14 August 2009

Radio Free Benito: 2007 Ass Kisser Shiraz

Yes kids, I was fooling around the other night and decided to review this wine in audio rather than in text. And why not try this out with a wine that has a silly label? Our guinea pig is the 2007 Ass Kisser Shiraz from South Australia. $10, 13.9% abv.

Click here to listen to the mp3 version!
Two minutes long, the volume might be a bit low.

.wav version here with boosted volume

10 comments:

Allen said...

Enjoyed the review and got to have a bottle of this wine just to show off.

Allen

Benito said...

Dad,

It has that "delightfully tacky, yet unrefined" quality of a Hooters.

Cheers,
Benito

The Wine Commonsewer (TWC) said...

Well, yes, the volume was a little low. The oral report defaulted to Itunes and when it finished the House Blond and I got blasted out of our shorts by Gretchen Wilson singing All Jacked Up at 140 db. :-)

Didn't expect the next record to drop down in the Jukebox.

Hey, I'm disappointed. Not the teensiest trace of a Memphis drawl? Dude, TWC has more of a Southern accent than Benito does. :-) I ain't kiddin' neither.

Not a bad first effort. I am not a good critic though because I prefer the written word. It is rare for me to listen to a podcast of any sort.

Benito said...

TWC,

Hey, I'm disappointed. Not the teensiest trace of a Memphis drawl?

Lived here my whole life, but the Southern accent is mostly gone. I'm not ashamed of it, but at some point you get tired of explaining to outsiders that you're capable of wearing shoes and using indoor plumbing.

I have a pretty neutral accent in Italian too, but my German is all screwed up. I learned the language with the accent of a North Sea fisherman, the weird equivalent of a Maine lobsterman here in the US.

Regional accents are beautiful things and I love hearing the different ones around the country--the radio show "Car Talk" is a great source of obscure accents. But unfortunately, if your home accent is associated with ignorance and lack of culture, it becomes tiresome trying to establish credibility with everyone you meet.

Cheers,
Benito

The Wine Commonsewer (TWC) said...

I came home from Memphis with a hell of a Southern drawl. Didn't help that my roommate was from Nu Awlins' I wasn't even sure he was speaking English for the first two weeks.

The accent faded away pretty fast but I still lapse into a little bit of a Southern Accent and can do a fair impression of one if the spirit moves.

Had a 22 year old science teacher I was in love with in HS who thought she had kicked the Southern Accent. She hadn't quite and it made her all the more desirable.

Most interesting one to me was the House Blond who spoke with a Boston Brahmin accent until about second grade. Where that came from I have no idea as we have no relatives anywhere near the northeast. We're all bland speaking Californios.

Too bad in this era of tolerance Southerners are still fair game. I blame Neal Young.

Benito said...

TWC,

There are three responses that Southerners have when teased by Yankees:

1) Lose the accent and move out of the region;

2) Take a moment for self-reflection and attempt to set a more positive example for the South when meeting others;

3) Engage in "Defiant Redneckism" and meet the criticism by growing a mullet, tearing the sleeves off your shirts, and blaming all of your woes on the outcome of the Civil War.

While most of the current generation are picking options #1 or #3, I've had some fun with #2. When my work as a corporate trainer took me deep into Yankee territory, I would make a point of teaching the most difficult and heavily technical concepts in a SW Tennessee/NW Mississippi accent. Talking about the physics of color, optics, and the behavior of tentacular polymers in building hexochrome inks was always a good way to make a Yankee's head explode.

* * *

Funny story about your daughter. Did you ever get her to do Kennedy impressions for visiting friends and family?

Cheers,
Benito

Samantha Dugan said...

I'm with TWC, thought there would be more drawl too. It was pretty cool to put a voice with the...well, the voice, but I am with TWC again, I'm no judge as I never watch podcasts either.

Benito said...

Sam,

Sorry to disappoint, it's just the way I talk. :) I might record one in the future using a more relaxed Southern accent, without making it sound like a sketch from "Hee Haw".

Cheers,
Benito

TWC said...

Did you ever get her to do Kennedy impressions for visiting friends and family?

No because it wasn't an impression, she just talked that way.

There is a theory that Boston Brahmin is the closest to the King's English and that it is the natural way English is heard and spoken. May account for something. Or not.

We did have people ask who in the family was from New England, including her 1st grade teacher.

Funny stuff about the Yanks.

I am trying to write a post about a stunning wine and all I can think of is how stunning the wine was. :-)

laura marzahl said...

same thing happened to me. i listened to the mp3 and it pulled up and played via itunes in a playlist of mine. when you were done, billie holiday started belting out "gimme a pigfoot", and i swear it was just like i was listening to NPR. you should send this in! you'e a natural. although not to lynn rosetto casper...i don't know why i listen to that show. i love to hate it. and i still giggle at ox and ass, too.