greenranger

In the imp, something sweet...fig? Wood, as well, but, I can't tell what kind.

 

Wet, cocoa and wood...not sandalwood like in Velvet, but, some other kind.

 

Drying, the wood has covered up everything else.

 

Sawdust. No cocoa, no fig, just sawdust.

 

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An hour later.

 

It did, finally, sweeten up. The scent doesn't really seem very fig like or cocoa like, though...just...sweet wood shavings.

I tested this at work, with no list of scent notes. It makes things interesting to try to figure out, sometimes. =)

 

In the imp, cocoa, and possibly sandalwood.

 

Wet, on me, chocolate, and red peppers and then fruit and flowers mixed with chocolate and red peppers and sandalwood. Lots and LOTS of scent, and they aren't playing nice at first.

 

Drying, to about 20 minutes in, the scents are still really not playing nice. Red pepper, and chocolate and flowers and fruit and just muddy ick.

 

 

Dry, after about 20 minutes, it starts to settle down into something very nice that reminds me slightly of Velvet, because I think I am smelling chocolate and sandalwood with fruit and possibly a touch of the pepper over it. The chocolate isn't as dry as the cocoa in Velvet, and the whole effect is creamier and sweeter.

 

Dry and a couple hours in, it's a creamier sweeter fruitier version of Velvet. Very very nice, and possibly addictive. I just need to get past the wet and early dry stage to get here.

 

It fades to just a faint hint of chocolate about 5 hours in.

 

Looking at the actual listed notes, I get slightly confuzzled.

 

"Bittersweet Mexican cocoa with rum, red wine, and a scent redolent of sacrificial blood."

 

I suppose the red wine is likely the source of the fruitiness that I got, but the sandalwood...does the sacrificial blood scent have sandalwood and red pepper in it? I smelled several things that aren't on the listed notes.

A dark spicy woody scent. Very different than any that I have tried so far. Very interesting, and intriguing.

 

I think I like this one...I think I like it very much!

This smells sweet to me. Syrup and tea and...resin? The frankincense is being very quiet in this one so far. It's usually pepperier than this. I'm also not smelling anything floral yet, unless the lilac is merely the sweetness? I don't know lilac well so I don't know.

 

Drying, it is fading. It's now a very faint tea and tobacco scent, with a very faint spicy kick that might possibly be the frankincense.

 

 

I wanted to like this one. The notes sounded great. I'm just not sure that this combination is working for me.

Um. This smells like green wood, and smoke to me.

 

Not what I expected it to smell like, but, there it is. So far it is green wood and smoke.

Rose.

 

Rose and resin.

 

Hopefully my skin's love of resins will keep the rose in line. Unfortunately, I feel the rose amping up even as I type...

 

Oh, yeah. Waaaaaay too much rose on my skin. Ah well.

Wet, this is greenery and leather. Very leafy, very leathery.

 

Drying, the greenery steps back, and now it might be just the pulpy ferns and herbs used to tan the leather.

 

Dry, there's a smoky note that has appeared as well. Smoky leather tanned with herbs. Very vivid.

 

__

 

My cat jumped in my lap and tried to lick it all off of my arm.

Interesting. Usually I can pick out Frankincense in a blend right away, even if I have trouble with the other notes, but, this time? All the notes are sticking together and the peppery Frankincense is just one part of the whole.

 

A nice quiet golden scent. It isn't as pushy as some of the resins are on me; it's more subtle. I'll have to see what kind of staying power it has on my skin before I make up my mind. =)

 

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It's just a little over an hour after I started this post, and the scent has vanished from my skin, except for a little bit of something musky smelling that must be the ambergris. This is the second time something containing ambergris has vanished, when otherwise the notes are well known for lingering for a very long time on my skin. This has wood and resin in it! It should be still going strong! Ah well.

Wet, on, incense. Frankincense? Oh, it must be the boswellia. There's the myrrh, and the scent that I think is galbanum.

 

Drying...is that rose? Eek, I forgot it had that. I really hope it doesn't take over. So far the incense is slightly more in charge than the rose.

