A popular opinion, to be sure. There are very high-quality whiskies coming onto the market, both blends (malt and grain whiskies) and vatted/pure malts (multiple single malts combined for effect). Compass Box is one such independnet bottler that specializes in this. I'd opt for a bottle of their "Spice Tree" over JW Black any day.
I’ll have to give it a look.
To my tongue, the Dewar’s stuff just lacks any of the regional character I really like in malt whisky. I’m not saying that good malt whisky has to have some pronounced character like the heavy peat smoke of the Islays or something similar that just smacks you across the face with how unique it is. It’s just that the whole blending deal seems to try to remove any identifiable regional character and create a “budweiser” effect of year-after-year consistent same-ness that just... I dunno.... it’s bothersome.
If I wanted boring uniformity, I’d drink vodka I guess.
I’ve had many good grain whiskeys from here in North America, so I’m not “grain whiskey shall never pass my lips” snob. I just don’t like supporting mass mediocrity as a business plan, and that’s what so many of these blends come off as to me.