion. So that's what I would say. I'm hoping the price, though, Robby. removing price um yeah and yeah i just don't know i mean i feel like like i've never thought that increasing a price makes something better per se like especially with wines too like if it's like a ten dollar bottle it's probably not great but if it's a thirty dollar bottle it's probably okay if it's
$200, I don't taste the difference. It's diminishing returns. Yeah, I don't know. I don't have a fancy one in mind. I would try older ones. I think just to see what the 100-year-old one would taste like would be cool. But in terms of stuff that you can get now that's like, oh, it's just rare and it's really expensive. I don't necessarily think those are better. I haven't tried Pappy and I don't actually want to. I've heard it's like overrated. I just had it a couple of weeks ago. Yeah. Overrated. Yeah. Or no. Oh yeah. Yeah. I ended up giving it away. I was like towards the end of it, I was like, eh, y'all can finish this.
And they were like, you don't want that. I'm like, no, it's too sweet. Like cherries. I'm just like, I didn't want it. Yeah. I think I did an article, or I can't remember what it was. I did a comparison between Pappy 12 and Weller 12. Do you know how those are linked? No. So Weller 12, Happy 12, originally they were distilled together. So you'd have the same barrels, you'd have the same mash build, they'd be in the same rick house, and then they'd put them in there and they'd do this X selection. So basically, if you imagine the sun rises and sets on two different sides of that rick house, and the ones at the top would have a higher angel share, a bit hotter, the ones at the bottom less.
but the perfect part would be the heart of that rickhouse. So what they used to do, they used to have those heart barrels and those would become pappy. Same age, same mash bills, same barrels, and then they'd take all the barrels around that and then that, that, and then that would become Weller. So then you think, what's the average of left, right, top and bottom? It's essentially that same fucking thing in the middle. Right. So then I did a tasting of, and I did a blind with a few mates as well, Weller 12 and Pappy 12. And I can tell you, like, I've got a very sensitive palate, so I can tell the difference, but it's fucking nothing.
Like, it's probably 5% difference for, like, many, many times the retail cost. Yeah. So you should be drinking Weller 12. It's just- I love Weller. It just doesn't have the same status. Yeah. yeah you can also do the poor man's pappy of like you mix the various wellers together and it's supposed to be like the same taste i don't know how you do it exactly you don't even need to do that i've got bottles of pappy in in actually in la at my mate's house and when i get over there which will be within the next 12 months we should get together and i'll do that test with you blind and you guys tell me
I love the blind tests. That's like my favorite thing to do at the house here is I just, I put glasses out. I numbered them around the corner and I'm just like, all right, y'all, find the expensive one. See if you can. Nobody knows. And most of my friends, nobody knows. My friends always do the opposite. The cheap one. They're like, the cheap one's the good one. I'm like, I can't believe it. We all suck so bad at this. I feel like I'm getting better now, but you know, who knows? Yeah. Yeah. I don't think it's about sucking at all. I think it's just about actual objective taste and smell. And that's what it really should be about.
It's not about that price. Like you mentioned before, Robbie, like it's diminishing returns as you're getting up there. There's a few examples that are worth the money, but I think there's very, very few compared to the amount of SKUs that sit up there. Yeah, for sure. Yeah, we did a, just related before we move away from blind taste testings. Have you, are either of you fans of Flamin' Hot Cheetos? I don't know if they even have that in Australia or not, but. No, I had them in Mexico, actually. I used to live there, so. Okay. Yeah, we had them there. Okay. So they make a new one now that doesn't have the color.
It's just like, so you have the originals that are like super red and then you have the new ones that have like less preservatives and they're like, have no color. We did a blind taste test of those. You can definitely tell the difference. Like that red 40 is like, Oh, that's the good stuff. Like you need that. I need to see the nuclear dust. Yes. Yeah. Anyway, sorry to derail us. What were you saying, Em? Well, I wanted to hear your album, the album that you're going to be in a cop and still sipping whiskey to. Like, that's good stuff. Hmm. That is hard. One album for all time. Because, so, my favorite band is Mayday Parade, but I wouldn't pick one of their albums.
Like, I like songs here and there. I'm trying to think of a front-to-back album I would pick. It's always a tough question when someone's like, your favorite movie, and you're like, I don't know. It's tough. Yeah. I don't know. I wasn't meant to be interviewing you guys. Oh, it's fun. Like, I know mine, Robbie, if you want some time to think, I can share. Okay, so for the first question, which was like, which one do I just want? Like, if I'm going to put it on the shelf and have it there forever, the ultimate jam so far has been Octomore 8.3, which is… 8.3? Nice. Okay. And I've had a few of them at this point now.
And I'm just like, give me all the Pete that you can because it's just never too much. And this was the first time and it was with Robbie was at Canon. The first Octomore that I had where the final sips, just the droplets on my tongue was like this candy explosion. And I was like, what is happening right now? When did this dram become a Rolo? And I don't want sweetness when I'm drinking a whiskey. I want to like earth and spice and give me all the fun. Anyway, but at the same time, I was like, I can't deny it. how good this is. Like, what's happening on my tongue? And sure enough, I look it up and it's like normal for a heavily peated scotch to eventually get ignored by your palate.
And it just releases the rest of the journey that's in the, and I was just like hooked. And so, yeah, 8.3 has been my favorite that I've had so far. In terms of like... I've had six points for it. I have not. I've had 12.2, 8.3, and... What are these numbers, by the way? Maybe that's it. Is that how much teeth they use? No, no, no. It's to do with where the barley comes from, basically, I think. So, 0.3 is local barley. Okay. And that's the only one that I collect, the .3s. Oh, really? Yeah, the .3s are the most interesting and the hardest ones to collect. So, yeah, you said it fucking right up my alley with the 8.3.
