Brand Overview: Dissident Cigars

Originally published at Tiki Bar Online

I heard about Dissident Cigars from the manager of Burns when he got back from this year’s trade show. True to what I would discover later, there were no real details, just, “Really interesting…we’ll probably be bringing them in eventually.” A couple weeks later their cigars showed up for the Chattanooga Tweet-Up…so they were sponsoring the event! It’s nice to know these things with a little advance notice, but…hey, we try to be flexible. It’s an attitude that has paid off big for us both this year and last….allow yourself the opportunity to be surprised, possibly delighted, and probably confounded.

So the short story with Dissident is that they are a couple guys (who prefer to be somewhat anonymous) who got tired of everything in the cigar industry being “a copy of a copy of a copy.” They wanted to do something original and make a statement at the same time. (I will interject here that one very large company did something “original” last year in terms of blending…totally unlike anything I’ve ever had…and I hate it…it’s not enough to be original…end of aside.) Dissident wants to send “a punchy, strong message that our brand is defiant, rowdy, and not afraid to stay against the grain.” I picked up one each of the Soap Box and Bloc blends to try out. Crank up some Pearl Jam and let’s burn something…

Escape is never the safest path…a dissident is here…

SOAP BOX

A soap box is something you can stand on while speaking. It raises you up a bit, allowing your voice to carry across a larger crowd than can hear you if you are just standing on the ground. It’s also a metaphorical construct people use to signal when they are going to start expounding on a possibly controversial topic that is pretty much totally opinion (although facts backing up an opinion are always a good idea). So the vitolas of the Soap Box by Dissident are Rant, Rave, and Tirade. I am smoking the Rave, a 5.5 x 52 ring gauge Long Robusto…Short Toro…whatever you want to call it. According to the company’s website this is a Nicaraguan puro, featuring fillers from Jalapa, Estelí and Condega, dual binders from Estelí, and a Jalapa wrapper.

The Nicaraguan wrapper was a tawny medium brown color; the coloration was quite even with mostly small veins and just a bit of toothiness. The band is different…definitely a break from tradition and not quite like anything else on the market that I can think of. I got a light leathery aroma from the wrapper, along with just a little earth. The foot was rich and pungent with earthiness. The cold draw was easy and the cold flavor was interesting…at first there was light earth and cedar, then I started to get a berry sweetness. After lighting, the cedar came through clearly. There was a bit of earthiness, too, along with sweet hay and black pepper.

As I continued through the first third, I did pick up quite a bit of cedar, to a point where that became the predominant flavor halfway through this third. There were supported notes of earth and sweet hay still, along with just a touch of dried fruit and pepper spice. As I puffed through the second third, I found the flavor profile hadn’t changed all that much. The cedar receded just a bit, which was good for me since I’m not usually a fan of cigars where cedar is extremely pronounced.

In the end the Soap Box was a solid cigar with plenty of Nicaraguan goodness to it. The last third saw an increase in earthy qualities though the cedar still had a major influence on the overall flavor. The pepper spice never went away, providing a nice, slow burn all the way through the end.

BLOC

“Bloc?” There is no official word on the Dissident website as of this writing regarding what this is in reference to. The spelling is that used during the Cold War when we referred to the “Soviet Bloc nations”…those under the control of the Soviet Union (Poland, Czechoslovakia, East Germany, etc.). The banding uses the 1980s style of graphic seen on computers and video games; that style is somewhat “blocky” (and having grown up with those games and computers, it speaks to me). The cigar itself is a box press, which could also be sort of blocky. Really, it’s all just speculative at this point, because I found very little about this cigar online…a couple mentions, some legal stuff…no blend info, no explanation of why they called it what they did. This is one of those times, then, that I get to just smoke it and tell you what I think with no pre-conceived notions…about the closest I come to a blind review.

I already said I like the video-game inspired packaging…definitely something we haven’t seen before. It’s fun…it’s good. The wrapper leaf was milk chocolate brown in color with a bit of darker mottling and a few pronounced veins. Giving the wrapper a good sniff, I got notes of leather and clean earth; the foot was a more funky, pungent earthiness. The prelight flavor was sweet with some berry notes similar to what I got in the Soap Box, but with a little more pepper spice and earthiness as well.

I lit up the Bloc and from the outset, I did notice it was similar to the Soap Box in overall flavor, but with a lot less cedar in the mix. There was less cedar in the beginning of this then in the end of the other, and where the profile gave room for other notes to come through, they were earthy and peppery and sweet. The effect was much nicer on my palate. Through the first third I really enjoyed the mix of black coffee, cedar, pepper spice, and dried fruit flavors. While not perfect for my palate, it was a very well balanced blend so far.

The second third featured flavors of cinnamon and red pepper over an earthy base that still had some black coffee notes coming through. The last third had the same basic profile with some other interesting notes playing hide-and-seek through it. The Bloc was a very good cigar that I am interested in trying again when it becomes widely available. Definitely something interesting, unique and worthwhile to hunt down in this blend. I am also intrigued to see what the blend does in other vitolas. Expect a full review at some point in the future.

I am always happy to when new voices and fresh palates debut in the cigar industry. I appreciate the creativity the Dissident owners have brought to their product packaging and marketing, as well. While the Soap Box didn’t hit my palate in all the right ways, the Bloc did…I’ve frequently stated, “If we all liked the same cigar, they’d be really hard to find.” So try them out and see what you prefer…or maybe you will end up liking them both equally. Bottom line is this company seems to have a solid foundation for growth, at least from a product standpoint. I look forward to seeing what they bring us over the next few years.