Beer Thirty with Dead Register's Avril Che

Dead Register's Avril Che

Atlanta, GA's Dead Register is on the cusp of releasing their follow up EP to 2016's Fiber with Captive.

Much like its predecessor it's got a small number of tracks while gobbling up goodly numbers of minutes, but hopefully you've already heard all about how I feel about their music.

In the meantime, Avril Che took some time to discuss her beer habits with me.

Let's find out together!

1. My personal favorite beer style is the might Double India Pale Ale. The best DIPA in the world is STLIPA by Urban Chestnut. Tell me about your favorite style. 

These days I bounce between IPAs and Saisons. I live in sweltering, humid, mostly disgustingly hot Atlanta, GA, where we keep the dehumidifier blasting even in the joke of our “winter” months.

I find the angular structures of IPAs are best for cutting through the nasty thick dog-fart-breath air that stagnates around us. I’m usually more interested in the dry-hopped side of the spectrum, and varieties allowing for distinct nuances to bloom – not so much the crazed hop-head types that fight to be the hoppiest, soggy, green generic brew in existence.

I find Saisons to be a great marriage of the love/hate for my environment. It’s nasty farmhouse funk, but presented in a gorgeously colored golden haze. It’s seeing some sort of beauty through the dank pile of urban compost that surrounds me.

2. Many international people have laughed at me for this, but American Beer is the best in the world. Not American Lagers, that piss water is best used for drinking 15 of them while you're at the karaoke bar, but American Craft Beer. Which nation is pumping out the best beer? 

I’m not going to laugh at you. I have to agree with you on that statement, at least for the current times. I dare someone to take me on a world beer tour to show me otherwise.

American craft breweries literally don’t give a shit in the best possibly way, which leads to all sorts of wonderful experimentation. I feel that there are no rules here as to how a beer is “supposed to be” so there’s nothing holding brewers back.

The great thing is that we as consumers embrace that too. Instead of the now-defunct music stores of yore, now I walk down the street to Ale Yeah! – my favorite local beer store and go straight to their New Releases section to see what seasonal concoction has been whipped-up.

You can’t download beer (yet).

3. Even though I'm a giant beer snob, I'll drink beers that break the Bavarian Purity Laws. My personal favorite is Schalfly's Bourbon Barrel Imperial Stout. It's a might 22oz of 10% ABV Stout aged in bourbon barrels. It'll warm your heart and soul. What beers do you love that break Reinheitsgebot? 

Pffffft. Purity Schmurity. According to the BPL, Belgian wheats are out of the question. Gnomegang Blonde Ale by Ommegang is one of my favorite Belgian-inspired staples. It’s smooth, clean and yet extremely flavorful and fulfilling.

Just makes me smile with its warm relaxing hue and aromas. I hold Allagash beers close to my heart. They do a fabulous seasonal Belgian-inspired IPA called Hugh Malone. I close my eyes and I’m magically in Portland, Maine, fantasizing about the scents of their barrel-aging room…

I could live in that room. Boulevard Tank 7 is another fav. I had a keg of that at my post-wedding costume party.

Best of two worlds: Belgian and farmhouse.

4. Right now, you couldn't pin me down and get me to give my favorite St. Louis Brewery, though Urban Chestnut's STLIPA does put them in the lead...but if you put a gun to my head, it's Schlafly Brewing. What do you think of your local brewers?

We’ve had a number of brewers pop up in the recent years. One of our first local brewers, Sweetwater, came around in 1997, when the craft beer industry had not blown up yet.

They had a beer called 420. Huh, huh. Well, 21 years later, they finally made their 420 Strain G13 IPA, which actually tastes like weed so that should have been their original 420.

They need a time machine. Anyway, I’m super partial to Orpheus Brewing when it comes to our local selections. They understand flavor. And I want flavor.

Gimme. Transmigration of Souls is a double-IPA that is perfectly potent. That sharp balance of generous hops teetering with dryness. Simply dashing.

5. Hops or Malt? Personally, I feel like a jerk for asking the question. Give me a malty Scottish/Scotch Ale or a hoppy DIPA...and I'm happy...but you gotta pick one. 

Hops all the way. Nothing against Scottish Ales though. I won’t refuse a nicely poured Belhaven. Innis & Gunn’s barrel-aged Scotch beers are amazing too.

But at the end of the day, I gravitate towards the pale ale or IPA spectrum. I like a finely-honed brew to slash and slice the universe, as opposed plopping on warm blankets of sweet fuzz.

It’s just too damn hot down here in the south.

6. Whenever I'm road tripping. I'm always bringing back beers. Ohio, Great Lakes Brewing. East Coast, Yuengling. Western New York. Genessee. What do you bring home?

With few exceptions, I generally don’t. One reason being that I have access to a huge variety of craft beers from all over the place.

I honestly can’t even keep track of everything we have in our beer stores around town. Another reason being that sometimes I really enjoy the experience of drinking a certain local brew in its locality.

For instance, Geary’s from Portland, Maine. I only drink Geary’s while I’m up in ME, and it makes it extra special somehow.

Geary’s Brown Ale would not taste the same in swampy ATL as it would sitting on a dock on with my feet in the cool waters of Cobbosseecontee Lake.

Can you tell I like hanging out in Maine? Cheers!