Ardbeg 2009/2023 (59%, OB, cask #3771, 2nd fill PX sherry butt, 633 bottles)
Colour: pale amber. Nose: the PX and the peat seem to get along pretty well at first impression. It's all nicely concentrated, syrupy, some elegantly sweet peat smoke and tar vibes, orange muscat wine, spiced marmalade, damson liqueur and salted caramel. Develops some fun notes of cola syrup and glazed ham with a little time. With water: more leathery and gamey now, lots of aniseed, a touch of hot paprika and ideas of spicy ramen, old Cointreau and red miso. Mouth: much punchier and very peppery, full of wood ashes, sawn hardwoods, camphor, black olives in brine, coal smoke and boiler shed fumes. With water: more classically on tar, salt and pepper notes, a slightly muddy, 'farmyard' style peaty quality, more wood ashes and bonfire embers, and many more black olive vibes. Finish: long, extremely umami, salty, camphory and ashy. Comments: I enjoy how the sweetness of the PX slowly fades into the background as everything is swamped by salty and smoky qualities. An impressive beast but rather more 'modern good Islay whisky' than classical Ardbeg I would say. 
SGP: 577 - 87 points. 

Ardbeg 19 yo 2001/2020 (51.3%, Elixir Distillers 'The Single Malts of Scotland' for China, sherry hogshead, cask #1-115, 256 bottles)
Colour: bright amber. Nose: sweetly tarry, syrupy medicines, sweet black liquorice, pine wood full of resin, camphor galore. A concentrated sense of sweet, tarry peat, with some impressions of caramelising brown sugar, smoked ruby ales and smoked ham. With water: very briny, ashy, meaty, smoky and umami. Someone has emptied a tube of anchovy paste and black olive tapenade into the glass! Mouth: good arrival, all on medicines and smoked dark teas, but becomes quickly a tad cloying and sticky. A wee bit of a tussle between tannins and sugars that feels a just a tad too cloying. With water: very good, but still a tad jammy, a tad woody and a tad astringent on the palate. Many very enjoyably peppery, tarry and camphory qualities counter that though in fairness. Finish: pretty long, back on tarred rope, smoked meats (brisket slathered in BBQ sauce) and smoked black peppercorns. Comments: very good, but it feels like the spirit and wood never quite manage to get along. 
SGP: 576 - 85 points. 

Ardbeg 2000/2021 (47.5%, OB, cask #2662, refill bourbon barrel, 194 bottles)
Colour: white wine. Nose: comes across as a surprisingly gentle Ardbeg. All on seawater, more delicate medicinal characteristics like gauze, mercurochrome and mouthwash. It invokes clear memories of Mum filling a basin with hot water and Dettol every time I grazed a knee or an elbow as a child. Continues in this vein of crisp, clean and dry, with brittle peat smoke, wood ashes and preserved lemons in brine. Mouth: very elegant and soft again, although perhaps that's a trick of the low ABV, as the flavours themselves are more to do with thick, pure peat smoke, impressions of petrol, smoked olive oil and tarred hessian. Gathers a more assertive profile and sense of thickness and even waxiness. It's also highly savoury and umami, with anchovy paste, Maggi, pasta water and miso broth all coming through. Finish: long, full of seashore impressions, more umami and pasta water vibes, crisp peat smoke, mineral salts and capers in brine. Comments: perhaps not the most Ardbeggy Ardbeg out there, but the softer approach here is rather disarming and the end result is a perilously easy to quaff and extremely delicious and evocative Ardbeg. Diet Ardbeg, if you will. 
SGP: 465 - 89 points.

