Transcription (edited for clarity)

[00:00:00] Intro: Coming to you from the hi-desert of Southern California, Red Bench Reviews brings you Today’s Sesh with Jon. Grab a joint, load your bong, or pack your pipe, and let’s get this sesh started.

[00:00:17]Jon: Hello, my friends. Welcome to the sesh. My name is Jon, and I’ll be your host as we continue the search for the Holy Grail of herb.

Well, my friends, let’s look at a classic. I have a certain place in my heart for the classics. I guess it’s because I’ve been smoking pot for 40 years, and I’ve tried a lot of different strains and I always go back to the classics.

[00:00:41] I just kind of like them over a lot of the newer strains, but, you know, I like a lot of the new strains, too.

About Northern Lights

So, let’s talk about Northern Lights. This is a strain that has a legend that goes with it. The legend of how it was created. Let’s just run down the legend really quick. This strain was developed by a guy named The Indian. His nickname was The Indian. And he lived on an island off of Seattle in the 70s – in the 1970s. He took a cross of Afghani and Thai, and he bred those together, and he got 11 seeds that he was going to try planting. So he planted 11 seeds of his new strain that he had developed, and of those 11 seeds, Number 5, what he called Northern Lights #5, was the bomb, it was like a super plant.

[00:01:51] This strain was taken to Amsterdam in 1985. Seeds of this strain – and it was grown by Neville Schoenmacher, who was a pioneering breeder in the Netherlands in the 80s. He developed several Northern Light phenotypes for a company called The Seed Bank. And The Seed Bank eventually became Sensi Seeds.

[00:02:19] This strain is amazing for growers. I’ll just tell you right up front, people ask me if I grow. And I am not a grower. I am not a breeder. These are not things that are in my skill set. I have tried growing a number of times, always to the detriment of the plants. It is a real shame for the plants that if I happen to be their grower.

[00:02:47] My last experience with growing, I grew some G13 back about 15 years ago. I grew some G13. And this strain, which is really a good strain, just suffered miserably under my own hands. The last batch – I did three batches of it – and the third batch, I had spider mites, I had white flies, I had powdery mold. Just about everything that could go wrong with my grow, went wrong with my grow. And so I got to the point there that I decided that I am going to leave growing to the people that have that skill set. And I’ll just smoke what they grow, and since then I’ve become a reviewer of pot. And so that’s just a short little bit to tell you about why I don’t grow.

[00:03:38] So I’ve been asked that so many times why I don’t grow. And that is why… I just don’t have a green thumb. You know, I’ve got a friend, Caesar, who’s got a green thumb. And he just puts those seeds in the ground. And he knows exactly what to do. He’s got a second nature for the plants – for the girls. We did a review of his Sunday Driver last year. It came so close to being a Holy Grail herb. It was just so well done and it was grown out here in our hot, hot desert landscape. It was outdoor grown in our hot, hot desert. And he did a fantastic job. Me? I just don’t do it. But anyways, that is a huge digression to tell you that Northern Lights is a strain that is known for being super easy to grow.

[00:04:37] If you are someone who has an interest in growing, haven’t grown before, they say that you just throw these seeds in the ground and they grow. That’s basically it. Northern Lights is very hardy. A lot of the beginner mistakes that we make when we begin growing – it is very forgiving of those and tends to produce really nice little buds for you on your first time out. So if you’re thinking about growing some pot, consider Northern Lights. Well listen to the rest of this review and decide whether Northern Lights is something that you want to have.

About 8 Track Brand

[00:05:17] I’ve got a jar. Where did it go? I’ve got this jar in front of me. This comes from 8 Track Brand, okay?

8 Track is a brand that I’ve been buying, oh, for about three or four months now from the Microbuddery down in Desert Hot Springs. I’ve tried their OG Kush. I’ve tried their Bubba Kush. Their Bubba Kush just knocked me out. I was buying that by the ounce until they ran out. I’ve smoked something called Island Sweet Skunk, which was a really nice strain, and someday I may do a review of that one.

[00:05:58] But anyways, 8 Track seems to produce a lot of the classics, which is why I’ve been gravitating towards this brand. I don’t know anything about the brand, I’ve tried looking up information on the internet about them, and haven’t found anything that’s anywhere about this brand, 8 Track. But I’m holding a jar of their herb right here in my hands, and it’s got a gradiated from purples to oranges to aqua color label on the front.

[00:06:28] It says 8 Track – seven grams of herb. I bought this for $30 at the Microbuddery – $30 plus about $10 tax. They delivered this jar of Northern Lights… the THC level listed on the label here is 32.5%. That is some strong Northern Lights, especially when doing research on Northern Lights. It was commonly listed at, oh, about 19% THC. So 32%, that’s almost double that amount.

[00:07:09] This jar was packaged on June 13th. So that was just a month ago and let’s get into this. Let’s break the seal – I haven’t gotten into this jar at all yet. So let’s break the seal and see what they’ve got inside for me

Inside The Jar – Look and Smell

[Sound of seal being opened]

[00:07:30] Okay Breaking off the seal. Let’s open this up. Oh my pops. It’s so fresh Oh, let’s, let’s give this a smell.

