The last honest Aston Martin review you’ll ever read

By Shahzad Sheikh

The new Aston Martin Vanquish is gorgeous. Actually that’s an understatement, this thing is gob-smackingly, jaw-droppingly, breath-takingly, eye-poppingly sensational. It’s voluptuous, sleek and sexy, it’s got incredible stance, undeniable grace, exquisite elegance, and magnificent presence.

It’s beautiful beyond belief. In fact, as I stare at it now, Amber Heard could walk suggestively and slowly past in extremely cheeky daisy dukes and a wet T-shirt and I wouldn’t notice, so transfixed am I by the beauteous vision before me, quite simply it is one of the most drool-worthy contemporary motorcars on the planet.

Okay, it’s derivative of the Aston Martin DB9, a very obvious evolution of the DBS, and heavily borrows cues like the elongated side strakes from the rare and exclusive One-77– although the Vanquish is far prettier than that overrated panda car – but it’s such a perfect fusion of the signature modern Aston shapes that I don’t care, and nor will you.

Under the bonnet is a glorious 6.0-litre V12 producing 565bhp and 457lb ft of torque, giving it a 0-100kph time of 4.1 seconds and a top speed of 295kph, driving the rear wheels through a six-speed automatic (an updated version of Aston’s Touchtronic2 transmission) complete with launch control.

Inside it gets a heavily revised interior, again closely based on the One-77’s cabin. Out goes the ancient Volvo sat-nav and the infotainment system is completely overhauled, employing excellent Garmin navigation.

The key fob (or is that still pretentiously dubbed the ‘Emotion Control Unit’) goes in the middle as before, but the centre console now features smooth shiny black surfaces with touch-responsive pads eradicating buttons.

So there you go, sublime, sophisticated, supreme – what more do you want? And if you’re a die-hard Aston Martin fan, and firmly believe this is the best car on the planet, you need read no further. In fact I implore you not to continue with this discourse, just scroll to the bottom to look at my pictures of this adorable automobile and then click to another page, say this one perhaps.

Okay now go.

Go on, scroll.

Yeah down, down, keep going.

What? Why are you still here?

Are you sure you want to continue reading? You’re not going to like it.

I’m about to shatter some myths. Are you ready for a reality-check?

Okay then, but I warned you.

The beauty, as pure and undeniable as it is, is only skin deep. Underneath, the newest GT car from the iconic British marque is, well, nothing new really. It’s a slightly updated chassis compared to the DBS, the engine has a bit more power but performance is only fractionally better.

To drive it really doesn’t feel that much different. Which might not have been a bad thing, had the DBS itself felt cutting-edge and contemporary. But the DBS was just a slightly more performance-orientated (and not quite as pretty) version of the DB9, which has been around, and still is, since 2004 – nearly a decade. In fact the platform is derived from the first Vanquish which was introduced in 2001.

Okay, so it’s old underneath, but there are cars out there still being churned out on old platforms yet feeling new and modern nonetheless.

This doesn’t though. It feels like an old car, and not in a good way. The seating position isn’t quite right, the reflections on the instrument panel make it unreadable at times, and reflections on the windscreen can obstruct visibility in our sunny climes.

It has back seats, but they’re useless for anything other than tiny kids, the handbrake is a quaint old-fashioned fly-off type near the door sill, which I’ve never had a problem with, but know of drivers who’ve really struggled with operating it. The steering wheel is flat-topped, flat-sided, but with a rounded-bottom – the opposite of what most sports car steering wheels do these days – and the tiny sun-visors are hilarious.

As for the touch-sensitive panels, they would have looked ultra-modern in 1985, but are difficult to use as you never know if you’ve actually activated them or not. There is no dual-zone climate control and the temperature settings are almost impossible to see in the daytime. And as for the new infotainment screen – I refer you back to the earlier comment about 1985.

Yes it does Bluetooth up pretty easily, but it’s a bit pointless as not one single caller could actually hear me clearly. On the plus side the Bang & Olufsen stereo (like that found in Audis) is fantastic with a rich and deep sound.

And at least the materials used are exemplary and the craftsmanship is very obviously by hand – perhaps a bit too obviously. Rolls-Royce interiors are also done by craftsman, but they’re millimetre perfect by comparison.

But it sounds great right? Well yes it does, totally. Though it’s neither as loud nor as evocative as the V12 Vantage, or as a Maserati. Thankfully though you can still revel in the ear-pleasing soundscape accompanying this car around especially once you press the Sport button.

