Initial Thoughts
Every now and again a buddy of mine, we’ll call him Jeremy, comes to town from Memphis. Jeremy runs a great blog over at Blind Eye Cigar Review and he’s also on Twitter if you’re into that. Well, Jeremy can be a hell of a guy somedays. His last visit to Nashville we hung out and did a video review for his site. As payment to put my beautiful mug on his video, he gave me three cigars from his local shop in Memphis.
I really don’t have much information on these cigars other than the specs that he gave me. No back story or anything; just a local shop’s custom cigar. If you look at Havana Mix’s website you’ll see a link to the Beale St. cigar and in one of the pictures I saw Rocky Patel signing a sign for them. So maybe Rocky actually manufacturers this blend? Jeremy if you read this I’d love to hear more about this stick down in the comments!
Alright let’s dive into this thing and see what we’ve got our hands on!
Looks
As I’m sure you know by now, I’m a sucker for packaging on a cigar. When you combine a great design and some shiny blueness, you’ve got me pulled right into your tractor beam. This Beale Street Rhythm Guitar cigar has a beautiful, shiny, dark blue band that really catches my eye. In fact, it has two of these bands. I’m in blue heaven here! The color and shine is very similar to the Rocky Patel Cameroon band. However, this design is much more intricate. The top band has a guitar shape to it that goes around the barrel of the cigar. It has a lighter blue stencil on the inside with white lettering that says ‘Beale St. Cigar – Memphis TN’.
Now the second band is just as eye catching but it delivers more of a hearfelt message: “No black, No White, Just blues”. I’m not sure if this is the moniker of the city or Beale St, but I like it. I’m really impressed with the overall look of this cigar. Most shops don’t go to this much detail to provide for their custom sticks. I love seeing the thought and work put behind this thing to make it a great looking cigar.
Function
Alright, enough about how the Beale Street Rhythm Guitar cigar looks. From my astute observations I believe this cigar is a toro, standing at 6″x50. It’s a good sized cigar, this vitola is right in my wheel house. I’m trying to stay away from all these monster sticks that are being released lately.
This stogie has a beautiful semi-dark brown wrapper to it. It’s an Ecuadorian Sumatra with very minimal veins and constructed flawlessly. I can barely see the lines of the triple cap on the head of the cigar. The barrel feels nice and firm and has a good bounce back to it when it’s squeezed.
Time to nip the cap and see what the dry draw has to offer on this stick. Mmm, the dry draw is perfect. just a bit of resistance, but I’m still able to pull some air through the barrel and pick up on some pre light flavors. I have a feeling I’m going to be a big fan of this cigar. I’m sitting here hoping that this cigar is in fact made by Rocky Patel. When I started out, RP was my favorite brand of cigars. I tried everything he made and settled on the Decade as my favorite. Then one day he came to town and I got to hang out with him at an event. I bought a box of mix n match RP cigars and he signed the box and took a picture with me. Very cool day. If he’s ever in your town for an event. I suggest you go. He’s a hell of a guy! Ok got a little sidetracked, so let’s get back to it. I’m gonna toast the foot and dive into this Beale Street Rhythm Guitar cigar!
Smoking
Instantly this cigar just starts bellowing smoke. What a great draw. It’s easy to pull tons of thick creamy smoke, can’t ask for more from the get go. The foot was somewhat hard to get toasted for some reason. It wanted to tunnel right off the bat, but amazingly it didn’t affect the burn line. I’m not sure what’s going on with that.
The first third smoked perfectly. A great burn line incredible draw and tons of smoke. I’m actually bogarting this thing down faster than I had anticipated. The ash is holding on quite nicely, I think I got it to around an inch and a half before I decided it was time to let it go.
The second and final third smoked perfectly until I got down to where I had to remove the bands. The top band, the one with the cigar on it, had some glue that ran off and it was stuck to the cigar’s delicate wrapper. It tore a little sliver of the wrapper when I pulled it off. I slide the second band over it without removing anymore of the wrapper, but as I got closer to the head with the burn the crack began expanding. Of course this happens frequently so I didn’t freak out. I just kept smoking and luckily the wrapper never completely unraveled which I’m thankful for.
Flavor
So I’m not gonna lie, when Jeremy delivered these cigars from Memphis, I was really hoping for some Rendezvous ribs as well. Needless to say he failed miserably on that delivery. Maybe next time, eh Jeremy? Since I didn’t get ribs delivered to me, the next best thing would be to have the cigar taste like ribs right? Yeah, after thinking that I decided that was probably a bad idea too. I guess I’m just really in the mood for some ribs!
The pre draw notes that I got off this Beale Street Rhythm Guitar cigar were very sweet. After nosing the foot and the barrel I picked up on a strong scent of molasses. The sweetness was the first thing to hit my nose. I didn’t pick up on much else. It reminded me a lot of what pipe tobacco smells like. It’s that sweet kind of sticky goodness that you smell from a freshly packed bowl.
Once I lit it up, the sweetness dissipated somewhat and I began picking up on a slight spice and nuttiness. This carried through the first third very well. Not a ton of change throughout the first third, just a nice creaminess and a bit of spice. I finally got up the courage to perform a retrohale of this cigar and the spice was intensified even more. The strength of the cigar was beginning to show. This was building into a fairly strong medium bodied stick.
During the second third, the Beale Street Rhythm Guitar cigar began building on itself. I started picking up more spice and a slight taste of cocoa. I assume this is being created from the Nicaraguan tobacco in the filler. I’m also starting to pick up on a nice earthy and nuttiness in this third. The spice is even more prevalent on the retrohale it kicks off the party and then is soothed by a nice bit of earthiness that is accompanied by the savory nuttiness at the end. It’s turning out to be quite the complex cigar.
The final third begins to die down. I started picking up a slight bitterness in the third, this is prolly due to me chiefing this cigar too fast because I love the way it’s smoking. Anyway I go ahead and resuscitate it and it begins burning clean and clear again. The spice has been toned down and it’s a nice easy way to fade out of this cigar. I love the flavors from this stick and it really showed me that some shops know what they’re doing and can have a ‘house stick’ made for their shops.
Would I Buy It Again?
For sure, they have two other sticks with different wrappers that I’m eager to try!
Is It an Every Day Smoke?
For me it could be. It was pretty damn good!
Would I Buy a Box?
Depending on the price point this could be a steal of a cigar for a box price!
Conclusion
Overall, I gave this Beale Street Rhythm Guitar cigar a 9/10. It’s a wonderful cigar full of flavor and a great smoking experience. I had a little trouble with the band tearing the wrapper and the bitterness towards the end. Other than that, it’s a great smoke and I’d highly recommend if you’re ever in Memphis to stop in at Havana Mix and pick these up! Jeremy said you can call Havana Mix and place an order, or you can order these online if I’ve inspired you to buy them!
