navybsn

Both of these are swill in my book. They're better than Bud but that's not saying much. I can understand not liking IPAs, especially if you've never had a really good one as fresh as possible, or maybe if you're someone (like my wife) who finds hop bitterness disgusting. Even under good conditions the flavors can take a while to click. But unless you've tried the real deal, you don't know what you're missing.
I was burned out on the hazy ones until I lost my sense of smell to Covid the first time around. Hazy, hoppy IPAs were the only thing that cut through the noise and tasted "normal" to me. Lucky me, northern VT is the land of plenty.

"I prefer beers I can't see through. So if it's too warm for a good stout, I want a black ale, scotch ale, or I will settle for a nice amber or honey brown."  - Navy Goat Butcherer
Yes this. I remember when I was in the pubs of Australia and all their beers were piss colored. I didn't know wtf to order, had to ask Carlissimo which piss he was drinking. My go-to here at home has become the Yuengling black & tan, $15 for a 12-pack, an eastern PA beer available everywhere and anywhere around here. And if they don't have it on tap they'll have their lager which is almost as ubiquitous as Budweiser around these parts, just with a wee bit more flavor. Because I don't always want a heavy syrupy stout with my dinner or in the warmer months. I'll grab a 6 pack of Smitty's red ale now and then as well. I ordered one at the Irish Cottage one time several years ago with my shepherds pie and I really liked it. And yeah fuck a bunch of bitter IPA's, I honestly find it hard to believe people like that shit so much.
 

 

If it weren't for beer nerds like us, we'd all be stuck with 1980's piss domestic swill for choice. Maybe just Bud Light for us yanks and Fosters for you folks on the wrong side of the planet. Be grateful for beer nerds.

If it weren't for beer nerds like us, we'd all be stuck with 1980's piss domestic swill for choice. Maybe just Bud Light for us yanks and Fosters for you folks on the wrong side of the planet. Be grateful for beer nerds.

As you can imagine, IPAs of all variations are prime movers in Sunny Florida. Beer menus are dominated by IPAs with various fruity additions. I do like the citrus variations (mango, orange, etc) as they tend to take the edge off the overbearing bitterness breweries tend to show as a badge of honor with the IPAs. We also tend to have a lot of Gose, Kolsch, and Pale ales. All fine, but I prefer beers I can't see through. So if it's too warm for a good stout, I want a black ale, scotch ale, or I will settle for a nice amber or honey brown. We've got a couple places here doing Czech style ales that are amazing, but you have to get them at the breweries. Will never see them on a shelf.
Again, not complaining. I have access to more quality beer than I could ever need, but it's a shame to see the commercially available craft beer market essentially turn into the domestic beer market it was a reaction to years ago. Lack of choice, same bland styles, just with added costs for the end user.

Yeah...I don't want it to sound like I'm complaining by any means. Md definitely isn't lacking for options, and if I have a craving for a certain style I can almost always find a well done version on the shelf. It's more that between the pandemic, the popularity of Hazy IPAs, and alternatives to beer fighting for the same shelf space, I've noticed there are far less options for a given style available than there was about 5 or so years ago...especially for styles that aren't in fashion with the Instagram crowd.
Like, the brewers in North America are really good at making various types of IPA's and Stouts, so if I can't get Yeti from Great Divide anymore, it's disappointing but someone local probably makes something nearly as good. When it comes  to a lot of the classic European styles though, well we don't have 1000 years worth of experience making Belgian style ales like Trappist monks in Europe. With a few exceptions, our versions of those styles are just pale imitations. So when a beer like that gets crowded off the shelf because local brewery #256 puts out another Hazy or Sour or whatever, it becomes a lot harder to find a replacement. Thats kind of what I'm disappointed about  
EDIT: I get it though. Both breweries and liquor stores need to prioritize what's selling, so from a business standpoint I totally understand why things are the way they are right now

I live in the home of hazy IPAs. There is an absolute glut of them represented at the supermarket, and slim pickings of everything else aside from multinational conglomerate pisswater (funny enough, the gas station has a better and more varied selection). Most of them are alright but tiresome, and the sheer quantity of them means that it's difficult to find them fresh, because the store is incentivized to keep its overstock on the shelves long after the beer is past its prime. Too many bandwagon-jumpers.
On the other hand, when they're done right they're amazing. Fiddlehead, The Alchemist, Hill Farmstead, and Schilling (Resilience) make great examples. I would hate to see those beers go away. Hill Farmstead and Schilling also make excellent lagers in an assortment of regional European styles. Both are real destination breweries. The only comparable place in MA was Tree House, another brewery somewhat unfairly defined by its flagship hazy IPA, that also makes an array of different styles and nails every one. 
We do get some good Canadian beers down here as well as stuff from Maine and NY state that fills in the gaps. The things I don't see around too much are English and Belgian styles, and big-alcohol barrel-aged beers. But it's basically Beervana. No complaints. Y'all should visit.

