You, friend, are going to die, unless of course you are artificial intelligence reading this at some later date after our extinction. Dear friend, if COVID doesn’t get you–unlikely, given current recovery rates–then something else will, perhaps even something absurd like a random lightning strike while you are demonstrating to neighborhood kids that you can still ride a unicycle, or the air burst of a casually passing meteor (look up the recent Chelyabinsk meteor if you don’t believe this is possible), or maybe even driving a Segway off a cliff (this, sadly, is how the owner of Segway died). Life’s absurdities demand one thing for certain: beer. But beer creates its own absurdities, as we so often note in this column. Let’s take a look at what the world has served up…

Kegs were invented to dispense beer. But Hormel, a major producer of canned and processed foods (including the greatest of all, Spam), created a Chili Cheese Keg. According to their late January press release, customers could visit their website and enter for a chance to win one for their Super Bowl party. That would be three-hundred four-ounce servings of cheese. Sounds great for a hanami party, too. Can we get one that dispenses wasabi? Or mentaiko mayonnaise?

Random thought: if you’ve yet to write a haiku about Spam, you should probably get to that. Give future artificial intelligence something strange and funny to ponder about us.

This was an interesting revelation… Several outlets have reported over the last couple of years that Quentin Tarantino loves beer and even created a fictional brand that he inserted into his movies. Old Chattanooga Beer first appears in a convenience store in Death Proof. In his more recent Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, the character played by Brad Pitt is seen drinking the fictional Tennessee lager several times. Tarantino even had a fictional advertisement created (by Watson Design Group), which was released in a promotional digital magazine for the movie. At 7.4%, however, that’s like an imperial pilsner. Maybe after Tarantino retires (he’s hinted at it), he’ll go into brewing beer…

Random thought: movies about meteor strikes (increasingly common) need fictional beer because what else do you plan to do when the big one is inbound? What would you name it? Sayonara IPA? How about a SMaSH (single-malt, single-hop) beer?

Big-name celebrities getting into the alcohol business is hardly new. Francis Ford Coppola owns a winery. George Clooney has a high-end tequila brand. But beer? We’ve previously highlighted the collaboration between Dogfish Head and the Grateful Dead. Also Goose Island’s collaborations with drag queen Shea Couleé. Drinkers in Japan may be familiar with the import Brother Thelonius from North Coast Brewing. It’s a 9% Belgian-style Abbey Ale the brewery produces with Thelonious Monk Institute of Jazz. These are all great, but beer seems to be missing that partnership with a true A-list superstar. Enter Connor McGregor, the world’s flashiest MMA fighter. The Irishman owns Dublin-based Black Forge Inn, where they serve up “Forged Irish Stout”. He tweeted about it late last year, then followed up with an Instagram account devoted to it.

Now if this were Japan, what would we have… Maybe a Sakuraba Chop Stout? A Shohei Ohtani Double-Fist Pilsner? This one’s too tempting: A Naomi Osaka lager using what else but the hop… Sorachi Ace.

Speaking of stouts, Guinness reported in late January that sales of its popular stout surged 30% over the previous six months. Industry insiders speculate that it was due to people flocking to pubs following the lifting of lockdowns in the UK. The on-premise market analysis company CGA estimates that a whopping one in ten pints served in London was a Guinness. As some of you may know, Guinness long promoted itself as good for your health (recall the “Guinness for Strength” posters). We wonder how many people used this as an excuse during the pandemic to down more stout. You, friend, are going to die, but maybe a pint might delay that.

We’re guessing that touting beer’s supposed health benefits is not going to convince Japanese authorities to discontinue limited pub hours and ‘requests’ not to serve alcohol…

Overall, the pandemic has created chaos in the beer industry, but these past two years haven’t been all suffering. Or some folks just forge ahead regardless. Late last year, the Brewers Association in the US announced that brewery openings continued, and that America now has over 9000 craft breweries–over 700 new ones opened last year (Japan only has about 500 in total). But with a staggeringly tragic 900,000+ COVID deaths in America, something is not right. Clearly, the added health benefits of these breweries is overstated. May we suggest going light on the keg cheese, America?

Random thought: do you know what a keg stand is? There’s even a Wikipedia entry for it now. It’s a party stunt where your friends hold you upside down and you drink directly from the keg dispenser. Please don’t do this with the keg cheese.

While American craft is apparently thriving, the Germans are hurting. Beer sales dropped more than 2% in 2021 after dropping more than 5% in 2020. Yep, Japan, we’re not the only ones who have been facing lockdowns. But Germany limiting beer sales like this seems so out of character, almost to the point of absurd. It’s like Japan banning sushi or the Koshien baseball tournament. Like Americans banning Super Bowl junk food. Even artificial intelligence has trouble processing this one. There’s a glitch in the Matrix.

A glitch indeed: the French brewery (yes, they actually exist) Hoppy Urban Brew (HUB) just released a blue beer whose color derives from the use of spirulina algae. The beer was so popular after its release last fall, that they are currently increasing its production. This news may come as no surprise to long-time beer festival goers in Japan. Toyama-based Johana Beer has served up a popular blue beer (Great Blue) for years. If you’ve seen it at a festival, you can’t unforget it.

Gimmicks work. In January, Budweiser announced that it was randomly putting 10,000 gold cans into its 24-can packs across America, and that finding one gives you the chance to win $1 million. As we reported last year, BrewDog in the UK attempted a similar marketing stunt. The idea harks back to Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory, of course. In the original movie, kids that find the Golden Ticket in their chocolate have a chance to win the factory. But if you had a chance to win a craft brewery in Japan, which would you want? We’d like to hear your answers!

That’s going to have to do it for this issue’s ruminations on this spectacle of absurdity. Don’t forget: that meteor (or lightning strike) may be coming. Enjoy a beer. Blue, black, whatever…

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This article was published in Japan Beer Times # () and is among the limited content available online. Order your copy through our online shop or download the digital version from the iTunes store to access the full contents of this issue.