Joe Swick: Everyone's Song Is Different

I've been following Joe Swick ever since I started working with Jenny & Francois, my US importer who sells Joe's wines in the States as well. I love that he breaks the image, traditionally assigned to Oregon wine, of "the little Burgundy of North America" (while still making some delicious Pinot Noirs).

His approach is free, experimenting, irreverent: he works with a plethora of varieties, purchased from growers across Oregon's Willamette Valley and Washington State and sells them under evocative, tongue-in-cheek names that are rich in pop-cultural references or reflect Joe's deep love for music, like Wyd?, Mallsoft or Vegas on Acid.

I see him as a fellow seeker of knowledge and new wine frontiers, even if they sometimes (often) come at the risk of failure; I think we share the belief that there's no point in repeating something that doesn’t work. The perfect person to exchange some ideas with, right?

Words by Milan Nestarec & Lucie Kohoutová / Photos courtesy of Swick Wines

I'll start easy, how are you? As we speak, you are preparing for the harvest. Has the vintage been comfortable or complicated in the vineyards so far?

We are doing well! Right now [mid-September, editor's note], we are about 2 weeks from harvest here in the Willamette Valley. We are getting all of our equipment ready for harvest. Barrels, casks, eggs, amphorae... We had a later than usual bud-break and flowering due to a colder and wet winter and spring. A few heat spikes in the summer. The last few weeks have been colder than normal and have slowed down ripening. I'm crossing my fingers for a few more weeks of dry and warm weather.

Before starting your winery, you've travelled a lot and done many harvests, both in the “Old World” and New. Were you after natural wines at that point already?

Before Swick Wines started in 2013, I spent 10 years and some 15 harvests working for other wineries. By working, I mean it was paid work, lasting anywhere from 3 months to 2 years. My first few harvests took place in Oregon and Sonoma County in California, in mostly small to medium Pinot Noir houses that focused on higher-end wines. I was aware of natural wines at the time, but I didn't have a palate for them yet. We didn't use the term "natural wine" in the early 2000s.

Between 2007 and the end of 2011, I worked two harvests per year, spending part of the year in Australia or New Zealand, and part in the USA or Europe. My cellar production skills really improved in New Zealand, because I was working in more industrial "factory" types of wineries where we were processing upwards of 400 tons of grapes per 12-hour shift.

Cellar interns sometimes can not get a whole lot of practical cellar experience when working for smaller houses.

If you work in larger wineries, it can be pretty easy to move to a smaller one, but doing it the other way around can be much more challenging.

Looking back, what was the most important moment from that time for you?

Every experience was meaningful to me for different reasons. The biggest benefit of working for so many different wineries is the life experience you get. You work for so many different types of people. Some nice, some not so nice, some outgoing, some shy, some strange. The exposure to cultures and languages different from your own is also priceless. You meet so many lifelong friends – the real ones – along the way.

The experience that left the biggest impact on me was the 2010 vintage with Niepoort Vinhos in the Douro Valley. I had known their winemaker at the time, Luis Seabra, for several years before coming to Portugal. Luis Seabra and Dirk Niepoort are probably the 2 most influential people to me as far as my wine career goes. Both are very inspiring, for different reasons.

Can you elaborate on that?

Dirk has a curious, experimental, confident and calculated mind. He also has an amazing palate and his tastes weren't just limited to Portuguese wines. I think that this is something that can happen when you are in one place for too long. You get an "AOC palate" where you only taste wines from the area where you make wine. While at Niepoort I was able to taste many bottles of DRC, Leflaive, Jamet, Chave, Raveneau etc etc... But also wines from Portugal, like the Baga variety from Bairrada DO. Amazing Colares and Dao wines. Old bottles of Port and Madeira from the 18th and 19th centuries.

Dirk gave me the confidence and patience to do what I believed in and to not be afraid of failure. A simple example would be the use of stems during fermentation and not worrying about lower alcohol, or about making red wines with light colour. Dirk taught me that red wines can have power and depth while still being light and fresh.

And Luis?

His work ethic and how meticulous and precise Luis was. Luis ended up starting his own winery called Seabra Vinhos in 2013 and I was able to work with him again for the 2015 vintage, before my own harvest started in Oregon.

Any other winemaker(s) that has really changed your perspective on wine?

As for winemakers whom I have only met a few times - Stéphane Moreau-Naudet in Chablis and Julien Labet in Jura were quite influential. I met them both in 2011. We spent the whole day in their respective vineyards and wineries, and their approach to oxidative winemaking techniques with Chardonnay and Savagnin was very eye-opening.

The winemaker is often seen as a rock star or, or a one-man/woman show, but in reality, there are so many other hands involved. Who do you create your wines with?

