Let’s attempt to slam the door on this shitty year with a run through Diageo’s special releases, which I briefly tried while in quarantine in London a few weeks ago. I kept most of my samples back for a more leisurely review and was fortunate enough to have already tasted this Talisker thanks to a care package from @PBMichiganWolverine. The nose starts off like a classic coastal Talisker, with sea spray and wet pebbles, before the rum cask influence makes itself known in the form of sweet mashed bananas and a faint funk. Sipped with a dash of water the whisky is by turns creamy, savory and tangy, with a hint of banana and a burst of peat on the finish. It’s another interesting twist on a Talisker — the rum influence is fortunately very restrained as I typically find such whiskies too sweet — but it falls a little short of the exciting standard set by the distillery’s contribution to the special releases in the previous two years.