Hang around whisky people long enough and at some point you are likely to hear that once upon a time, blended scotch reigned king.

Now it would be unfair to dethrone or bury blended scotch, that is still how most people consume their whisky. Yet, the growth of an enthusiast crowd looking for single malts and even single cask experiences, has, over the last three decades, significantly reshaped parts of the scotch whisky industry. It has not reshaped everything; after all, the economics of the industry still depend heavily on mass production of malts and grains for blending, but it’s given rise to new premium categories that never really existed before.

This week I turn back the clock and focus on the art of blending, with blends from across the 20th century, including many from the 1980s and earlier, when blends were, unquestionably, king.

For anyone who has never tasted these older blends, they are a remarkably different experience. The earlier you go, the higher the malt content you are likely to find within the blend, especially for blends that date prior to the grain whisky loch of the 1970s, when an overproduction of grain whiskies led to a crash in their prices– and an easy way to save money on a blend was to increase the proportion of those heavily discounted grain whiskies.

Earlier blends were often higher proof as well, so that prior to the 1990s, most major blends came in at 43%. If you are looking at this webpage, I certain that you already appreciate how big a difference that 3% makes for mouthfeel and the vibrancy of some flavor elements.

So here we go: some of the blends will be familiar labels, others are long gone. Blended whisky labels have, much like distilleries, gone through long periods of consolidation into larger conglomerates. While many operated as semi-independent fiefdoms inside larger conglomerates in previous decades, greater centralization of control, has resulted in the death of many labels and blending subsidiaries.

Yet, there not all hope is lost: Compass Box have long cut their teeth producing blends for enthusiasts, nerds, and the general consumer, while Diageo has put out its own limited and special releases of blends (more Cladach please!). Thompson Brothers have also been no stranger to releasing interesting blends, either made in house, or blended in the cask decades earlier.

So there is hope for interesting blends in the future, but there is plenty of fun to be had in chasing down old bottles and hoping to strike pay dirt with something that is still lively and vibrant, even after decades in glass. The risk is great, many have a cabbage water edge to them, or the old bottle effect, but the reward is a moment of time travel!

Artwork this week is my own: I channeled my love of vaporware aesthetics and 1980/90s visions of the future. Whenever I taste an old, slightly floral and maritime whisky, this is the color palette that comes to mind.