I think we're so aligned. Like, it's crazy on music and everything. But, yeah, I think you're going to love 6.3 if you can find it. It's very, very hard to find. I'll put it in the wish list. I'll find it at auction. Add to the Whiskey Wishlist, Octomore. Yeah, 6.3. That's going to be hard to find now. Oh, sweet. And then following, what's the album? The album is Deltron 3030, a sci-fi hip-hop album by Del the Funky Homo Sapien. It's just front to back, this amazing story, some of the best raps. They're so fun. The beats are so cool. And it just doesn't get old to me. I could listen to that album forever.
I still don't know all the words, even though I've heard it so many times. Yeah, put a link in there. Put the link in the show notes. Yeah. Deltron 3030. Yeah, it'd be cool if people drink this whiskey to the albums that we say. That would be cool. All right. So I thought of an album that I like all of the songs on. It's not necessarily like my favorite songs, but I don't have any. There's like one skip on it. It's like all of it. It's Jimmy World's Bleed American. Oh, that's a good one. Lots of classics on there. Yeah. Nice. Yeah. Yeah. Does it tell kind of a story from track one to the end? To be honest, I don't know.
I just like all of the songs. I haven't paid that much attention to what it does. I liked their album right before that one, too, when they were kind of emo. Not going to lie, I used to sing a lot of those songs, too. All right, Denver, you're up. Oh, wait, here, can I share really quick? So if you're into Pete's, have you had Scarabus yet? What's that called? Scarabus, S-C-A-R-A-B-U-S. They're kind of new. And I got a bottle last month because I'm just chasing peat, and I want all the peated eyelids that I can get my hands on. And it was a $35 bottle in the States, which is pretty cheap. And my goodness, if it's not delicious.
It's like on par for me for like Lagavulin 16. Yeah. It's beating Lafoyg. So it's like knocking down. It's super good. And so basically, you didn't ask, but I'm just going to tell you, which is this is my new favorite cheap peated scotch to keep around because I can just drink it and just never get it. It doesn't get old. It's super good. And I don't feel bad having two because it's not like... Oh my God. You should have suggested this one as well. Like... That's what I'm doing right now. Let's do a Isla one. But you've had Compass Box peat monster, yeah? I haven't. It's on my wish list. Yeah.
I think that might be up your lane as well. I agree. Here, I'll share the scale of this. So for ultimate whiskey... Dram, single dram today, because it will change. My answer will change tomorrow. What would I want to have? I think cheesy golf oil, wild turkey. I love that. Any of that sort of 80s, 90s turkey, like that juice is golden. Like so, so good. If I'm going to pick a Scotch whiskey, I'd pick Glendronic 1993. Any of those single casks in PX or Olorosa, those are absolutely minf. I'm going to need you to write these down. I got to put them in my wish list. We're going too fast. Yeah, like vastly, vastly different flavor profiles.
And just for you, Adam, if I was going to pick one Isla whiskey at a time, it would have to be Isla and finished in PX. Yeah. What's the best one I've ever had? Just trying to think. Uh-oh. I did have an I beg, like an under-the-counter I beg from, I think it was Bill, Bill Lumsden, who makes it. Yeah, he was here like a few weeks ago actually. What was it, Bill? It was a whiskey stranger. But anyway, I think it was like a four-year-old finished in PX, and that was just like, it would blow your mind. Like so much energy, so much flavor. There's something to be said for like, I think those whiskeys that sit sort of under the tenure at Tenyamar.
Like it's like going to see like a, like people always like chase the Super Rolls stuff, like, you know, over 30 years old or whatever. But I love the energy, like going to see like a band in their prime on the way up versus like going to see like, you know, the Rolling Stones now versus them in the 80s. Oh man, that's going to be Scarabus for you. Because Scarabus is like three or four years old. It's like kind of young, but it's so peated. And the way that they make it, it just, it hits way above where it's supposed to. So, I'm excited for you to try that one. I'm going to add it to cart now.
Awesome. Yeah, brilliant. And if I'm going to pick an album off the top of my head now, it'd probably be Springsteen, The Young, The Innocent, and The East Street Shuffle, if you know that one. No. I'm going to be listening to that tomorrow, though. So before he was famous. So I think his first two albums kind of overlapped. There was, I think, Asbury Park, which is a little bit later, but the first album was that. And he didn't, like, had no commercial pressure at all. He just did the album that he wanted to do with ultra-long intros and, like, it floated between rock and jazz and it was just...
Just some amazing, amazing, amazing tracks in that. And to sit there and have like a whiskey, well, I'll be lying down because I'm in my coffin, but it would be that album and then the whiskey that would get piped in. If I'm going to go a Scotch whiskey, it would probably be um dalwini 15 which is not an expensive whiskey um it's just a whiskey that i can drink all day and if i was going to pick an american one i'd probably pick um yeah wild turkey 101 nothing yeah i'm not that complex i know i just i just really enjoy it and i always do like it's just a nice just a good whiskey Yeah, so we don't tend to like bourbon as much, but I did have a clarifying question I wanted to ask you.
It's like, we've got these two different glasses, right? And it's like, this one is for bourbon, and this one is for whiskey. However, the whiskey is spelled without an E. Is that just because that's how you spell it in Australia, or is that because it's meant to only be Scotch-style whiskeys in this? Like, what would you put a rye in, which one? Okay, there's a, what do they call it? The History of Words, which is, is it etymology or? Sounds right, yeah. Is that the... Yeah. Yeah. I don't know. Basically, the history of words. So then the Irish were making whiskey and the Scotland were making whiskey as well at the same time.
