Appearance - 6 | Aroma - 5 | Flavor - 6 | Texture - 6 | Overall - 6

Bottle from Home Bargains, Manchester. Deeper golden with a very thin head. There’s some grainy malt in its nose, but more in its taste, although certainly not heavy.

Dog & Pheasant, Shrewsbury

Appearance - 6 | Aroma - 6 | Flavor - 6 | Texture - 6 | Overall - 6

Cask @ Bow Legged with Brass, Halifax. Copper with a small head. Has a sugar sweet berry fruit flavour. Medium to full bodied.

Appearance - 6 | Aroma - 5 | Flavor - 5 | Texture - 6 | Overall - 5

B&M Bargains, a cut price supermarket chain, is where the 500ml bottle came from. BBD 31 Jan 2015. Poured into a pint vase (Old Speckled Hen badged) on 16 May 2014. It looked quite impressive, clear light amber with a full foaming head of white bubbles. Nice blend of flavours, but nothing to get excited about. I think Elbow should start singing songs written and produced by brewers: they would then quickly realise they must leave brewers to make beer and them to make music. The beer is more malty than hoppy with a semi-sweet fruity note here and there, crisp and well carbonated in body feel. Not unlike a lot of Marston’s other bottled supermarket selections.

Appearance - 6 | Aroma - 5 | Flavor - 4 | Texture - 6 | Overall - 5

Bottle from Bernie’s Real Ale Off Licence, Shirley. Poured a clear light amber with a frothy white head. The aroma is malt citrus hop. The flavour is moderate to light bitter with a light watery hop bitter palate. Light bodied with average carbonation. It’s rather amazing that a brewery the size of Marston’s can’t do better than this. I could barely drink it.

Appearance - 6 | Aroma - 4 | Flavor - 5 | Texture - 6 | Overall - 5

500ml bottle from B&M. Colour is amber with limited with head. Minimal aroma, with a slight sweet biscuit taste. Ok. Maybe Elbow should stick to their great music.

Appearance - 8 | Aroma - 6 | Flavor - 5 | Texture - 6 | Overall - 4

Cask at the Conan Doyle (Nicholson’s), Edinburgh. Pale amber with a thin white head; malty aroma; thin with a malty taste; biscuity finish with some warming spices. A very ordinary bitter.

Appearance - 6 | Aroma - 5 | Flavor - 5 | Texture - 4 | Overall - 6.5

Cask handpull at The Old Buttermarket Canterbury Nicholson pub. Clear pale brown lasting white head. It’s a pale bitter. Nothing wrong with it just that it’s a bitter. Straight up. Bit watery in the mouth. Some hop on the finish.

Appearance - 6 | Aroma - 4 | Flavor - 6 | Texture - 6 | Overall - 5

Cask at the Bridge, Kingswinford. Pours dark orange with a medium head. Aroma is very eggy sulphur. Taste has bready sulphur.

Appearance - 6 | Aroma - 6 | Flavor - 6 | Texture - 8 | Overall - 6

Cask at the haymarket... Light copper... Thin off white head... Soft toffee fruits nose... Soft malts... Light tiffee fruits