But like the engine note, the performance too seems slightly subdued. Not quite as strong and unrelenting as I’d expected from a V12 – the V8 in the Bentley Conti GT feels more potent.

The gearbox too is little lethargic and clunky now in comparison with rivals, and whilst satisfying to use when you’re on it, not every owner might appreciate it, plus it’s only a six-speed when high end car makers are offering eight, and there’s talk of nine and ten-speeds on the way.

Talking of rigid, why is there some squeaking going on in this car? Is it flexing? Not something you want to be wondering about as you’re cornering at speed. But then it doesn’t really seem to enjoy that anyway, even though it goes through the motions ably enough.

The turn-in feels a little hesitant, the Vanquish doesn’t settle through a bend and, hang-on, is that understeer? You can hustle it along pretty efficiently, but you eventually revert back to a more casual gait where it seems far happier and composed.

There’s something odd about the suspension too: in normal mode the damping is fairly loose and there’s quite a bit of movement even on a smooth highway. However, put it in Sport mode, which would normally seem inappropriate, and it stiffens up the body control and pummels the road surface into submission giving a less agitated ride, although it’s more fidgety.

All of the above criticism is really me being quite fussy, because it’s not as bad as it may have sounded. And in fact considering what a delicious piece of eye-candy this car is, it’s all pretty much forgiveable…

No, no! We car-reviewers always do that with Astons. We always give them far too much leeway, just because they are British and beautiful and Bond drives them and we all wanna be suave superspies in tuxedos.

Uh-uh! This far, no further. We can no longer keep perpetuating the myth. It’s time for some tough love.

Sorry Aston, but these vices are not acceptable in a car costing AED1.2m, especially when it’s your flagship. It’s about the price of a Ferrari FF, and love or hate the styling (and it’s really rather nice actually) the presentation, build and dynamics of the Fezza are perfectly executed. You can definitely feel the value in the Italian GT. Not something you would have expected to read in the 1980s perhaps.

If we found flaws like those apparent in the Aston in Bentley’s and Rolls-Royces we’d go to town on them because we’d relish the chance to have a dig at their owners, Volkswagen and BMW respectively.

But what I’ve now come to realise is that if it wasn’t for German stewardship of these iconic British marques, the cars bearing the winged-B and the Flying Lady mascots would also be stuck in a stagnant time loop, cashing in on bygone glories and hoping their customers will be forgiving and keep buying into the cachet and perception.

But this is the 21st Century, and the nouveau-riche of the Middle East and China is not the sentimental type ruled by passion and misplaced loyalty – like I am, but then I’m poor so I don’t count anyway. And product placement in spy-movies will only get you so far.

These discerning drivers are used to owning precision-built, fully thought-out utterly solid metal like Mercs, and would be rather appalled at the inherent sense of fragility you get with an Aston.

In fact that’s the answer isn’t it? BMW and VW both own British luxury marques and are doing a fabulous job with them. (Heck even Jaguar’s thriving and building its best cars ever under Indian ownership.)

Mercedes made a hash of Maybach, but nobody really cared about that antiquated brand. There’s already discussion of a partnership between Daimler-Benz and Aston, and frankly I’m beginning to think it can’t come soon enough.

Perhaps the Three-Pointed Star should simply swallow Aston Martin, because the small sports-car maker just can’t afford to keep dressing up old tech and relying on a 10-year old design template. Fresh investment for all-new product might only come with Mercedes muscle.

So now you know why this is the last honest Aston Martin review you’ll ever read, because it’s unlikely they’ll lend me any cars after seeing this write-up. And no other journalist will tell you the truth about modern Astons for fear of being deprived of cruising around in such alluring shapes. I can’t really blame them. I’ll miss it too, but I’ll still get to see these lovely Aston shapes, which is evidently better than being behind the wheel anyway.

2013 Aston Martin Vanquish

Specs

Price: AED 1,185,500 ($322k)

Engine: 6.0-litre V12, 565bhp @ 6750rpm, 457lb ft @ 5500rpm

Performance: 4.1secs 0-100kph, 295kph, 14.4L/100

Transmission: Five-speed auto, rear-wheel drive

Weight: 1846kg

What do you think? Is he right, or utterly, comprehensively, unforgiveably mistaken? Let us know what you think of Shahzad’s review below. Go on, lay into him, how dare he speak ill of such desirable cars!

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