Ardbeg 25 yo 1999 (49.5%, Club Batard x OBE for 1st anniversary, sherry, 88 bottles)
Colour: bronze amber. Nose: classical Ardbeggian tar and black pepper. Fir and hardwoods, full of resins, natural tar extract, gentian eau de vie and liquorice root. It even starts to go towards this impression of root beer syrup that I heavily associate with wonderful experiences with those luminous old 1976 sherry butts. Starts to really gather complexity as well, with some maraschino cherry juice and pickled dark fruits emerging - a slightly tangy, rancio and balsamic combination. With water: just a few drops and it sort of shakes off its sherry cloak and reveals a gym-sculpted Ardbeg beneath (a tad homoerotic perhaps?). A more direct peaty profile, extremely precise, intense and showcasing a more emphatic medicinal and slightly herbal profile. Mouth: superb arrival, very tightly focussed on concentrated tarry and peppery characteristics once again. Really all about tarred rope, hessian cloth and things like aniseed distillate, smoked almonds, pure sea salt and oily sheep wool. With water: grubbier (positively so) and earthier, full of coal scuttles, puffer smoke, mud, beach kelp and salted liquorice. Lashings of camphor and iodine now. Finish: long and beautifully deep, full of glowing peat, and circling back to this rather wonderful meditation on tarriness in all its forms. Comments: love the evolution and in particular love the finish. As we often observe about the best 1990s Ardbegs: they remind us a bit of the 1970s. That's certainly the case here. 
SGP: 567 - 91 points.

Ardbeg 30 yo 1973/2003 (51.9%, Douglas Laing 'Old & Rare', 94 bottles)
Colour: pale gold. Nose: ha! Coming back to 1970s Ardbeg feels a bit like seeing an old friend after several years, you just pick up where you left off as if nothing happened. This feels immediately familiar with these stunning combinations of pure tar extracts, seawater, waxes, oily sheep wool, herbal infusions, delicate old medicines, mineral oil and just this hard to describe, general, shimmering sense of fatness, oiliness and immense texture. With water: saltier, more rugged, utterly brilliant, even better! Mouth: with the very best old whiskies you are knocked out by the nose and then the palate just goes up and up into the stratosphere in a confounding fashion. Well, you might say we have boarded the Ardbeg hot air balloon (who said these notes are mostly hot air anyway?) An astonishingly dense, textural and beautiful mouthfeel; a whisky of incredible power but with a sense of effortless control and sophistication as well. Flavour wise it's another philosophical musing on tar, medicine, seawater, pepper and peat. But taken altogether it becomes something much more profound, like all the great Ardbegs of this era, it's so much about body, texture and physical effect in the mouth as much as actual flavour. Not too sure we're making sense here, or indeed, not just gibbering absolute mince (always a possibility when tasting such great whisky, I grant you). With water: will someone please get this whisky some Ozempic! Finish: censored. Comments: up there with the very best of the best in terms of old Ardbeg, though it's a rather crowded pedestal... 
SGP: 467 - 95 points.

Ardbeg 30 yo 1967/1997 (51.7%, Signatory Vintage for USA, cask #1142, oloroso sherry butt, 530 bottles)
Colour: deep ruby / mahogany. Nose: every type of exotic hardwood and resin imaginable, combined with some 100 year old Cuban cigars still in their boxes. Cherry cola and root beer syrups fused together with star anise, dried mango, prune juice, celery salts, cocktail bitters and over-stewed exotic fruit teas. Some fruity, freshly brewed espresso, bitter dark chocolate, creme de menthe and a single drop of motor oil. Hypnotic whisky from out of a time warp! With water: gains a magnificent impression of salinity, pure tar, roof pitch and endless tiny tobacco and dark chocolate notes. Totally brilliant! Mouth: a deeply spicy and earthy attack! Wood spices, natural tar extracts, bitter herbal notes (a whole jeroboam of Fernet Branca and Jägermeister), herbal ointments, wormwood, the classiest, darkest dark chocolate full of sea salt and endless umami qualities that bring to mind the usual suspects of Maggi, miso and anchovy. In some ways you could say it is on the cusp of being too woody, but it seems to have gone off into these magnificent 'varnishy' territories that recall the greatest bourbons - even very old Armagnacs too. One of those old school whiskies where the wood becomes almost digested by the spirit and part of the immense whole. With water: develops a beautifully intricate patchwork of spices, resins, tarry notes, camphor, earthy Pu Ehr teas, clove, liquorice root, tiger balm and soot. You could go on for hours. Finish: very long, glowing with the same modulations on wood spice, tobacco, herbal bitters, camphor, drying faded peat and umami notes. I feel like I've just ingested a Partagas smoothie! Comments: despite all that gushing, I think I still prefer the 1973 by a single point. At this level of the scale, the distance between such scores starts to get quite significant. But still, a total masterpiece and a clear indication of the distinctions between 1960s and 1970s Ardbeg, even with all that sherry in the mix. 
SGP: 475 - 94 points.