Dave Brookes

Halliday Wine Companion 98 Points

The '23 release of the Schubert Theorem is just gorgeous. It's kinetic. The purest of plum, black cherry and blueberry fruits stretch impossibly long on the palate, with impressive density and a real sense of grace to its travel. The edges are smooth and round here and there is a calmness as it glides across the palate, the tannins more in the powdery spectrum (and I'm sure this comes from the portion that spends its gestation in a concrete Nomblot egg). Bunch (50% or thereabouts) is bang on here, lending a golden ratio of spice, sinew and texture. But man, that pure rolling swell of fruit is the star; this is a wonderfully composed wine.

Erin Larkin

The Wine Advocate 98 Points

The 2023 The Schubert Theorem Shiraz is a gorgeous wine. It is silky, inky, pure, black as the ace of spades and long through the finish. The use of concrete egg in the fermentation/maturation stages lends the wine a sense of purity and finesse. It supports a core of crystalline fruit that is wrapped in earthy, grainy tannin and woven together with threads of saline acidity. It has rose petals, detail and delicacy, power and precision. Standish performs somewhat like a Burgundian producer—he works with one grape (I suppose two, if you count the small inclusion of Viognier in the Relic) to express different vineyard sites, soil types and elevations. There's no "declassified" fruit in these wines, no flow-on opportunities to other cuvées, just "make or break" viticulture and winemaking. The ancient terroir of the Barossa is writ large in these wines. It is striking. This 2023 Schubert, despite the cool and wet conditions, is a testament to Standish's clarity of vision. 14.9% alcohol, sealed under natural cork.

Gary Walsh

The Wine Front 92 Points

Raspberry conserve, toasty oak, red capsicum, spice, tobacco and chocolate. Deep and rich wine, quite toasty with roasted coffee bean flavour, blackberry and blueberry, quite some sandy grip to tannin, orange peel, dark and spicy on a finish of good, but drying, length. 92+ points.

Mike Bennie

The Wine Front 93 Points

Bold, meaty and very concentrated. An inward concentration to infinity with blackberry coulis, prune and fig, date and salted Brazil nuts, dark chocolate drinking powder, roasted capsicum and beetroot with lots of clove and bitter herbs. Very firm tannin profile, drying, powdery finish with a wall of chalky pucker. A kind of oafish nature to the wine, a sticky richness and palate-staining overtness. The finish a touch bitter with smoky tannin. Character, intensity, for sure. Not quite to the pace and finesse of past releases, but worthy for impact. 93 points.