Holy shit...yes. Especially the "Hazy IPA". How many versions of that style do people need?
To be fair, I'm by no means hurting for good beer, and a lot of the local brewers are making some really good stuff. I just hate seeing the market contract to the point where certain styles are all but dying off because they aren't trendy. Like, give me a good bock or scotch ale, instead of the the 3000th fruited, imperial, milkshake sour

Same down here. Even the big retailers have decreased their selections. Craft beer selection is getting quite stale as well. The boom is definitely on the decline. On the other hand, we have quite a few quality local breweries in the area, so I mostly drink stuff from one of them. Usually a decent selection of styles although always heavy on the IPAs. Good lord I wish that trend would die off. 

Ondfødt - det österbottniska mörkret (2023)
 

Slough Feg - Traveller
 

Devastation - Idolatry, death/thrash Corpus Christi Texas 1991
 
Assorted Heap - The Experience of Horror, death/thrash Germany 1991
 
Cyclone - Brutal Destruction, Belgian thrash 1986
 

Motorhead - No Sleep Til Hammersmith 40th anniversary
 

Helloween - Walls Of Jericho

Vinyl palooza this weekend. That's what happens when I go out of town and my wife leaves me alone in proximity to a record store. Went in just to grab my daughter a couple for her birthday and walked out with a stack.
Bathory - Hammerheart
Bad Religion - Suffer
The Sound - Counting the Days
Sepultura - Bestial Devastation 
Sepultura - Morbid Visions 

Vinyl palooza this weekend. That's what happens when I go out of town and my wife leaves me alone in proximity to a record store. Went in just to grab my daughter a couple for her birthday and walked out with a stack.
Bathory - Hammerheart
Bad Religion - Suffer
The Sound - Counting the Days
Sepultura - Bestial Devastation 
Sepultura - Morbid Visions 

Napalm Death - Throes of Joy in the Jaws of Defeatism (2020)
 

Sorry if already posted
Loving these, goat-a-licious
Krwawy Pontyfikat | Okrütnik (bandcamp.com)
 

Crucifier - Led Astray | Iron Bonehead Productions (bandcamp.com)

Protector - A Shedding of Skin, German death/thrash 1991 (I didn't even see Yannis post before I posted this)
 
Sarcófago - Hate, Brazil 1994
 

Rapture - Aeons of Devastation
Chilean death metal
https://rapturedeathmetal.bandcamp.com/album/aeons-of-devastation

Hellish - La Danza de las Cuatro Serpientes Elementales
Chilean blackened thrash
https://entheosrecs.bandcamp.com/album/la-danza-de-las-cuatro-serpientes-elementales

Tau Cross - Pillar Of Fire

I now have a solar powered computer. Technically now if I listen to music it's carbon neutral metal!
(yes like all green projects I totally ignore how much carbon was used to get to this point and only focus on this moment in time)

Stop...you're going to make me blush. 😁
I am actually alive and well, and amusingly enough just happened to be looking in on the forum late last night when I saw my name go up, so I figured I'd check in. Didn't mean to completely wander off like I did, tends to happen with me sometimes when it feels like conversation at a place has gotten too quiet or fallen into too much of a rut...something else will grab my attention and off I go...and yeah, the new job, while not overly taxing by any means, definitely has moments where it needs a lot of my time (the next several weeks for example). So, that certainly doesn't help.
As for Whitenoise and my taste, there is quite a bit of overlap. We definitely cover a lot of the same ground, and I've pulled some good reco's from him over the years, but he's right when he says we have different priorities in our music. Usually a lot of the stuff he likes best would get just get a "not bad" rating from me, and he'd probably say the same about a lot of my personal favorites. In recent years my tastes have been running toward bands that like to hide a surprising level of melody under a thick layer of fuzzy production...the so called "raw black metal" trend. Though, I'll admit, it's a trend that's quickly wearing out its welcome.  I'm also probably a lot more forgiving of the use of synth, even though I seem to be one of only 5 people who's already over that Moonlight Sorcery band that's making everyone cream their shorts.
Regarding my year end list...honestly, I got tired of trying to whittle it down to a manageable number, and since there was no real pressing need to have one, I figured why make myself nuts, and basically just kind of stopped working on it. If you want to see it "as-is" though, I'm more than happy to post my rough list.
Hope everyone is doing well
 

CRUCIFORM - Cruciform
PURITY CULTURE - Purity Culture