And Ireland was actually head of Scotland back then. So they used to sell more whiskey into the US. And the Irish wanted to... Well, they differentiated their whiskey by having the E in there. And so I think that's where, because they used to import more into the US, the United States then took up that spelling of the word rather than the Scottish spelling of the word, then came in Prohibition and the Scottish could produce more whiskey faster because they had double distillation rather than triple distillation in Ireland. So then they could supply quicker. And so then the Scottish took over and then the Irish fed it away, but the spelling remained.
So there is no real difference. Whiskey with an E and whiskey without an E. It was just a differentiation between Ireland and Scotland. And then the US adopted whatever was bigger at the time pre-Prohibition. That's my understanding anyway. Okay. So you're saying then in terms of the glassware that the bourbon one would be just for bourbon and the whiskey one would be for everything else? Uh, the bourbon one is, so I always do, uh, when we design glasses, it's going right back to how, how you make it. Um, so the bourbon one is actually designed for corn based spirit and the other one is designed for barley based spirit.
So that's the way to look at it. Okay. So it depends how much of each thing is in there. Yeah, so then how they make it and then how they drink it. So then there's also a different cultural context, if you imagine. So like drinking bourbon whiskey, you generally have that in Kentucky, Tennessee, in a warmer climate, eating very different foods, listening to very different music. It's a whole different cultural experience to drinking Scotch whiskey in Scotland in a colder environment. And the audience, the cohorts are looking for different things. So, like, I would see our bourbon glass being a little bit more of a mallet, whereas the whiskey glass is a little bit more of a scalpel, if you imagine, because that's what those different cohorts are looking for.
So in Scotch whiskey, you'd be even looking at the months that something is finished in a barrel, and you can get that in the whiskey glass. Whereas in the bourbon world, they're sort of looking more at overall proof and power and pepperiness and sweetness and those sort of things. I feel like they're sort of looking at less notes than they are in Scotland. And then also it needs to cut through on a generally fattier foods in Kentucky and Tennessee and also needs to be suitable for ice. So it's got a bigger opening than the whiskey glass. So, yeah, it's like we're factoring a lot of stuff into these classes.
A lot of variables. Yeah, a lot of variables. It also has that like what we call the chode internally, but it's that stub on the bottom, which, yeah, a stem, I guess. Yeah, that thing. Yeah. Now you can't unsee it. So, yeah, it's designed because a lot of the times I was in Kentucky and mainly Tennessee, you just sit out on the porch and you'd be just drinking really nice bourbon and you need to isolate your hand heat. You can't have the whiskey glass because you're just constantly just heating up. And it's better for higher proof as well, that bourbon glass. And the difference between the spirit surface and the edge of the top of the glass is a lot less.
It's like half the distance because that's what you kind of want. So you just end up having a smoother, bolder experience with those bourbons. And yeah, with our research, that's what we kind of found that people were kind of after. And that's what I was after as well, I think, in the end. Yeah. Yeah. That's way more complex than I thought it was. Um, which was going to be another question that I was going to have is like designing a glass, right? Is like, how do you know, I guess there is some science, like you just listed some concrete criteria, but is some of it also just vibes of like, let me just change the shape a little and see how it's different or like, or is it all science based of like, you know what I mean?
No, no, no. It's a mix of science and art, yeah? You don't get good music if you don't have a little bit of magic, yeah? It's not just all production levels and great instruments and all of that kind of stuff. There is some humanity in it. So I think you need that mixture of, like, just changing stuff and talking to people and maybe something just feels better even though it doesn't report better on data. Yeah. So we definitely look at that. Like, we wouldn't, I don't know, I keep on going back to music, but, like, we wouldn't have the company we have if I didn't have the upbringing in music that I do because there is some magic beyond the technicality
the technical and sort of the things that can be measured, there's some sort of level of humanity that we put into the glasses. And also, we don't rush that at all. So, for example, our wine glass was eight years R&D and there's no commercial company that can kind of do that sort of level of R&D that we can do. These wine glasses are insane. I only talk to people. Yeah, they're pretty crazy. Yeah, with the fins in the bottom there. Essentially a turbine. Yeah. Yeah, my wife was skeptical at first. She was like, what is this? And I was like, just try it. She was like, these are really nice.
I was like, yeah. The turbines are cool. I'm going to have to spin my next, you know, what I pour in there and air it out. That's pretty cool. I've done a few whiskeys actually in there just to see. I was wondering. I was like, why not, you know? Yeah, it was interesting. Like the smell profile, because you've got such a big aromatic bouquet, like sort of area above it, makes it pretty interesting. You get another perspective on... on those spirits. So it's, I'm a big proponent for that as well, just making, like I always tell this analogy that like essentially we're looking at these whiskeys and then you want to get as many aspects of this statue as possible.
If you're seeing a statue, you can see it from one angle But you're not getting the full story. So, like, having, like, our glasses, so the whiskey glass, for example, you can smell at the top of the whiskey glass and at the bottom, and it will change the profile. So, you can smell behind the alcohol and then with the alcohol, and that tells you a different story, and you get a couple of facets of that particular statue. Very interesting. Yeah. But then you pour in another glass and you'll get a whole other angle of that. You'll get a different view on a different part of the flavor and smell profile.
And it tells you a different story. So you're just getting more out of it. I've never tried smelling the top or the bottom. Yeah, I never thought of that. I always smell the bottom. Yeah, and I'm like, I wonder if I did that. Interesting. Oh, my goodness. How fun. Yeah, so you get sort of more ethereal and lighter notes on the top. Yeah. Good to know. So something we should do before I forget, because I will forget. We have a rating system on this show, zero to eight tentacles, zero being the worst, eight being the best. Adam, what do you say? I have rated it already. It is fantastic. I'm really, really happy with it.
