Gas Face, I Preposterously Spose it’s Awesome

It should be pretty clear that I’m not only from Maine, but that I have a great deal of love for the state. All the branding and flavor of this blog is Maine-centric, from the logo to the accompanying slogan “The Way High Should Be,” and the inextricable reality that I’m writing about cannabis in and from Maine almost exclusively. I was born and raised here, and while I moved away for college and then followed that by a few short years of some wanderlust, came back to Maine in my mid-twenties and chose to stay to settle down, get married, raise a family, and (I would like to think) give back to the larger Southern Maine community, first as a school teacher, and now as an educator in the cannabis industry. So suffice it to say, I go all in on Maine.

So let’s back up a minute. It’s Spring 2010, and I’m living in an apartment in Scarborough with my yet-to-be-fiancé-let-alone-wife, so girlfriend at the time, or – as I started calling her after it felt inevitable that we’d get married – my pre-ancé (priancé? I never decided on a spelling). We were both in our second year of teaching, feeling both exceedingly wealthy and successful (we had real adult jobs now!) and horrifically destitute and poor (we had just finished a full time graduate program for which we had to take out more college loans). I was driving to South Portland for a high school marching band rehearsal, for which I was on the visual staff. I was on that stretch of Highland Ave in Scarborough, having just turned off of Black Point Rd, when a song came up on CYY that at first I thought was some kind of Eminem parody, or something. It seemed funny, and not bad, but at first I was a little confused why it was playing on the “new alternative rock” station.

Then the second verse dropped:

Check it out
I’m from Maine and I don’t hunt nope and I can’t ski
Smoke weed but I can’t roll blunts
Might be with my wifey
My necks not icy
Eatin’ at McDonalds ’cause Subway is pricey

And I thought (and possibly even said aloud to myself in the car), “Well, that’s a little on the nose. Also, he’s from Maine, that explains it.”

So I kept listening, but with a closer ear to the lyrics. And I was sold, immediately. I didn’t know who this guy was, and they didn’t say directly after the track finished. Luckily I was in the car long enough to get to the point between other songs where they recap what they’ve played recently, and there it was, “I’m Awesome” by… Spose? Did they say “Spose?” I assumed at first there was an apostrophe in there. S’pose. Because I had just finished grad school to be an English teacher. And I overthink everything, as you may have gathered.

Not surprisingly, the next time I chatted with my little brother – who was living in Santa Fe at the time – he was already in the loop about this Spose guy. Some dude from Wells, and he was making it big (big for being from Maine at least). My memory gets a little fuzzy here, but I think I ended up getting his music from Google Music or something, or seeding a Pandora playlist with just him. I wasn’t really buying CD’s anymore at that point, and I didn’t use iTunes or Spotify then. Regardless, I went out of my way to listen to his music, but my little bro – always the best source for up-to-date media releases – would keep my in the loop when new Spose dropped. This became especially important by 2012, as by then I would be married, and my wife and I would have welcomed our first kid, who would be very, very medically complicated, and so my reliance on others for telling my when things were happening in the world increased exponentially, and my brother really stepped up helping me keep up with music in particular.

Fast forward to Summer 2013, and the State of the State concert at the State Theater, featuring Rustic Overtones (one of my all time favorite bands, and whose concert I was able to take my wife to – again well before we were married – and in a venue in which we would later get married), the Mallett Brothers Band (whom I didn’t know at the time, but immediately loved), and Spose. I don’t want to speak for any of these musicians, but it really felt like Rustic was handing the keys to the kingdom to Ryan (Spose), and if I’m not too out of line suggesting, Ryan seemed surprised, humbled, and flattered as Dave Gutter motioned for him freestyle over the encore finale that saw all of the bands on stage playing together. It was the Maine-est shit ever, and it was amazing being witness to it.

Anyway, that was an aside, as most of my posts usually are. But my point is, I was exceedingly excited a few days ago when one of my assistant managers at the store handed me a jar with branding I didn’t recognize, and informed me that it was Spose’s brand of cannabis, we’d be carrying it, and that he personally had asked for the budtenders to get this sample to share so that we would be familiar with his stuff before were selling it. I immediately knew that this would be my next post, so I got a good picture of the bud, busted the sample up for me and my four primary budtenders, and proceeded to smoke my portion of the sample.

First, Spose (can I call you Ryan, from one Ryan to another?), if you’re reading, thanks for the samples.

Let’s do the breakdown, as usual. Starting as always with the aroma, this cultivar, Gas Face, smells amazing. I’ve rarely handed a new jar around to my coworkers that elicited such a similar reaction. Everyone was simply taken aback at how good it smelled. Most were blind smells, as I held the jar out covering the label, and they got a big whiff strain unseen. I’ve talked about how people react differently to smelling a new strain, and everyone did the eyes closed, long slow inhale, and then their eyes opened with a brightness to them as a smile lit up their face. Seriously. Everyone thought this smelled fantastic.

