Time to get the standard 10-100 WP on the record. This is a rye I've had a number of times, mostly at bars and a couple of belts from friends bottles, it's always been good and also a rye that's just a little hard to pin down. Whistlepig is now as iconic as about any bottle, largely due to the massive boost in exposure from the tv show(breakingbad) it is becoming much more of a standard shelf item with the 10- 12 - 15 years and farmstock common place now. Well known as a "pricey" bottle of good rye we now reach the age old question of "but is it as good as the price?" Nose: Great loads of rye spices including ginger, pumpernickel and allspice, feint pumpkin sweetness and orange rind as well, from the nose alone, clearly there is "something here" worth looking at. Front: Extra peppery heat, musty aged oak. by adding a few drops of water I got a little more including some caramel and red hot sugars however much of the spectrum found in the nose is simply missing on the tongue or stepped on by the hi-heat. Over all a good drink of rye but just a bit thin in the middle for me. Finish: hot pepper oak and grains or maybe some grain chaff from the barn along with some of the spice profile linger on, Whistle Pig is a rye that announces itself and leaves with a well marked, "rye's been here". Push comes to shove, if I had this bottle on the shelf for say 40 or 50$, I would say yes, this is a good rye with some interesting qualities but for the near 80$ most retailers are asking I can easily find something like a Knob Creek or Russells that I can enjoy at the same level maybe even better. The straight rye drinkers will probably get more mileage from the hard packed pepper heat and lack of middle sweetness, the average bourbon whiskey drinker is unlikely to find it as rewarding. For me Whistle Pig isn't bad, it's in fact a good rye, but living up to the hype as well as the pricing standards, well that's entirely different. There are any number of "hyped" rye labels, Willet, Kentucky Owl, Peerless, to name but a few, but when you have far thriftier options like Woodford, Knob, even Bullet and Redemption around, you don't have to kill a Benjamin just to find a good sip of rye. If you want to have a complete bar of good rye bottles sure you want at least A Whistle Pig, but as an economic minded drinker you don't really need to worry about it. Adding the 12-15, Boss Hog and even the new Piggyback will make for interesting comparison but this is the standard WP product.