I would have given it a 7.5 or maybe higher out of 8 for like a little bit more Pete. And that's just me being kind of selfish. However, I gave it a 7.25 in my little local open claw already. And I'm going to savor it though. So this is like... Really, this is my third highest rated. I think maybe my fourth. There's only a few whiskeys in this at this high of a rating. And I'm going to save this. This is like really, really special. So, yeah, 7.25. I'm in love. This is super delicious. Question. How do you get 7.25 tentacles? You do whatever you want. Yeah. It's a little freebie. You know, you can go wherever you need to.
You should chop on the tentacle. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, what do you think, Denver? For me, like, I think this is – I'm looking always for innovation. And this, like, generally when I have a whiskey, like, I can put it in a category of other whiskeys that kind of taste the same. This one sits out. So this is very much in tentacles. I would say – I'm going to go seven and a half. Seven nights. Because I think this would be interesting. I wouldn't pull this out at the start of the night with mates. I would bring it out probably midway towards the end, make sure the music's right and the food is right.
And I think this would be Nirvana. Yeah. There's something there. There's something to think about. Yeah, I think it's pretty good. It's... I'm going to say a seven, I think. A little bit lower than you guys. Still pretty good. It's got an interesting factor. It's the highest it could be. The way it changes a lot. It's really good. There's just some amount of... aftertaste in the middle that is like i don't know how we described before the like uh vegetable-y like whatever it was i forget the word the grassy the grassy youth i forgot it too yeah there's just a little of that just a tiny amount and whenever a little bit of that hits me i don't love that but everything else great is it is it changing for you now robbie is that grassiness starting to go in the glass um i don't know let me think about it and try some
And I'll tell you what, you'd probably erase that grassiness if you'd pulled that into the bourbon glass. Oh, interesting. So, like, if you wanted it, you could accelerate it, huh? Yeah, there is a little bit less of it now. Yeah. Yeah. I keep getting starburst. Like my first, as it first hits my tongue, I'm like, which starburst am I having? Am I having all of that at once? That's the grape high chew. That's what I'm telling you. Like it's. Yeah, no, the grape high chew was tight. That was like a really good descriptor. Oh man, it is very exciting. You're right in that it's own genre. Yeah. I'm funny.
It's time to get suede. Yeah. The piece sort of a fading out and the sweetness is conquering, but it could be that I've changed glassware as well. Oh, true. Very true. Yeah. I do like the, um, like the idea of aging in different barrels and like mixing things and stuff. I feel like that is way more like you can do a lot more cool things with that than like people try to have a unique mash build or whatever. And like, doesn't change it all that much compared to like, like barrel does a lot of good stuff with that, where they age it in a whole bunch of different kinds of barrels. Um, yeah. And that, like, I really like those, too, which is maybe another one I should have mentioned.
I forget what it was, the Barrel Dovetail, I think. I really like that one. Okay. That could be one of my ones that I would have all the time. Oh, wow. Tell me about this Whiskey Web and whatnot. So what are the topics normally covered? Because it's not just a Whiskey podcast. It's some web, some AI, some... Yeah, so, I mean, these days we're having an existential crisis that will all be unemployed and AI will take everyone's jobs. So we talk a lot about AI, but historically it was very, like, web development focused, like, you know, front end JavaScript, HTML, CSS development stuff. And we still do some of that, but, like...
It's more about how do we work with AI, how do we get stuff done, what sort of tools are we using these days, stuff like that. And then, yeah, there's always whiskey involved. Sometimes we talk about it in the beginning, sometimes we save it to the end, because the technical audience doesn't love it as much as, but we have a whiskey audience too, so they like it. And it's a hard, hard mix. And then, yeah, depending on who the guest is or how we're feeling that day, there might be no tech. We might just get pretty drunk and talk about whatever we want. It's totally fine. It goes wherever it wants.
We modeled it after Hot Ones, if you've seen Hot Ones, the TV show or YouTube show. Yeah, right. They bring in their hot questions, good guests, and then sometimes most people are like, I don't give a crap about the hot sauce other than I see them eating hotter sauce, you know. But it just keeps the conversation grounded and spicy. And adds some duress if you drink enough. Yeah, exactly. Because I think the hot sauce, I think there's 15 or 14 hot sauces in the fridge right now because I'm very much into that. Nice. But it's, yeah, it just pulls down barriers. So essentially this is what the alcohol is doing.
But I'm very, I am very interested in AI and we do talk about that within the company a fair bit. I just ended up buying this, do you know what Panta Lake is? No. From Intel? That sounds... Yeah. I've heard it. I don't know what... You got a local LLMs? Yeah. Yeah. So I can do that on this thing I got yesterday. Oh, yes. I did. Oh, I saw these at CES. I did see this. I just couldn't remember the name of it. Oh, dude. Yeah. Very cool. Okay. So how deep are you into this? Do you know which models you're going to run locally? Or are you just like... I don't know yet. I think we're going down, it keeps on getting more and more a part of our business, AI sort of assistant.
But I just find it interesting, like, and you guys would be the same as me, like, we're essentially, we lived in the world before AI, and now we're going to live in the world after AI, whereas my kid is going to grow up just solely in this world. So we can work as puppeteers and we can still have a job and everything. Um, I'm just, I'm concerned about what his future will hold if he doesn't do a trade or something that's, um, like, because he, he can't follow my path because he was not there before and not often. So he doesn't understand what is good. Um, and so like, I, I think the, the role for me as kind of CEO within our business, and I've got, I've got a couple of other businesses, um,
is to be the puppeteer, to use AI as sort of to do the grind rather than to do the actual high-end creative stuff because I still think we need a human there. But to do like the churn work, that's something that I came up in when I came out of university. Like the juniors did the churn work and that's how you learn how the machine works. Now, if the machine is like changed at the bottom end to the mid end, how does my kid get a job? Like, how does that happen? I don't know. I'm very concerned. And I'm just saying more and more of the power of it. Yeah, sorry. How old is your kid too? Two and a half.
