22 Apr B52 Before the Internet Music Videos

B52 Before the Internet Music Videos

B52 Brewing Company

Conroe, TX
Hazy DIPA
ABV: 8.5%
IBUs: ?
Packaging: Draft, 4 pack 16 ounce cans, delivered by Hop Drop

Gaaah… A beer like this sure does make me miss the days of old. The year was 1997. I was 10 years old as I sat with my childhood best friend, Daniel. Daniel was one of only a small handful of friends of mine that had cable. (I didn’t get cable TV until I was 18 years old in my first apartment, and even then, it only lasted for a few months.) Wearing basketball shorts, white tank tops, and calf-high socks, we sprawled out across his living room couches watching MTV for hours and hours that summer.

Drinking Hill Country Fare Apple soda and eating Ramen as the music videos played on and on. This happened often at Daniel’s.

I just got my first ever Walkman. It was the thick, chunky, black one that would skip if you so much as blinked hard. I got a matching set of CDs and tapes that summer. Bone Thugs and Harmony E. 1999 and Mariah Carey Butterfly. Go ahead. Say something. I dare you.

It was the first time that music became real and personal to me, and that summer shaped me in a big way, but this isn’t a coming of age story about me and music. Along with the seductive serenades of Mimi and the guttural, violent, harmonies of Bone, it was the first time I remember seeing a music video.

Missy “Misdemeanor” Elliot was the culprit. “On my window-oh-oh… I can’t stand the rain,” while Timbaland’s funky, minimal beat loops over and over. The peculiar fish-eye lens inflating every scene from the jeep to the weird trash-bag-suit still sticks out in my mind. I probably saw plenty of other music videos before that one, and I surely saw millions after it, but this is the one that comes to mind when I think of the first music video.

B52’s Before the Internet series has been a fun ride down memory lane week in and week out, but this Music Videos has by far been one of the closest to home.

The cans feature a stack of old CRT tv’s – the funky old almost-square ones with dial-knobs. Each TV features an old music video that you remember fondly or GTFOH. My favorite from the can has to be Smells Like Teen Spirit, but anyhow.

On to the beer! B52 Before the Internet Music Videos pours with the picture-perfect appearance that most of their IPAs do. It’s a bright, warm color right in between yellow and orange, and the head is as white as a ghost. It laces down my new glass like a dream.

B52 Before the Internet Music Videos looks perfect, and the smell isn’t far behind. A generous helping of berries, grapefruit, and tropical passion fruit bounce out of the glass like booty in Sisqo’s Thong Song video, and the taste has me walking on air in the same way.

When I cracked the can open, it hissed a little bit of beer onto my hand, so I licked it off. That sounds gross as I type it, but I wasn’t about to wipe it off on my clothes either. When I licked my hand, it was straight tropical, passion fruit. Once I moved on from licking myself like a kitten, each sip lured me in with a smooth citrus-tangerine start. A semi-sweet rush of hop-candy was followed by a mildly-bitter grapefruit finish.

The Citra and Belma hops were a 1-2 punch of fruitiness, and I enjoyed the palette pummeling. I expected some hop burn after the aroma took over the room, but there was none! The ultra-creamy mouthfeel help set B52 Before the Internet Music Videos apart. It’s a chewy beer and not for the faint of heart, despite the approachability when it comes to bitterness.

As far as I know this one’s only available onsite at B52 unless you hit up the homies at Hop Drop for delivery. Use code “BEERCHRONICLE” for 10% off your beer delivery, and get some B52 nostalgia delivered before you head out to Wild West Brew Fest this weekend.