Pale Ale 2.0

From cask. Pours clear and golden yellow with a small white head. Aroma is citrusy. Crisp hoppy. Smooth fruity. Bitter, hoppy, light pine to grapefruit. Dry and toasted finish.

Bottle from Bert’s Crystal clear deep golden color with a good sized white head that persists and leaves lots of lace. Bready almost pilsner malt aromas with hints of melon rind. The flavor has a bit more hop bite but keeps the bready malt and hop profile. Nice brew, a bit different, but I enjoyed it.

Bottle. Pours a clear gold with a head that dies tons thin film fairly quickly. Aromas are of silo grain dust and light oranges. Flavor has a kind of grainy edge to it and ends with some bitterness that is hard to pinpoint in the flavor spectrum. Decent but I might like 1.0 better on this one.

Bottle. Clear amber with a large off-white head that lasts OK. Aroma of oranges, caramel earth, apricots. pepper. OK but not exactly rambunctious and there’s some cooked vegies lurking. Sweet with caramel, some stone fruit, oranges, a little zesty orange note, peppers and pepper. Moderate bitterness. Doesn’t really dry out at all. A bit of a worry.

Bottle. Amber beer with a cream head. Malt and earth aroma with grapefruit. Grapefruit and pine flavor. Medium bodied. Grapefruit and pine lingers.

Bottle: Slightly hazy amber with a full, light beige head. Caramel, orange scent. Taste is slightly bready, caramel malt, orange-peel, lightly peppery floral bitter. Pretty nice.

Location: 12 oz bottle from State Line, 6/23/15, Enjoy by 8/27/15, Thanks Evan!

Aroma: The aroma is spice and earthy hops, light pine, some fruity notes, and a bit of pale malt
Appearance: Pours a hazy dark gold with a sheeting off white head and some streaky, drippy lacing
Flavor: The taste is lightly sweet, with some mid-palate spice, and a medium bitter finish
Palate: This one is medium bodied and fairly clean, slightly tingly on the mouth, with a dry finish
Overall Impression: I can't actually recall the last time I had a Stone Pale Ale 1.0, but from reading my review of that one it seems like the new release is an improvement to my palate, so good on them.

On draught at Winking Lizard. The beer is a clear bronze color with a medium thick white head that diminishes gradually. Small patches of lacing on the glass. Aroma of fruit, grassy hops and malt. Light to medium body with flavors of floral hops, bready malt and fruit. The finish is mildly bitter with a short hoppy aftertaste. Decent overall.

Draught at YardHouse Fenway, 6/18/15
Stone and its marketing. It certainly dosent leave as bad a taste in your mouth as the Big Guys, but this is pretty ridiculous in its own right. That press release with the fake teary-eyed "It’s with a heavy heart that we discontinue..." blah blah blah....only to reintroduce the 2.0 series is just a lot of marketing and talk. Here was a chance, however, to actually make good on all this nonsense by following through with an improved product. Did they? Of course not.
While I think the sub-2.0 reviews are overly critical, this stuff is laughably unchanged for the better. Malty, heavily bready flavors are carried out by scratchy/husky malts that are "backed" by moderately floral hop notes with minor bitterness and light fruitiness.
Is Stone trying to Next Level us all and herald the return of the under-hopped English pale ale? I certainly get that you brew a shit ton of beer and it can’t all taste like [enter small batch, limited release, Vermont Nano-brewery IPA here], but this is pretty sad for all the uproar they made.
To its credit, its clean (though Stone’s beers are almost always clean) and aside from the grainy/husky character, it’s drinkable. But come on, would some tropical/juicy/stone fruit hop character have killed you? Or barring that some interesting citrus flavors? Or barring that even some fresh noble hops? Seems like they asked, "Ok guys, what is the least interesting hop character we can give this beer?". Alright, that’s enough out of me, rant over.