Nice. Okay. I got eight and 10. Robbie's got three. Yeah. I've got a four-year-old and 14-month-old twins. Yeah, so tell me your thoughts for your kids. Yeah, I don't know. Like, I feel like, so this is maybe a philosophical question to set us up, okay? So it's like, people say AI can't think, right? Well, who says humans can think? We're just pattern matching also. Like, maybe it is better than we think. Maybe we are all just AI. I don't know. Like, and so with that in mind, I'm kind of like, maybe it's fine. Maybe it'll work itself out. But yeah, in the traditional sense of like a capitalistic economy, I don't know how you like...
I could see all of the wealth being concentrated in like a hundred people and everyone else revolting and like we're back in the ice age or whatever. Um, because I don't see any jobs that will persist. Um, maybe universal basic income will help. I don't know, but I don't think so. Um, but if you tell everyone your houses are going away because you can't afford them, you're going to have a big problem. Like that's not going to be okay. So I don't know. I have no idea. Um, Yeah, it's not all doom and gloom. I am hopeful with software, we make way more code now. And so humans still have to look at it and go, this stuff's bad, throw it away.
This stuff's the good stuff. You still need that check. But for how long will you need it? I don't know. It's got limits. Yeah. In my house, so my kids are older. We've done a lot of coding already. We've done a lot of different things. And I believe in balance as like one of the first things to seek. There's so much cool shit in this world. Like there's no reason to focus on one thing too young or too early. Like go experience a whole bunch of things. However, I do tell them that the way to make money in this world and to achieve happiness is to just be good at something. and I don't know what that's going to be at your age and whenever you decide to go be really good at something, but so far, it's pretty consistent that if you quest to just be really good at something, and lucky for you, if you can find your ikigai and it brings you joy as well as money, but if you get good at something, it helps your whole day feel fulfilled to go do that thing.
So, seek some balance. There's too much fun in this fucking world to get all tidied up and wad it up in a ball and go hide from it all. You got to go seek it, attack it, and get good at something. And so in this house, it means that my kids are skateboarding. They're also trying sports. We code. We watch TV. We play video games. But we try to like... do everything within reason. So it's like, hey, you already did that today. Why don't you go do something else? You already did some of that. This world is too cool, man, for you to go focus on like the one thing. And AI has been a very small part of it because I want my kids to be able to
know what they're getting this is the same reason i brought my kids up on retro video games i was like you got to learn the nes first you got to know that you're galaga the ship like that's step one man move back and forth and then shoot the ships that are coming at you you know and later you're like all right now you're richter in castlevania's uh you know dracula's castle so here's a whip dude and you need to go beat up the fucking zombies and uh and save save the world um and all of these things kind of all mix in together and so like just recently in terms of coding my kids are basically building like flash games which are super fun man they were fun 20 years ago they're still fun now so dude we they made a choose your own adventure and at the end was like this laughing dog that was really annoying but also kind of funny uh and then i turned around and we used ai to um we've been drawing dungeons by hand on this crisscross grid
It's like isometric paper. And it's super fun. You sit down and you start drawing lines and then a couple of other lines and you've got a dungeon. And you can be like, this part of the dungeon is a swamp. And this part of the dungeon has a giant ass spider or whatever. And we did that before I went to AI and was like, hey, AI, I want you to make us a dungeon builder. I want you to do a random seed. I want to be able to expand the rooms. I want you to make doors that go in between them. I want there to be journey maps that I can set. And then we know the value of what we're getting there. And since we've sat down and planned
we've got an idea of what we want out of AI. Instead of just sitting down and copying someone else, we've got like a goal. We did this with videos too. My kids were like, I want to be a YouTuber. And I'm like, oh yeah, okay, here. So Saturday, we're going to write a script. We're going to shoot some video. You're going to use Legos. You're making Lego video. We're going to upload it to YouTube. You're going to dub it with your own voice and we'll put in some music. And they were like, yeah. And dude, like five hours into making the video, they were like, This is a lot of work, and our videos are only 30 seconds long.
I was like, hells yeah, I needed you to know the reality of what you're watching on TV, because when little Boo Boo looks like they're up there turning the lights on and off, and you think they're real and haunted, that shit ain't real, man. They're just in a room like you, shooting with a crappy tool. uploading it to their computer like the majority of making that video my kids is lame as hell man it sucks and it's boring um but they had the vision to make the thing that you ended up liking so you got to know the deltas so that's like a big thing for me it's like the vision's the skill having the knowledge exploring these things getting your teeth into and yeah just so yeah we do robotics in this house too it's like all of it i want it to all be available and
And we just explore it. So, I don't know, AI's not going to ruin that. Even in the world before and the world after them. Exactly. Even in the world before. Yeah. A lot of kids at school, my missus is a teacher and they would just do the prompt. They wouldn't even learn any sort of nuts and bolts in order to create that YouTube video. You just feed in the stuff and then tell it what to do rather than working out how it does what it does. Um, That's a very, I'm going to steal that out of you. Awesome. It's fun, too. It's fun to expose how things work. That's the best thing I have in a small podcast.