[00:07:43] Oh, I’m hit with, with pine smells right off the bat. An earthy kind of pine smell.

[00:07:52] Oh, I’m, I’m looking down into the jar here and I’m seeing what looks like a light green, light green to medium green.

The herb is just… I don’t know if these nugs are just so solid or if it’s a little dry. Oh my. Gosh, it smells really good. Good pine smell in there. Let’s pour this out on my tray here and take a look at what we’ve got in the jar.

[00:08:22] We have some solid, dense nugs here. We’re looking at… oh, that one feels like it’s about a gram. We got a lot of smalls. There’s some stretching on some of the nugs. Good amount of stems that I can see because they stretched out as it grew. I’m gonna cut up one of these nugs. I’m gonna take this biggest this biggest nug right here.

It looks like it’s about a gram and a half and let’s give it a cut and let’s see how that cure is.

[00:08:54] Oh, that’s not dry at all. Oh my. no… that just cuts up really nice, really thick. Matter of fact, these are just so… I couldn’t even tell if they were dry or if it was just super denseness. And gosh, they’ve got an incredible amount of denseness.

[00:09:14] I’m cutting them up here with my trusty scissors – my trusty trimming scissors. As you know, I like to use scissors to cut up my herb. It gives me a good sense of the feel of it. If I just took these nugs and just threw them in my grinder, I’d be missing out on part of the experience. At least that’s how I feel in my book. That’s how I go about it.

[00:09:37] I’m going to put these [nugs] back in here, back in the jar here so that they don’t dry out in our dry weather here.

[00:09:45] I’ve got a nice little pile now in front of me that has a very strong pine kind of smell to it. It’s kind of earthy – very earthy now that it’s cut up. I mean, it’s not a loud smell. This is a very mellow kind of smell It’s just kind of sitting there… just kind of like tempting me to put it in my bong and try it out. So let’s move along to the bong and give this a shot.

Taking Bong Tokes

[00:10:20] I’m gonna know right off the bat that this is not a particularly sticky strain as I was loading that into the bong.

[00:10:27] I loaded about a half a gram here in my bong, in my GRAV bong. If you watched my reviews, you know what I’m talking about – my bong. And I absolutely love this! This is a beautiful piece of glass and it is a remarkable smoking machine.

[00:10:44] Here we go. Let’s, let’s try Northern Lights from 8 Track Brand.

[Sound of bong smoking]

[00:11:13] Oh my, that, that is a taste that takes me back. Oh my gosh, that is a taste that takes me back. That has got a very strong marijuana-y flavor in it, but it reminds me of sort of like a dank cupboard kind of flavor. Like if the… the smoke was filtered through a dank cupboard before getting to my lungs and blowing it back out again.

[00:11:42] That takes me back – 85 is when this strain was burst on the scene. It was in the middle of the Just Say No era and it was… this was very hard to come by. This is a strain that I came across very few times back in the day. When you came across it, you knew you had something special because there were no seeds.

[00:12:08] This was a often a sensamelia strain and sensamelia was very hard to get in the eighties. We’d get an eighth of pot and you would spend a good half hour to an hour cleaning out all of the seeds of the pot so that you wouldn’t get any in your bowl, because it is horrible to get a seed in your bowl. It just explodes, it tastes horrible. I’ve smoked more than my share of seeds in the past, just from accidentally getting them in my bowl. That’s one of the things I love about today’s marijuana is it is so rare to get a seed. I almost rejoice when I get a seed because I’m going to pass it on to my friends that grow and see if they’re interested in a quality seed.

[00:13:02] Anyways, my goodness, I’m forgetting the task at hand and the task at hand is looking at the flavor. of this Northern Lights. Let’s, let’s take a second hit.

[Sound of bong toke]

[00:13:28] Mmm.

[00:13:32] Smooth, smooth cure on that herb. I’m just really impressed by that. I’m not getting huge clouds. The clouds from this hit are about medium size. And, oh my gosh, leaves kind of a bit of a minty taste. I have sort of a minty aftertaste in my mouth from this. My goodness. Wow. Those were very good couple of hits there.

[00:14:03] Right now my eyes are feeling very clear. It’s very heady right at the moment. But what we’re gonna do is we’re gonna let it sink in for about 10 minutes because it takes about 10 minutes to really feel all of the effects of the herb… to really know where it’s going and be able to give you an accurate sense of what this herb does. So let, I’m going to take a 10 minute break and for you it’ll just be a second and I will be back and I will tell you what I think of this herb.

Ten Minutes Later

[00:14:34] Ten minutes later.

