Port Ellen 1974 GM

N: [Colour: yellow=orange amber] On the nose we are talking creamy, thick butter, honey/treacle drizzle sponge cake, mango juice, chocolate, desiccated coconut, maple and cinnamon twists and heavily sherried raisins & sultanas in copious amounts. Theres a [light] chalky [heavily] maltiness and only a hint of farmyard - you really have to go digging for it. The same is true for the mineral notes but both are shy and slow to emerge with time. All the noise here is from the casks, sherried casks which have culminated in providing a very competent, integrated and moorish nose. 
T: Sherried for sure [although with time there are lots of bourbon cask notes too], oozing with maple nuts and chocolate with lots of sweet maltiness. Peppery at first, then salty with fruity, [dark] oak surging through later on.
F: Dark oak with a lighter sherrred [cherry/chilli/chocolate] maltiness, the mouthfeel thinning all the time but ultimately moorish with all the vital components immaculately intact. A waxy-dry spirity~oaky finish with some fruity, cereal maltiness chewing to be had just when you think its done, with orange, mango and passion juice entering the fray along with oaky [soured] cream and remnants of the boozy sherried sultanas. There was magic right there and so too it continues on the complex chewy finish with a hundred conversations going on at once. This whisky just turned fabulous. Theres ash at the death but i honestly can’t tell you whether its from this or the 1971 i tried before - my money is on the ’71.
C: Absolutely delicious stuff, the kind of whisky you dream of drinking everyday. Theres surprisingly very little information about the use of [sherry vs bourbon] casks for Port Ellen online and less surprisingly i have no knowledge on the matter.

Scores an A-