Yeah, it's been great. Do you mind if I pour just another half a dram? I'm just going to. Yeah, please. Yeah, I've already done that. If anything, I might have. No, I think I did another half. I'm at like three halves spread across here. Three halves. 1.5? Yeah, 1.5. 1.5. Yeah, it's really fun having kids. Lots to explore there. I mean, I could continue going on like little things. But yeah, I treat AI the same way we did with screens eight years ago. And everyone was like, don't give your kids screens. And I was like, that's fucking stupid because they're surrounded by screens. If you don't give them screens, then they can't have AI.
Well, that's true. Yeah. But I was like, so we did assisted screens for like a long time. I was like, yeah, dude, my kids have had screens since they were little. I sat with them and we played together just like we might cars or just like we do with finger skateboards right now. Like, I'm not the type of dad that just gives my kids shit and then walk away and drink whiskey and ignore them. I like to be with them and show them and teach them. Yeah, correct. One day, and I can't wait for that, actually. I met someone the other day, and they were like, I drink whiskey with my dad. I'm like, oh, that's so beautiful.
I can't wait for my children to do that with me. They probably won't, though. They'll probably grow up and be like, dad always smelled like Pete, and it was gross. Well, the younger generation doesn't drink, which is sad to me. But I don't know what they're doing. It's smart. It's smart. Well, yeah, AI is coming for a lot of jobs. You can't ignore it. It's cool that you're in it so deep. That was actually going to be a lot of this interview. It was going to be asking you subtly about your day-to-day as an industrial designer working very physically. However, you go through all the same motions that anybody does with AI.
So here's actually the topics. I'm just going to spout them really quick because this was sort of the rubric I was going to go for. I was going to be like, what are your tools? What are the roles that you play? Yeah. What's your, what are you inspired by? What are the goals that you set? What are the loops that you find yourself in? What are the schedules that you like to work within? What do you do for a retrospective and sunsets? And then what do you do when you're riding into the sunset and when something is done? Because you've, clearly gone over this you have to remember all of those and answer them all right now but as a ceo you have to do all those things so yeah that's kind of what we all feel like isn't as a builder right now with ai is that we have infinite employees uh and we have all this opportunity but we have to be a ceo we have to manage a team and we have to have goals and know our tools and so anyway that was where i was going to go with it all but yeah
Where is? Where do you want me to start? Well, I don't know. We don't have to go there. But I mean, I am generally interested in it. Yeah, just in general, what's the flow, I guess? Like, you don't have to get every bullet, but just what's your flow in designing products, I guess? Yeah, the flown designing products. But I'll firstly tell you about this guy. You guys got to try that. Yeah. That's even more valuable in the US. It's called Gospel. I think it's one of the best rides in the world right now. I'm intrigued. There's one from North Carolina. I know. I love her. Yeah. He lives in Australia and he's a veteran.
He's in Melbourne. And he's an engineer as well. And so he did this right and it's just excellent. Easily in the top, rising the world right now. Cool. Okay. My flow. How do we get to a product? So for me, like as I'm getting older, I think that human connection, I kind of mentioned humanity before in music and that little bit of magic. I think that's starting to play more and more of a role because I think our technical chops – are pretty well respected I think worldwide now. People know that we can absolutely nail the performance of a product for example. But I think there are whole other sort of realms and I've mentioned it before in other
like whiskey or bourbon or wine or gin or whatever, they form a few threads in a fabric of culture essentially and you need to look at the whole fabric. You need to look at the whole blanket in order to understand where these threads kind of fit in. So we could do things in isolation and develop products extremely fast with zero context. Like what's the point of that? That's not something that I care about so much. It doesn't make commercial sense which kind of harks back to the start of the business where I'm not sure if you guys know this, this was meant to be a Christmas present to family and friends
Did you know about that? I saw when I was looking up your history that you fucked it up, though, and that you didn't deliver. And it's like one of your regrets is that you messed up Christmas because they all got bought out. You made them and they sold out or something, and you didn't. Yeah, well, fucked up Christmas were me and Lylee. That was meant to be like it was me and Lylee. We were drinking whiskey at the time, and we're talking about parking at a massive shopping mall here in Australia and how chic that is at Christmas. It's like a war zone. And so we said, like, why don't we just do our own Christmas present?
And at the time, we were drinking whiskey and a lot of whiskey. And so, yeah, why don't we do a whiskey glass? Okay. And then he forgot about it the next day. And then, like, a few days later or something, he was still bouncing around in my head. I was like, why don't we actually do this? And he was like, nah, man. I was like, come on. I think this will be fun. Yeah. And so then he was taking 35, I was taking 35 and was selling 30 externally. And then I did like a shitty website on Squarespace and had 100 in there still developing. And one of my mates had started this blog that was becoming pretty popular.
Now it's probably like it might be the biggest blog in Australia. Oh, wow. Yeah. So he said, like, man, this is a cool story. Let's just do a story on it and help you sell those 30. But the big key detail was he didn't tell me when the article was coming out. So, like, all the e-com works. The pictures are up there. I think the text was, like, garbage, I think, from memory. Yeah. And then the article had come out and then I saw her in the morning, like it was, you know, everything's fine. And then I checked at lunchtime, I was doing something on there and it said zero on there. I was like, obviously I fucked up the website.
Like it wasn't, like how could it be? And then I got home and then I saw on my personal Gmail and it was just like, I think it was 460-something emails or something. And it sold out and there was heaps of people that were trying to get this stuff. And it was just before Christmas. So people were just buying Christmas presents and not really factoring in that this thing worked. And I built it so that, like Lyle and I built it so that it would work. It was a high-performance thing. whiskey glass, but people were buying it for people for Christmas presents. So I was like, okay, let's do a test again in February out of the gifting period and see if there's any actual interest.
