The Rolling Stones Made a New Spirit to Promote Some Very Exciting News
A bottle of rum and tickets to the tour sounds like the perfect holiday gift for Stones fans.
Dave J Hogan / Getty Images for The Rolling Stones
The Rolling Stones are no strangers to the world of celebrity spirits collaborations. To commemorate the band’s 50th anniversary in 2012, Suntory released a rare blend of Japanese whiskeys, including a 50yo Yamazaki, that now resells for tens of thousands of dollars. Four years later, Jose Cuervo released a limited edition guitar case of 250 Aniversario to celebrate the Octogenarian rockers’ first glimpse of a Tequila Sunrise, at the Trident Bar in San Francisco, on the eve of their raucous agave enhanced 1972 American tour. The last decade has also seen collaborations with Crystal Head vodka, plus two runs of Goldy Gin with London’s Thames Distillery. But as the Stones’ remaining members (drummer Charlie Watts passed away in 2021) kick off a promotional tour for their latest musical release, Hackney Diamonds — British slang for broken glass — the band is dropping a bottle all their own which you may want to handle with care.
Today marks the release of Crossfire Hurricane rum ($37), an 80 proof blended golden rum, sourced from Jamaica, Barbados, and the Dominican Republic. The blend boasts the tropical hue and nose of caramelized bananas, after spending five years in French oak barrels.
Crossfire Hurricane was made in collaboration with co-founder John Fincher, a former rocket scientist and Survivor: Samoa contestant, who entered the spirits business after disparate stints with the defense firm Northrop Grumman and brewery Anheuser-Busch.
“I learned marketing from the largest beverage company in the world,” Fincher tells Food & Wine, explaining how his time in the beer business laid the groundwork for his latest gig as a partner in Socio Ventures, a venture capital firm specializing in helping celebrities develop premium spirits.
“It is an absolute privilege to create this product alongside some of the greatest artists of our time; the band’s vision and enthusiasm for Crossfire Hurricane set us apart and positioned us to redefine the rum category,” Fincher added. In recent years, other legendary musicians have done likewise, including Bob Dylan, who partnered with Spirits Investment Partners in 2018 for the launch of the now award-winning Heaven’s Door bourbon.
Crossfire Hurricane is a perfectly evocative name for the Stones’ rum. It’s easy to picture the band indulging in the tropic intoxicant while recording Goats Head Soup at Dynamic Sounds studios, in Kingston, in 1973, after the rockers wound down their Cuervo-fueled US tour. The name also brings to mind guitarist Keith Richards’ star turn as Jack Sparrow’s father in Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End, even his impromptu set at the premiere of The Rum Diary in 2011. However, the origin of the phrase “Crossfire Hurricane” isn’t what you think. It’s rooted not in Richards’ lush life but in a tough childhood.
According to one biography, Richards penned the opening line of the Stones’ 1968 hit, Jumpin’ Jack Flash: “I was born in a crossfire hurricane,” as a reference to being born amid German air raids on his hometown of Dartford, England, outside of London. Coincidentally, the classic Hurricane cocktail, the French Quarter staple of light, dark, and overproofed rums blended with passionfruit syrup lemon juice and the glow of grenadine, also dates back to the Second World War, when it was invented at Pat O’Brien’s bar in New Orleans.
The Stones have been around long enough to see Crossfire Hurricane take on new meaning in recent years, which may explain why they’re suddenly eager to reclaim the turn of phrase.
Following a provocative 2012 documentary of the same name, which chronicled the band’s 1970s heyday, the expression became the code name for an FBI investigation into Donald Trump’s 2016 campaign, at a time when the future president defied the band by repeatedly closing his rallies with “You Can’t Always Get What You Want” against the group’s wishes.
If you want Crossfire Hurricane, you can get it at crossfirehurricane.com now through December 31, before bottles hit store shelves in the new year.
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