[00:14:38] Well, well, well. Hmm. That’s what I call a nice 10 minutes… all my senses had to be alive the whole time – had to be very alert, I mean, the whole time. Because this was one that came in very mellow. I was, like going, uh oh – have we have we run into a dud version of Northern Lights? It had been so long since I had had a real creeper strain. This one it creeps up on you and the first couple minutes – the first two three minutes – are in no relation to how it will be 10 minutes down the road. Well, they are in relation to it, but it’s just the high really came on at about seven minutes. That was according to my timing, about seven minutes, all of a sudden I felt my eyes get lidded and the buzz really started to kick in.

[00:15:39] The buzz that I’m talking about is I’ve got a great body buzz that’s mixed with a really nice head buzz that is remarkably clear minded. My head, it feels really clear… really crisp at this point.

[00:16:00] It is so peaceful the the body buzz. My stomach was kind of a little upset before we started this review and I feel so good right now. My stomach is relaxed. I had a little bit of anxieties this morning. And those all just went into neutral and faded away. I feel so relaxed at this point.

[00:16:26] I feel like everything is just right. Just the way it’s supposed to be. Oh my, and there is a great quality of chill involved in this, in this high. I’m going to recommend this Northern Lights, at least I’m going to use it for doing the things that I like to do to just chill… which everybody has their own set of things they’d like to do, whatever it is that just, you know, you just like… you know…

Oh my, I’m just fading out there a little bit. I think that’s the wonderful effects of this Northern Lights that is just come down upon me… and I swear at the 10 minute mark just before I got back on the on the mic again – I was just quite, quite, quite stoned feeling. But it really hit me [then].

[00:17:29] I’d taken, you know me, I’d taken about five, six hits of this… I wanted to smoke that bowl all the way down to the end and see how that tastes – smoking all the way down to the end. And it just kept its flavor, and the great quality, I ended up having to take much deeper bong tokes than I normally take to get bigger clouds. And once I was able to achieve the bigger clouds, it had a real content feel to it – a real satisfying feel to it.

[00:18:07] So anyways, I’m enjoying my good body buzz, along with a great mental relaxing buzz. And, you know what I’m gonna do? I’m gonna take one more hit, because I can. Ha ha! I love, I love this.

[00:18:21] I have written down in my notes, I write notes as the ten minutes is going by, to remind me, because I’m stoned, you know, and I’m gonna forget things. One of the things I’ve got here on my notes, is I say, this is the reason I love Indica’s – the body is totally relaxed and feels right. And let me tell you this is a thing that has to do with having severe depression is that my body often feels very out of place. It feels like me and my body are twisted. And I’m like at a like 30 to 45 degree angle off from my where my body should be. I feel like I just don’t quite fit in my body sometimes. And the Indica’s like this reminds me – this is really one of the reasons why I smoke Indica’s – is because it put my body at feeling right. It feels like everything is lined up now and I feel good. I feel really good. I feel like I can do things. I can feel like even though this is a strain that is very renowned for putting you into a couch-lock and it very well might later on… but right now, I just feel like I can do things because because my body feels good. You know just doing anything is going to be a joy.

[00:19:49] Anyways, let’s take one last hit here. Oh, my. Here we go. Okay. Northern Lights, which I’m very much enjoying, from 8 Track, a brand here in Southern California.

Last Hit and Closing

[Sound of a bong toke]

[00:20:22] Smooth. Remarkably smooth, that, uh, blowing that out, I really enjoyed that. It’s got that minty aftertaste.

[00:20:38] It’s got that minty aftertaste to it.I just really like it. I’m gonna rate this one… I was gonna give it a 3. 9, but I’m gonna smoke this whole quarter, so I’m gonna put it above the 4 mark. I mean, I think I’m gonna give this a 4 on the Holy Grail scale. No, no, because of that making my body feel right, we’re gonna give it a 4.25 on the Holy Grail scale. Definite winner.

[00:21:07] This is, this is one that I’m, I’m gonna, now I’ve got a quarter of it and I’m going to totally smoke this because I am so amazed at how good my body feels right now. It’s going to bring me back again and again and again. This bong of mine is going to get a lot of attention over the next few days as I enjoy this quarter… hopefully it’ll last more than a couple of days anyway… I’m drifting off there a little bit.

[00:21:37] Let me just say thank you so much to my subscribers, to the people that have come on board and are downloading my podcast each week. I really, really appreciate that. Thank you so much. If you’re not subscribing to my podcast somewhere, I hope that you will join me each week on Wednesday when we put up new reviews.

[00:22:01] Oh my, oh, this one is, I gotta underline again that this one is a creeper strain and you take a hit and it doesn’t like go, Oh, Oh, there it is. It’s like, where is it? And then you’re doing something like the closing on a podcast and it just walks up and just hits you right upside the head and says, here I am.

[00:22:33] Oh my gosh. Well, thank you. Thank you again, subscribers. And, and I, and I hope you will subscribe if you’re not. And I ask that you share this with your friends. If you know somebody who would enjoy hearing these reviews, pass it along… I appreciate that. Okay. Anyways, until next week. Best of health.

Credits:

Jon Christopher: Host
Tania: Director
Stephen Joel Jensen: Introduction
Music by The Near Heaven Orchestra