So we did 10 times our batch. Okay. And that sold out. It was only available, I think, at the time in Melbourne, just in one city in the world. And then I think that sold out in two weeks. So the people that got those presents started talking. Nice. Yeah, it just kind of rolled on itself. And then I think we only started paying for advertising... maybe two or three years ago, and the company is 11 years old. So that's just basically unheard of. Wow. Because everybody who bought our glasses in those eight years prior basically sold glasses for us. Because the product was so good. So it's just, it's not something I could even replicate or I could advise anyone else to do because, yeah, it's just the amount of work that we put into each product.
It's like, it's based on love. It was meant to be for family and friends and genuine passion for whiskey. It wasn't to be anything commercial. It was never meant to be that. And that kind of, those sort of, that philosophy I guess still drives us today. Like we don't rush stuff out. We make sure that it's absolutely perfect and fulfills like multiple criteria that no other commercial company that was listed or anything would ever do. pay any attention to but like you know i want to like in in mexico i don't know if you've seen that film but it was important to me to get close to those families and get close to those distillers and understand what they're doing and you know have dinner with them like they would invite me to their their houses and stuff and we sit there and like learn the story like learn that one yeah exactly
Yeah, that's the, yeah, I love that glass. And that's the only one that has that. You can see there's like a little cross in the bottom. It's the only one that has that in the engraving. which is just a nod to the history of the Spanish coming through Mexico and then religion on the West Coast. So they drink out of veladoras, do you know what they are? The little candles, the fluted side little thing that you have tequila or mezcal in. It's like a little glass. So they're actually candles from the church that people used to throw out once the candle had burned down, and they had the little cross in the bottom.
And so that's how people used to drink it on the west coast. On the east coast is on the Caribbean, and they used to drink it out of the thing called a jicama, which is a seed that falls off a tree, and they cut it in half and then drink mezcal out of that or tequila out of that. But anyway, so yeah, I'm going too deep again, but I've got to get back to the flow. That's what I'll do, Robbie. So basically, we factor in all of these things, like the people, the music, the stories, the food. All of these things are really important in the enjoyment of these spirits, all these liquids in general. So I make sure that we spend time and get to know people and understand how that works and then create by far and away, in my opinion, the best glass for that particular category by a long shot.
Yeah. Love it. Go ahead, Robbie. Yeah. Sorry, I was just going to say, I think like every product, if it starts as like a passion project that you actually know about, care about, want to be a good product, does way better than if you're like, I want to make some money. What could I make money off of? Then it is like influenced the wrong way because anyone that's like an expert in a thing is It's like if you're, you know, you're a small batch baker and you make really good bread or whatever. It's like people want to come get that. If you're like a store bought bread loaf, you're like, that's not as good.
It's never going to be as good. It's like about that passion, that small scale, that like knowledge of an expertise that like you know, I think that sets you up well and that's hard to replicate. Like most people don't know that much about things. Like I've, I'm, I'm curious. I thought about a question of like other glassware brands. Do they like even know what they're doing or are they just like, like is, is there a lot that's like, could it look cool? Here's how it looks cool. I don't care how it functions. Like do people do that? I feel like they probably do. Um, Is this going to be edited later?
Well, this is live right now. It's live right now. So you don't have to answer if you don't want. We can talk about it offline. I can answer that for you without being too political. But it's definitely people designed just for aesthetics. There's heaps of aesthetic stuff that happens in this industry that has no performance benefit, but they spend tons of money on it marketing and then try and sell that to you. And then I just feel like people are just getting ripped off. Like it happens in every industry as well. Like you said, like starting from the very beginning of different companies and things like that, are you here for the best experience of that?
Like in my industry, are you there for the best experience of that liquid or are you there to make money? And they're two different things. So, like, it depends if you actually genuinely have a passion and you want to give the best result for the customer. In my case, it was my family and friends at the start. And that means a lot to me. And then I genuinely love whiskey. So, like, I'd be doing it regardless of making money or having a business. So, I think that sort of thinking is... And you went back to capitalism before. But like that sort of thinking I think is becoming a little bit more endangered.
And it's a shame. It's a shame because like as you expand, it's harder to hold on and keep that core and keep that kind of real love or soul to a brand. But I think it's like I will fight for that till the fucking end. Because that's what drives me in this company. It's not the monies. It's not the P&L. It's like people sharing a passion and genuinely loving whiskey. I'm the bridesmaid. I don't want to be the fucking center of the room. I want the glass to disappear and you to have a good time. When you drive a Porsche 911, you're just having a good time driving a car. You don't need to think about how that engine is functioning.
That's my job. So that's what I would just want to make people happy. Like I want my friends to have a good time. I want my family to have a good time using our stuff and for the glass to disappear essentially. But I've done all the research and made sure that it works with your food and works with the music, works with like accuracy and taste and smell and all of those sort of different criteria there and temperature control and airflow and everything. whole bunch of different stuff that we look at. But it should all disappear because what is important is your human connection. You should have a good time and not know why you're having a good time when you're using our stuff.
I love it. At some point, I'll ask you what instruments you play. But I have a thing that I've been comparing a lot of engineers to luthiers because I like that I've rarely met a luthier that doesn't also play an instrument. But I've met a lot of engineers that don't know how to build anything for the engine that they work on. So a good example is an engineer who works on Chrome or an engineer who works on some sort of framework engine, which they're very smart individuals. However, they don't know how to use the thing that they build. And you're in the camp of the people that I love in this world where they can play the instrument
and make the instrument. And that flywheel is what makes what they do so good. And you're right. It is also a sustainable flywheel. The flywheel, that's why it's a flywheel, feeds itself. It will never end as long as your love for whiskey continues to feed your love for industrial design, which continues to feed you creating things that other people recognize are good, and the flywheel spins on. So it's just a really cool... That's rare, I agree, and it's rare because people see things fail that are passion projects all the time, and so it deters them from beginning. Anyway, it's awesome. So yeah, what instruments do you play?
