END OF THE ROAD FOR BBB IN CANS ?

My annual trip to Dorset for the festival of new (and not always obscure) music that is End of the Road ends today.

I’ll take in 30 bands, 12 food carts, and be taken for £5.50 a half pint for the Beavertown Cowboy Lightning. But it was worth it. Wish it wasn’t against my principles to ask for tasters (must be a quids worth in the cup below).

I wrote in July about the less than thrilling beer menu at the middle-class nostalgia fest that is Latitude.

In contrast End of the Road would match a smaller CAMRA beer fest for range and quality, with a core range from relatively well-known local breweries.

And space on smaller bars for tastings by smaller folk like lovely Brew Shack of Wimborne, whose Porter and Piranhas I sampled yesterday.

Let’s be very clear; a tutored beer tasting is COMPLETELY different from beer tasters, OK.

It was interesting to chat to them about getting their (excellent) beers into local pubs, and they have a small Tap at their brewery open 2 till 7 pm on Fridays (surely a shoe-in for the GBG with those hours).

There were nearly as many brewery as band T-shirts on display in the Tipi tent.

On the field I did my usual study of what festival goers are drinking in 2017.

More cider and ale than lager, judging by the cans on display. Little Stella and Carling, lots of Beavertown (from the bar) and Brew Dog (from Shaftesbury Tesco). The Punk revolution is complete.

The bloke next to me sprayed his beer over my £7 programme. It was Cwtch. I almost thanked him.

A few folk were keeping faith with Boring Brown Bitter though.

And, since you ask, Car Seat Headrest were the highlight so far. No, I’d never heard of them either.

Published by retiredmartin

Retired NHS, doing long walks around UK and the world to record the great bits. Focused on Good Beer Guide pubs and live music.

21 thoughts on “END OF THE ROAD FOR BBB IN CANS ?”

  1. This is where you could have set up a business as the Real Ale Doctor. Walking round the field with your jug, offering to take their can of Bass and transforming into a magical beverage by pouring it into the jug and thence into a pint glass. All done under the Doctor’s cloak.

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  2. All music festivals are Middle Class! Just because the girls haven’t cleaned the dirt from under their finger nails, smoke roll ups and are generally a bit tatty round the edges doesn’t mean they aren’t Middle Class, in fact they’re probably more so – Ya?

    Decent beer selection for an outdoor event, especially with your comments elsewhere re it being kept properly, despite placcy glasses. Gyle 59 IPA for me, I think it was the first one of their brews I tasted. Mind say, I had a few nice pints of Summer Lightning while I was in Dorset this August – pure golden liquid straw, and it’s luverly!

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    1. I always assumed the roll ups were due to the contents of the cigarette being unavailable pre-rolled over the counter. Have I misjudged the festival going public through unfair stereotyping? Otherwise I agree they are middle class, perhaps even stuck up. Again, stereotyping. Correctly..

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  3. There’s nowt wrong with Bass in a can,i got four cans of it along with some Guinness Original to drink on our train journey from Falmouth to Nottingham,the wife was drinking cans of Kronenbourg 1432 or whatever it is called or was that 1432 cans of Kronenbourg,you never know with my wife.

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      2. No she car’nt drink more than me because my wife is a proper woman,but she does seem to drink anything unlike me,it varies from cans of Special Brew and Stella,and wines,Brandy,Whisky,Bacardi,the list goes on and on,but she does like drinking good real ales and is a has a better taste of than i do,so can be more critical of it than me.

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  4. “Let’s be very clear; a tutored beer tasting is COMPLETELY different from beer tasters, OK.”

    Pfft; semantics. A beer tasting is merely tutoring on a small scale. 🙂

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  5. Disappointing to see people still feel the need to neck beer straight out of the can. Surely even a “plastic” glass is preferable to drinking straight from the container, and even BBB’s deserve better treatment.

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    3. We still feel the need to neck beer straight out of a can while travelling,but then we may well be far more uncouth than you are.
      If at home we always drink out of proper beer glasses.

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      1. No argument here Alan. 🙂

        I’m paraphrasing (can’t remember the proper saying) but needs will out.

        Cheers

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  6. Sorry to miss you at EOTR. As well as the excellent Brew Shack beers at Tipi bar there were also excellent 8 Arch beers at the Garden bar. Steve dispensed tasters at 2pm on Sunday providing also welcome shelter from the rain. Blog post to follow on BeerEurope eventually.

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