Founder's Rübæus Pure Raspberry Ale: The Official Beer of Drunk Dialing and Sexting.

Its foolishly hot outside now and the outlook is rather dismal for any climate changes between now and late October.  Its such joyless drama school with the oppressive Texas weather, that all there is to lean on psychologically is the prospect of finding a reliable summer beer that will treat you very well until the great reprieve of Autumn.  This post is about one of those beers.  Founder's Rübæus Pure Raspberry Ale.



Being forthright, [AA] has never been a scoop-whore blog.  Never an, 'Oh, we doubt you've ever heard of it' hipster-kind-of website.

We like to take our time with criticism because we're usually pacified by an aggregate of 'too many new beers', 'so little time', and 'life better spent drinking it, than writing about it'.  There is also the tumor of laziness that metastasizes and cripples cleverness and wit all the time.  The pile of discarded posts tend to look creatively like the rejected song list of any Bloc Party project after 2004.  Just terrible.  Plus, we enjoy liquifying our insides enough to tranquilize a stag moose and, everyone knows, drunk writing tends to end up reading like the lyrics to Gangnam Style.

But never has it been the case, whereupon the doorstep of the [AA] offices rests a gift delivered from one of the country's best brewhouses.  And never has it been from the blog's favorite brewery in the entire country, perhaps the entire planet.

Even more so, it has never has been the pre-release of one of summer's most anticipated seasonal beer releases.

All of this was reason enough to access the pause button on Wendy Williams or Dr. Oz, or whichever terrible soul-destroying fucking daytime bullshit it was just to see what was playing out with the postal guy fiddling about with something on my lawn. 

A fucking score.

So, as quickly this gorgeous trio would cool in the frigidity of a 45 degree beer fridge, would it be pitched down the 45 degree angle of my craned throat, happily internalizing the hype and imminent promotion that  Founder's Rübæus deserved.  I was gonna help sell fucking loads of this stuff.  Right?

Whether by legitimate journalists or amateur hacks like myself, most criticism about beer is fully emo'd out to the extent that its pretty stupid to suggest converting anyone based on your lame opinion.

Conclusions are even more skewed when the term FREE is bandied.  The ability to remain totally unbiased is spoiled by the sudden appearance of factory-direct, donated summer badassery, especially since Founder's is like my forever jam, guys, like drinking the brewery equivalent of Neutral Milk Hotel's 'In the Aeroplane Over the Sea'.  The only way to show proper gratitude was to drink the shit out of it and nod energetically and maybe offhandedly mentioning how sipping this from Alison Brie's belly button wouldn't improve Rübæus in the least.  But, erm, not really.

Sipping Rübæus is actually a lot like watching old people Facebook.  As in, 'oh, its just sooo frustratingly fucking close to getting it ... No, I don't think you're doing it right ... Nuh-uh, don't do searches in the status bo-.'  Ah, fuck it.

As gracious as I am regarding Founder's massive generosity, and as ingenious I believed their fruit beers of prior years to be -- Blushing Monk Belgian Raspberry and Cerise Cherry -- I feel like Rübæus uses 2013's fruit du jour the way any freeway exit Chinese buffet uses MSG to assault the palate.  Rübæus is sharply alcoholic at its spectral ends with a patchy wavelength of sweetness that echos in the center.

Yes, this raspberry ale tastes good.  It IS good.  Real fucking tasty.  So are fortified flavored wines.  Rübæus has the clanky delivery of an MD 20/20 face slap, sweetly covered up with a hard kiss of saccharine.  Its like drinking a pint of your high school ex.  Fun and wild and probably very dangerous.  Also, totally unsuited for longevity, lest you're eager for the cops to show up, making you scatter around in the dark for your belonging.

Actually, it sounds like I was right to be excited about this. 

ABV 5.7%
Acquired Beer Mail
Can I Find This in Austin? Yes, look for it starting in early July
Album Pairing Coldplay | A Rush of Blood to the Head (2002)
★★★★★★★☆☆☆

And look for more [An Avenue] beer + music opinions on the new collaborative side-project Draught Punk! A podcast!