Because you must, all this music chat. Yeah, I loved that before, like saying about sort of playing the instrument and being able to make the instrument. It's very important for me... And I'll put this into my son as well, just getting your hands dirty and learning how to do it. Like with the wine glass, for example, I ended up finding like 400 Pinot Noir vines and then planted that at the farm so I could learn how to make wine because that's important in order to understand wine at a very, very... Grassroots level, pardon the pun. So what instruments do I play? I can play guitar, which you can see there.
But, yeah, I have a few guitars. And then I can... The instrument that I played the longest was piano, so sort of seven years or eight years of tuition. I fucking hated it. My mum made me do it. I got me to play too. Yeah. Yeah. But the thing is, in hindsight, that set me up to know how chord progressions work and how you can get two notes and you get the third note to work. But that said, that has so many different applications across my life. Like seeing those two notes and then working out what the third note is because I think that stems back to music. And also that's probably why I'm all right at maths.
Engineering also. I was doing maths in year 12 last year of high school. And then I went into like mechanical engineering and that sort of stuff. Um, so yeah, that I play, yeah, so guitar, uh, piano, um, and then I played trumpet for like three years. Um, cool. These are all the instruments that I've played also. Interesting. Oh no way. Yeah. Yeah. I did trumpet in middle school and, uh, then I got into my, I did piano, uh, cause my parents made me also. And then, yeah, I did a guitar after that cause I thought it was cool. It would make me cool to play guitar. So, uh, I did. Yeah. I followed exactly that same timeline.
Like middle school was trumpet and then piano was like all the way through from like, I think primary school. I don't know what middle school is actually where that is in age. Uh, sixth to eighth grade. Uh, you're like 12 ish. I don't give or take. I don't know. Uh. Right, yes. I went to, yeah, from 12 till 15, I think, trumpet, something like that. There was some other instrument that I was playing. But yeah, anyway, yeah, so I just got into the guitar and then started writing music while I was living in Mexico. And then, yeah, I think more so like an instrument, like I really like the voice sort of thing, the singing sort of stuff.
So since the business became sort of bigger and stuff like that, I've kind of neglected that a little bit and the sports as well. I used to play a bit of sports and... used to race mountain bikes when I was younger and then got into road bikes a fair bit and still got like, still got quite a few bikes. But just after I had the sun, kind of, that kind of disappeared a little bit and so the guitar just gets on the wall. This is only one here, but there's six, I think of them. You can't have too many instruments. Yeah, they're all at my folks' place, so they just sit there in their cases. But I think as he gets older, I'll have a bit more time to kind of get back into that and want to get into the voice stuff a little bit more, especially with my DNA from my parents and my sister.
Like, she's obviously, that's what she does as a job. So it's there. Just need to, you know, train a little bit and then go from there. Maybe next time we do this, maybe we can do this offload away, Adam. Well, you need to pick up the banjo, dude. I feel like you're ready for the banjo. The banjo is part drum, part guitar, and then it's also a lead singer. That's what makes it so much fun to play. It does all three in the same rhythmic gesture that just keeps the beat. It's just... It's this wildly expressive, subtle, minimal instrument that I'm just infatuated with. Very cool. Is it like, it's essentially a hollow body, yeah, or a semi-hollow body?
Yeah, they're hollow bodied. It kind of depends on which one you get, but most of them are hollow bodied, yeah, and they resonate off the back. But there's some of the open back ones are super loud also, so it just depends on what you get. Yeah, right. I have a free one on my wall that I don't think has a back. I haven't touched it. But Chuck gave it to me and was like, I don't want this. I was like, cool, I'll take it. Yeah. You'll play it one day, dude. It's all good. Yeah. Yeah, I want to see it in the background, Robbie. You've got all the fancy lights. Yeah. Let's see if I can point at my stuff and see.
Oh, is it over there? Oh, nice. You can't see anything in my room. Hold on. It's darkness. I'm sad. I would play you another song, but it sounds like you couldn't hear it. Yeah, well, I'd love for you to try again. What am I going to play? Where? I wonder if it's the one. Do you guys know C.W. Stone King? No. I do not. I think this is like sort of 1920s Americana sort of music, but he uses the old banjo and the guitar, and he's from Melbourne. All right, so before you play, Adam, I would like to say we are definitely over time. This has been really fun. I'm not going to cut you off. I'm going to let you play some, but thanks, Denver, for coming on.
Is there anything you want to mention before Adam plays this out, essentially? not really I just had a fucking good time like that was it was very easy I feel like we're just like hanging out and it's not even like anyone that's what we do so yeah that's been very very easy I really really enjoyed this I'm looking forward to meeting you guys in person hopefully in the next year but yeah it's yeah thank you for having me and thank you for like working this out with Ridley as well like Yeah. Really, really great. Thanks for coming on. All right, Adam, what are you playing for us? Can you hear it much?
I can hear it. I can hear it. Thank you. It's Aesop's Mountain. Aesop's Mountain? Yeah. I don't know that song. It's got a good jam. It's just an old-timey track. But it came through. That's nice. Yeah. Yeah, only a little bit of it. I can only get the very high notes. I reckon there is some of this kind of song. Yeah, I think so. You'll hear it in the recording later. Awesome. When do I get to say that? Uh, it'll be, I don't know. We're a few weeks behind, so it'll, it'll take a while to get it all edited and out like for the official episode. Um, yeah. All right. Robbie, so you're in New York, are you?
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