Closet Drinking Toward Destiny: The Story Behind “Tap That AZ Podcast” – Grand Finale

In part 3 we explored how the people of the Arizona craft beer family helped me find the path toward the career I was meant to pursue. The awesome beer didn’t hurt either. So after a few episodes and upgrading my recording equipment I started to get more at ease. But not totally; I still get the butterflies before every interview but the “on-the-verge-of-throwing-up” feeling has since been kept to a minimal.

My vision from the beginning was to implement a video element, a kind of “Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives” for Arizona craft beer. I did lots of research on equipment and decided that I would just start off with my iPhone using a gimbal. I was talking with my main beer consultant Justin Cross aka The Alpha Ale, co-founder of “Earn Your Booze” and told him my thoughts asking if he knew anything about gimbals. He basically told me to stop being dumb and get someone who knows what the hell they’re doing. Damn that Justin Cross and his sensibility. Because otherwise I would have jacked that up so bad it would have made Blair Witch Project look like Avatar on an Ultra HD 4K TV.  But Aaron Markus us a true professional and artist. If you haven’t seen any of the videos for Tap That AZ yet then drop whatever it is that you are doing and watch them right now. Aaron is truly talented and works his ass off to create some stellar video magic. Cider Corps is a great one to start with.

The addition of the video element has turned this neat little hobby into a full-blown obsession. So much so that I have abandoned many things that I used to really enjoy like playing guitar terribly and watching every episode of “It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia” as many times as it took to remember every golden line of the best comedy show of all time. Every free minute is dedicated to expanding my knowledge of craft beer and brainstorming new ways to get Arizona beer on the craft beer map. My daughters even think that any time I leave the house I am going to do something related to beer. And they’re probably right 98% of the time. Not sure if that’s a good thing. Damn it, now I REALLY need to make a career out of this!

So what’s on the horizon? With new-school brewers like Weedy from Tombstone putting just a lil bit of hops in his beer in the “Town Too Tough to Die” and my boys from Dark Sky making liquid gold up in the pines as well as the traditionalists like Brian Helton and Brad Williams from Scottsdale Beer Co. the sky is the limit for Arizona beer. We are in the infancy of what we are capable of and I hope the craft beer world is ready for us. My goal is to play my role in making sure that those who don’t know find out what is going on out here in the desert. Surrounding myself with all of the right people has been and will continue to be the key. As the saying goes “it takes a village to make great beer”. That’s the correct saying right?

The goal is to eventually turn Tap That AZ into a TV show. Aaron and I have also partnered with media expert Erik Merkow to launch AZ Food & Beer, a standalone media platform for everything Arizona beer and beer-related food. Through both of these outlets the goal is to put a positive spotlight on all of the awesome things going on in Arizona beer.

Are you look for specific beer reviews and critiques from me? In the words of Johnny Depp’s character George Jung in “Blow” “That ain’t me babe”. Some unknown musician named Bob Dylan may have written that originally but there’s no way to know. Let’s just give credit to Johnny Depp.

Stay awesome!

Eric

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Eric Walters
I love beer. Specifically Arizona craft beer. Oh yea, my family is pretty awesome too. An amazing wife and 2 awesome little girls make my life great. And did I mention beer?



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