I remember seeing this energy drink called Amp everywhere. It was on Dale Earnhardt Jr's car. It was all over advertisements and flavor signage at convenience stores. At the time, the presence and sheer volume of marketing for Amp and Monster solidified the color of energy drinks as canonically green in my mind.

I thought, at the time, that Amp was its own company. From when I can remember seeing it the can had no clear branding indicating otherwise. And, until recently, I still thought it was its own company. Then a few months ago I saw this thing called "Mtn Dew Amp" for sale at the store and the memories of Amp as this cool thing I saw on a NASCAR livery once flooded my mind.

In reality, Amp was never its own company. From its inception in 2001 until at least as most recently as this article was written it was and is a PepsiCo product marketed as a sub-brand of Mountain Dew. Even when it was in stores when I was much younger. PepsiCo took it through a chaotic rebranding as it struggled to find fit as one of their few energy drink brands.

• Inception (2001) 〜 2008: "Amp Energy Drink from Mountain Dew" era
• 2008: Mountain Dew logo moved to the bottom of the can
• 2009 〜 2018: "Amp" era, no Mountain Dew branding
• 2018 〜: "Mtn Dew Amp"

From 2008 to 2011 Amp sponsored Dale Earnhardt Jr with Amp livery that was not readily identifiable as Mountain Dew-aligned. After the pivot back to Mountain Dew branding PepsiCo would go on to bolster its energy drink portfolio by acquiring Rockstar in 2020 and Celsius in 2022, which I've written about in Living In The Energy Drink Renaissance. They spun out some of Amp into a thing called "Amp Game Fuel" in 2019, complementing their "Game Fuel" brand they began in 2007 with just regular Mountain Dew as co-promotional material for some games like Halo 3, World of Warcraft and Call of Duty Modern Warfare 3 and others throughout the years. The history of Amp is chaotic.

The "Mtn Dew Amp" I witnessed and bought in a convenience store is the heir to this long, chaotic lineage…

…and the original is so disappointing.

The taste is citrus but I can't pin down exactly what fruit. Its can indicates that Mtn Dew Amp contains orange juice concentrate. While not exactly orange juice, which is much more acidic than this, its not close to lime either, which is hinted at by the front of the can. It's like orange juice but muted. Very, very underwhelming. And the carbonation is very lacking too. It's almost just a soda with caffeine.

After sipping there is a sticky residue on my lips redolent of that texture many Rip Its I have enjoyed have left behind. It's unpleasant. I don't like it.