1980 Château Musar Red

Marked bottle deposit on the shoulder. Pale rust red. Hint of decay on the nose which may well be cork-related (although the cork itself smells clean). Very vigorous, palate-grabbing start. This is full of life with light tannins on the end. Very impressive in many ways even if it’s still quite youthful. Really very difficult to assign a score to. I’d love to taste another bottle of this to assess whether that slightly note of decay is because of the wine or the cork. Wonderfully impressive in every respect other than this (which I will ignore in choosing my score) and this tastes as though it has a great future. The note of decay dissipated. (JR)