At the winery, it is just myself and Maureen Eden. Maureen and I have worked together for almost a decade now and she is just as responsible as I am for all of the wines that we make. I can come up with some pretty weird concepts or projects and I can always get an honest answer from her when I'm getting a little too avant-garde.

We are definitely two different people with two different palates and I think that is why we work well together. She is the calm voice of reason in many cases when I am losing my marbles during harvest.

As far as the rock star thing, winemakers are just people doing their jobs. There are perks for sure, but the production side of things is not glamorous at all. Especially if you're a self-funded winery without outside investment.

How is the low-intervention wine movement on the West Coast, any interesting new winemakers we need to try?

I would say there's more in California than in the Pacific Northwest. To be honest, I don't get a chance to taste that many American wines, since I don't really drink wine much these days. My favourites in Oregon are Eyrie, Cameron and Thomas, although there are so many great wineries here, it's hard to choose.

As far as natural-leaning winemakers, I would say Jarad Hadi from Grape Ink is making some of my favourite wines from Oregon right now. In California, I really like Hardy Wallace and Evan Lewandowski.

In the collective perception, Oregon = Pinot Noir. It's a grape we all cherish, but at the same time, I love that you work with many other varieties. I see it as a breath of fresh air in this certain "Burgundian monotony". I also heard you started working with Gruner Veltliner, my favourite – did it work out?

Aligoté has been a breath of fresh air for us. I think that Oregon is due for some varietal switch-up in the near future. Gruner Veltliner is new to me… just 4 barriques made! We're bottling it soon, so we'll see how it turns out. I tend to treat most white varieties in the same way – on lees without battonage, in older barrels or concrete eggs.

Speaking about varietal switch-up, what are the rising stars in your portfolio and which grapes or wines less so?

I'm not overly enthusiastic about hybrid grapes, to be honest. I've tasted a few really nice examples from La Garagista in Vermont though.

I make a lot of orange wines and I love making them, but you won't find me drinking orange wine if I have to choose a wine from a bottle list. I lean more towards very minerally, salty white wines with precision. If I could make [wines with Portuguese varieties like] Baga, Sercial, Arinto, Encruzado or Ramisco... It would be a dream. I love Nebbiolo, too. I love tannic red wines with lots of acid.

You say: "Every year brings new wines and a new approach". I totally relate to that – as a winemaker, you react to the grapes, the weather, the current context as well as state of mind… At the same time, it can be quite confusing for customers – or not?

It can be confusing because vintage variation is a real thing, especially in colder climates. My 2022 Aligoté is very different from the 2023. So much of everything also comes down to logistics. Sometimes we miss a pick because we can't process the fruit, or a truck breaks down. Sometimes a vineyard doesn't make it to maturity and we have to make sparkling wine from it. This is the fun challenge of making wine in Oregon!

As a business trying to survive, we also pay attention to the market, and I'm happily seeing more demand for white wines now! This is a breath of fresh air for us.

We also share the fact that there's not a centuries-deep veneered tradition behind us, no 16 generations to look up to, like for example in the much alluded-to Burgundy. It is what it is – I see it as an advantage in the sense that my hands are not tied, however, the older I get, the more I find myself missing that history a bit. The possibility to ask someone what it was like before, the opportunity to consult. What's your take?

We do have a little bit of history here in Oregon. There are so many variables in winemaking that make everyone's wines taste different. Winemakers evolve and learn from mistakes. Our tastes and views also change. We change as people. All this changes the way our wines taste. I think that the best way to learn is to taste the classics. Taste the wines from the houses that have been making wines for many years.

I think that lower intervention wines are basically going back in time to how wine was made before more industrial techniques were available. I like the authenticity of wines that are made in this way.

It's de rigueur to say that we're making wines based on the terroir, not the style. Nevertheless, each winemaker has a certain stylistic line. Do you find your own "style" evolving, or is it the same one as ten years ago? If that's even possible, if only because of how we evolve as people, as you just said…

We are always evolving at the winery. I think that our wines have improved, especially over the last 3 years, thanks to longer elevage and proper sulphur use when needed. As we move forward, I think it will be more about fine-tuning things and going with what works best for us. We've been pretty experimental with varieties and styles and now we are dialling it all down a bit. In most cases, I am making exactly the style of wine that I had planned to make. I would love to be able to make some more acid-driven, minerally whites in the future.

My vineyards are located in two villages only 3 kilometres apart. Not only there's a different terroir, but also a completely different mindset – one is smaller and sleepy, the other more forward-thinking. You're working in two states, there must be differences between Oregon and Washington as well…

Oregon and Washington, for the most part, are completely different, wine-speaking. Washington grows many grape varieties and it is a warmer climate. Willamette Valley in Oregon is mostly Pinot Noir and colder climate grape varieties. Both have soils that are mostly sand or volcanic. Another similarity is that we benefit from colder nights during the warm season, and we have colder winters than California.

