The nose is woody and spicy, but dominated by black cherry and blackberry. There's also enough leather and alcohol there to make it the official beverage of Jim Morison's pants, but I'm not sure how lizard kings and mad fish get along. (The Doors were never that funky.)

The flavors are just huge in the mouth, as the funky earth and brambly fruit getting' down on the get-down with spice and oak. It may not age as well as a funk jam like Stevie Wonder's "Superstitious," but it'll rock that end-of-summer party for sure!

Cheers,
TSW

NOTE: If Mad Fish is opening your mind to Western Australia as a wine region, then allow me to paraphrase the godfather of funk (George Clinton): "Free your mind and your taste buds will follow."There are some amazing wines coming out of the Margaret River area. The only problem is that not too many of them are exported far and wide just yet. Want to change that? Show your love by buying some Mad Fish. If they know we'll try wines from newer areas, you can bet your funky platform shoes that they'll send it over.

If you live in Australia or the UK, you likely know what I'm talking about with Margaret River wines, and now you know that I'm officially jealous of you.

* - WoW's party wine denotation is given to a bottle that you can bring to a party, and it'll make you look good -- but you won't be devastated if you end up not getting any.

This wine is like Earth Wind & Fire in the late seventies: really big, really funky and mostly kick ass.

I say "mostly," because there are some things about it you have to grapple with. Just like we all had to turn a blind eye (or rather, a deaf ear) to the string arrangements that polluted perfectly good music and turned some perfectly good funk into perfectly horrendous disco, you'll have to accept some earthy brambliness, my made up words and a little too much alcohol.

Another problem you'll have to deal with is what food you can eat with this wine. Trust me when I say that anything on a barbeque and/or on fire will do just fine. Caramelizing sugars make a lot of wines taste as flat as a Captain and Tenille bass line. But this wine holds its own and some of yours too against fire-smoked anything.

That's great news, considering it's time for an end-of-summer barbeque party.