Although it obviously drew inspiration from Thin Lizzy’s raucous 1973 rendition, Metallica’s 1998 take on the traditional Irish street ballad “Whiskey in the Jar” redefines heaviness with every mention of the song’s titular spirit. Now, the band is lending its name to its own whiskey through a unique collaboration with WhistlePig distiller Dave Pickerell.
The resulting Metallica Blackened American Whiskey harkens back to the apocalyptic doom of the thrash metal song “Blackened” on the band’s 1988 album …And Justice for All. But this whiskey draws upon much more than Metallica’s dark feeling and long history as bourbon aficionados.
Drawing upon past experiences with a rumbling church organ while serving as a professor of chemistry at West Point, Dave Pickerell joined with Metallica to develop a proprietary method of sonically enhancing whiskey by using Metallica’s music directly. Dubbed “Black Noise,” this process involves blasting distilling casks with sound of “Blackened” among other tracks, causing the whisky inside to seep deeper into the wood for a “darker character and more balanced mouthfeel.”