Climate change and extreme weather are affecting vineyards everywhere. How do you deal with fire risks and smoke-affected grapes?

We haven't had to deal with too many warm vintages in either Oregon or Washington during my time making Swick Wines. Talking about smoke, 2020 comes to mind – that year, we made mostly Pet Nats and direct press wines, no skin contact.

We are still trying to understand smoke. I think we are in a far better place than 5 years ago. We did release a small batch of smoky Pinot Noir from the 2020 vintage called "BBQ Wine", a name that's a nod to my time in Australia, when the many bushfires resulted in smoky wines and we would just call them BBQ wines – because of the flavour, not as a pairing option. That wine was a Pinot Noir from 60-year-old vines that was only slightly smokey and it was actually really good.

But we did have to dump a lot of wine down the drain. It's not a very cost-effective solution. I think that we have to find an equilibrium between growers and winemakers, so that both parties can survive when we have a smoky vintage.

Distributors, customers, sommeliers are not very forgiving with smoky wines. I think it is better to not release a wine that is smoke-tainted. Just make the best decisions that you can in a smoky year. For us, it means no skin maceration.

I've been through about a million fuck-ups during my winemaker career and think it's interesting to talk about it, although people are usually reluctant to share, preferring to erase them from their memory. Do you remember any of yours?

Oh sure!

-Filling red Syrah barrels with direct press Viognier in my first harvest. I was told to do so by the winemaker, but he laid out the wrong barrels...

-Rolling a press of Sauvignon Blanc in New Zealand due to a mechanical malfunction.

-Opting to go zero-sulphur on wines that I should not have.

-Dropping barrels.

-Not topping when I should have.

-Sloppy racking jobs.

-Falling off of the end of a truck trying to pallet jack bins of grapes. I seem to do this at least once a year.

- Pushing myself too much. Long days, no sleep, poor diet.

I used to be quite dogmatic and thought that my way was the only one that was right. Today, I respect so many classical winemakers who do not seek the "natural" label, and I always try to learn something from them. How do you see the intersection of these two worlds?

My definition of natural wines is “wines made without any additions or subtractions (including sulphur) coming from responsibly farmed grapes. As of 2022, I have completely stopped making zero-sulphur wines. I would not call myself a "natural winemaker" anymore because I use sulphur when needed. I want to make wines that I am proud of. I don't think that it is practical to limit yourself to certain options at the sacrifice of making a lesser wine.

I would prefer just to have a certain style associated with my wines. Aromatic oranges, acid-driven whites and lighter elegant reds. I try to work with the least possible intervention. I love the purity aspect of low-intervention wines because they taste real and authentic. Just like people! I like people with an edge, who aren't perfect.

Nestarec makes Nestarec wines. If you call them natural? Okay! great! I'd rather be known for a certain style that works for me and you can call it whatever you want.

What wines do you like to drink during the harvest? I ask because recently I have noticed that the harvest wine selection affects me to some extent – I unconsciously tried to imitate those wines! So I changed my tactics a bit and now we mainly drink our wines from previous years, so that we understand how they behave over time and can react to this during the current harvest. Do you think that we all copy from each other, or is it irrelevant?

More and more, the only time I am drinking any alcohol is at a work-related function or a special occasion. I'm pretty bored with wine, to be blunt.

I like coffee, tea, sparkling water, non-alcoholic beers. I will open up special bottles with interns during our harvest dinners. Usually wines from places that I have worked or wines that have inspired me. I do like to pull out wines from our library, to see how they have changed. During harvest, if it is the Aligoté pick day, I will open up some Aligoté from past Swick vintages or other producers to celebrate... But, as far as harvest drinking goes, it is usually a cold crisp beer – one that tastes like beer – after work. Tecate, Pacifico, Modelo or Rainier are my choices.

I think that we get inspired by each other. I wouldn't call it copying. I would say that happens more on the branding side of things... like clear glass and hock-shaped bottles for example, haha.

When I am in harvest mode, it is music that keeps me going. I always have music on at the winery, I can't work without it. Jazz in the morning. Then on to some [Grateful] Dead or [Widespread] Panic or something with a little more edge. Afternoons I get into chillwave, vaporwave or Mallsoft music. Then when I really need to focus at night, it's classical Indian music. Ragas.

My classic final question, do you think wine is art?

1000%. The place, grapes and yeast in your winery are your instruments. From there you can create whatever song you want to make. Everyone's song is different.

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