Anything Southcorp can do, BRL can do better, or so somebody must think. Straight in the footsteps of Devil’s Lair and its Fifth Leg wines comes the new Starvedog Lane brand, three ‘new wines with attitude and bite’, plus a fashionably hip label with dog bone motif. Now I have read the press release about how Starvedog Lane was the name of a temporary encampment of German migrants near Hahndorf in the 1880s, and I do know how hard it is for marketing departments to create new labels, but sometimes it’s just a little to obvious to make connections. I also wonder how Ian Hollick, whose Ravenswood Coonawarra Cabernet Sauvignon is an established regional classic, must feel about a ‘Ravenswood Lane’ vineyard in the Adelaide Hills which produces sauvignon blanc. Given Henschke’s recent failure to prevent Rosemount from using the name ‘Hill of Gold’ for its new Mudgee brand I’d hardly suggest legal action, but it wouldn’t please me were I in his shoes. For the record, the Starve Dog Lane Ravenswood Lane ‘Gathering’ Sauvignon Blanc 1999 (how will all that ever fit on a wine list?) is an attractive musky and rather juicy varietal wine with intense flavours of cassis and gooseberries and passionfruit, with a grassy, almost nettley herbal quality that’s just slightly too sweaty and over-exaggerated. It’s long and bracing and I rate it at 17.0, suggested drinking window 2000-2001. It retails around $30, which is tall for the first release of a lightly oaked wine.