But what does it smell like? I’m going to use some of my stock words, but this is all said with the caveat that it was smooth and sweet and pleasant, as most of these individually might seem like one of those “super weedy” aromas. It was gassy, leaning into the diesel end of that spectrum more than the earthy end, but without the tangy, citrusy notes that often accompany diesel strains. It teased being a bit cheesy, perhaps as a replacement for those missing citrus characteristics. Weaving through the gassiness is a green aroma that dances between minty and piney. It’s bright, and these greens seem to be where the sweetness of the overall aroma come from, like a greenhouse of mixed plant types, but not floral. Overall, it’s a clean, crisp aroma profile.

The buds also looked great, mostly pale green, with some medium to darker greens beneath, and little clusters of brown pistils throughout. And the whole bud is absolutely snowy with trichomes. This is one of the frostier strains I’ve ever had that wasn’t relying on being overly cured to get that dry, white look. This bud is fresh, fluffy, and sticky, perhaps the second stickiest I’ve cataloged. All that said, this was a surprisingly clean grind. I always expect nugs this dank to gum up my grinder, but once I had finished the grind and opened it up, almost all of the flower had fallen through. I did my little sweep with the brush I keep on hand to to coax all of the remaining bits and kief (bits and kiefses, like bits and pieces?) into the holes, but it was almost effortless.

At the first hit I was concerned that I was going to be critical of the smoke. It was – in a word – harsh. I coughed a little more than normal. As I was about to lament aloud, I thought of this, and reconsidered my criticism:

The flavor was fairly consistent with the aroma, though it lost some of the greener notes, replacing them with a bit more of a musky, peppery, almost skunky quality. As I’ve said before, not always my personal favorite (I’m more of a fruity or herbal guy), but this was nice. The bitterness of the smoke itself, with the light note of cheese from the aroma lingered in the mouth a bit after the hits, but weren’t bad at all.

I took another solid hit from my bubbler, which went down a bit easier, and after a very short and controlled cough, I settled in to see how or if the high would hit from just these couple rips. Everything gets you high eventually, so I frequently like to start slow with new strains, to see what the more subtle effects are, or if it’s going to hit quickly, or what have you. 

From there, I got quickly absorbed in the show I was watching, a few minutes passed, maybe ten, and I was feeling a little buzz, but nothing too wild, so I figured I’d take another hit or two and see what happened. As I shifted forward, sitting up a bit, the high hit me right in the front of the brain, like one of those old crash test dummy commercials, where you see the car just hit the wall, accordion a bit, and stop dead. That was how the high hit me, speeding from the back of my skull to the front. Boom. You’re high.

It’s a stoney, fuzzy-brained high, but in the uplifting and euphoric direction, not heavy or couch-locked. Instead of some types of heavily stoned feelings where thinking becomes difficult, I was a bit giggly and prone to my mind wandering, but with some amount of direction. Like the hobbit says, “Not all who wander are lost.” My brain was on a hobbit adventure. I wrote back in my Lord of the Rings posts about comparing strains of cannabis to strains of pipeweed, and it seems that Gas Face may be in the lead for one of those strains.

The more body-focused effects were intensely pleasant too. I felt a gentle tingling across my skin, paired with a lightness of body and a physiological calmness. I did get a bit of the munchies, but was able to keep my snacking to mostly healthier options, which is not always the case for me. Either due to my food choices, the strain itself, or most likely some combination of the two, my stomach felt settled all evening and the following morning as well. Additionally, I had taken a bad step walking up the stairs into my house coming home from work that evening (one of my kids had left their roller skates on the steps, and it was dark), and my knee was all messed up from twisting badly, and as the evening went on, it felt better and better. This all makes sense, as one of Gas Face’s parents is Face Off OG, which is known for having high CBG, which can promote healthy digestion, as well as act as an anti inflammatory not unlike CBD.

As I mentioned in my Khalifa Kush review, I’m prone to getting excited about celebrity weed, and this is a local celebrity, which makes it all the more exciting for me. If a multi-millionaire has a national brand of cannabis, that’s cool and all, but this is a guy from maybe an hour from where I grew up, who I’ve seen grow as a cultural icon of the area, and who has made some noise on the national stage. My brother even got to see Spose perform in Albuquerque a few years ago when he was still living out there (my brother, not Spose). I’m really stoked to see Spose get into the cannabis game locally, and I’m even more excited that the dispensary where I work is going to be carrying his products, and I’m even more excited that what I’ve had so far has been excellent, both in terms of overall quality and the effects. It’s not in the store yet, but keep an eye out. The label is called Preposterously, and here’s a picture of the branding on the jar. Once you can get some, do so, and enjoy!