Rawrrr: beer.
Anyone who has spent any amount of time in downtown Ann Arbor has probably happened upon a tall, slender monster playing the violin. Playing it very well, actually. The Violin Monster is a legend in this area, no question.
During an interview last Friday with Matt and Rene Greff, owners of the Arbor Brewing Company and the Corner Brewery, I learned that they have teamed up with the Violin Monster and will be releasing a Violin Monster beer this fall, perfect for bringing to that Halloween party you’ll be going to!
As we were preparing for the interview (which you can read HERE), one of our favorite ABC waiters, Heather, brought us some beers.
“So, Heather is going to be in our documentary,” Rene told us. “Do you know the Violin Monster? Well, we have a mutual friend and our mutual friend said, ‘You guys should get together and make a Violin Monster beer!’ So, we’re releasing a Violin Monster beer around Halloween.”
I asked her what that had to do with the video.
“As it so happens,” Rene said, “The Violin Monster has a group of friends that own a little independent start-up film company. They decided, pro bono, that they want to do a documentary of the making of the Violin Monster beer. They’ve been following us, sitting in on all of our meetings, and after spending some time with us, they said, ‘We want to do a 90-minute, feature-length piece about Arbor Brewing Company and your ties in the community.’ We just met tonight and we’re exploring things we can do.”
I asked Matt what kind of beer the Violin Monster beer will be.
“It’s kind of a crazy, new made up style,” he said. “It’s going to be a dark ale with some autumn spices and we’ll use our hefeweizen yeast strain to give it that banana-clove flavor. It will also be pretty bitter but not a ton of hop flavor and aroma. The pilot batch that’s fermenting right now smells amazing!”
Rene described it as a “strong dark wheat beer made with Midnight Wheat, brown sugar, and spice.”
I can’t wait for the documentary OR the beer! By the way, if you’re not familiar with the Violin Monster, here is one of many videos of him doing his thing.
You can see more videos HERE. His webpage is ViolinMonster.com, his Facebook page is HERE, and you can follow him on Twitter HERE.
UPDATE: So, the beer has an official label now and it is hooooowling good!:
[CC Violin Monster photo credit: Mike Prosser | Flickr, Arbor Brewing Co. sign photo by Anne Savage]
