Echo de Lynch-Bages 2022

Expressive nose showing flowers, tea, herbs and dark berries; creamy attack, ripe fruit, slightly drying tannins, short finish.

Delivers a sappy (if perhaps slightly extracted stylistically) beam of dark cherry and cassis notes girded by graphite and sweet tobacco. Clear and precise in its message through the violet-accented finish. Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot and Cabernet Franc. Drink now through 2035. Tasted twice, with consistent notes.

Blue fruits, subtle perfume, a juicy blackcurrant and stony minerality on the nose. Supple and juicy, a real sense of fun with detail to the fine tannins. Well balanced, gorgeous texture, depth and characterful. A great second wine still with terroir markers, a salty finish, chalky texture and grippy tannins. Still concentrated and serious, there’s an intensity to the fruit but really well delivered. Will be a beauty. 91 IPT. 3.69 pH. Ageing 14 months, new and one-year-old oak barrels. 3.9 g/L total acidity. 91 IPT.

Tobacco, smoke, forest leaf and blackberries are what you find on the nose and on the palate. This superb baby Lynch Bages is an outstanding Pauillac on its own, thanks to its core of cassis, blackberries, spice, smoke, cigar box and herbs. The fruit is sweet, ripe, and vibrant. The wine is a blend of 64% Cabernet Sauvignon, 31% Merlot, and 5% Cabernet Franc. Drink from 2025–2040. 90–92 pts.

Dark ruby, purple reflections, broad ochre rim. Delicate notes of liquorice and fresh orange zest, a hint of mint, attractive bouquet. Juicy, red-berried and fresh, fine tannins, lively, animating style, mineral on the finish, good ageing potential.

Blackcurrants, smoky tobacco, crushed stone, and graphite emerge from the 2022 Echo De Lynch-Bages, a ripe, concentrated, structured second wine. It bears more than a small resemblance to the Grand Vin, in a rounder, more mouth-filling style that will offer two decades of overall longevity.

Dense dark-berry bouquet, heart cherry, noble cassis spice and Brazil tobacco. On the full palate, silky texture, a tightly knit tannic framework, floury astringency and a muscular body. In the focused finish, blackberries, graphite and a grainy astringency.

A serious Echo that gives a good entry into the main wine. There are a ton of tannins here, and it has the inky, slate, crushed rock character of Pauillac. Carefully extracted cassis and bilberry fruit, this is measured, one to look out for, needs a few years to relax. pH 3.69, 10% new oak.

Dark, intense, beautiful colour. Very aromatic, pure nose with ripe fruit. Juicy on the attack, silky as it develops, splendid on the mid-palate, the wine unfolds with a density and nobility like never before. Superb!

This second wine is rounded with layers of fruit and soft tannins. It is juicy, full of berry and cocoa flavors. The wine's spice aroma and juicy aftertaste are attractive. Drink from 2027.

Tasted blind. Light nose. Dry and just a little bit pinched. Not top-notch fruit and a very drying finish. (JR)