 

So far so good. The combination of resins seems to be enough to keep the rose in check. It would be really nice to have an incense and rose scent where it wasn't all ROSE.

 

I think we may have a winner! Myrrh, with the aid of it's trusty companions boswellia, galbanum, and copal, has subdued rose! I think I can detect the rose as a flowery edge to the scent, but it is mostly lovely resins. It is almost close to Penitence, with a bit of rose. Mmmmmmm.

In the imp, I sniffed multiple times, and got something different each time. One time, spicy resin(frankincense? Gum Mastic?), the next fruity(pomegranite?), the next herby(fennel? verbena?). I have no idea what this is going to do on me.

 

On me, herbs. Strong herbs. Broken sappy stems of some plant. It is making me think of something related to celery, but, wilder and more woody. Eventually the anise comes forward slightly.

 

Ah, there are the resins, just managing to get past the stems. This is interesting. I'll have to try it again to see if it grows on me. Heh.

 

Wet, it smelled like smoke...then pepper...then spicy beeswax.

 

Drying, spicy peppery leather and wood, sweetened by beeswax.

 

*crosses her fingers that more than just the leather and wood will survive the drydown*

 

Dry, it is leather. Nice leather, but, mostly leather. I liked all the stages to get here, though, and on some leather blends I don't.

Wet, I definitely smell the cinnamon and vanilla. On my wrists, I actually get the clove as well as the cinnamon, and maybe the pine.

So far, this is what I had hoped Chimera would be, as it is definitely more spicy. I'm sort of expecting the vanilla to come forward and overpower everything on my skin, though.

So far, the pine is holding up on my wrist, and the cinnamon and clove are keeping up with the vanilla on the back of my hand, or at least making it a really spicy vanilla.

Wood and spice. This one is stronger on my skin than many that I have tried recently. I smell the cardamom in this one. The hay absolute is not apparent yet.

 

Drying, the scent is settling back and not jumping off my skin anymore, but it is still spicy wood. I think I'm beginning to smell the hay absolute. On me, this is a lovely complex wood scent, and I'm happy to have one that isn't primarily cedar or pine.

 

Darn, the spicyness has faded, and now I have polished wood. It's nice polished wood, but, I miss the spice.

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Well now, I have finally found a scent that is more than, "Baby powder," or "Just perfume," to my husband. He thinks this one smells like incense! Yay! *Is hopeful*

This ended up being a tasty mead. I can't really differentiate all those notes, so to me the scent is more like a mead that was brewed with all those things in it, into one intoxicating but deceptively innocent smelling drink.

This is a really well blended scent. It has a presence like some of the vanilla scents...but, it isn't really like them? It just feels subtle and warming, like how I perceive the vanillas to be. When I sniff closely it is a very complex scent, but close to my skin.

It did take a little while to get to this point, though; when I first put it on, I thought I smelled root beer or cream soda. =) I suppose that's appropriate enough. My first experience with drinking mead was with a really lovely home-brewed mead that tasted like it was about as alcoholic as a soda pop. Whhooo! Intoxicating stuff, but lovely and innocent tasting.



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This lasted more than 6 hours on me, and the scent kept getting more complex instead of going single note like so many do on my skin. It didn't have a lot of throw, but, I do like this and I am happy that I purchased the bottle unsniffed.

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I'm just going to add this clip from Wikipedia in case anyone was wondering what gruit was. I didn't even know it was a word 'till I read the lab description, and then looked it up:

Gruit (or sometimes grut) is an old fashioned herb mixture used for bittering and flavoring beer, popular before the extensive use of hops. Gruit or grut ale may also refer to the beverage produced using gruit.

Gruit was a combination of herbs, some of the most common being mildly to moderately narcotic: sweet gale (Myrica gale), mugwort (Artemisia vulgaris), yarrow (Achillea millefolium), heather (Calluna vulgaris) and Marsh Labrador Tea (Rhododendron tomentosum, formerly known as Ledum palustre). Gruit varied somewhat, each gruit producer adding additional herbs to produce unique tastes, flavors, and effects. Other adjunct herbs were juniper berries, ginger, caraway seed, aniseed, nutmeg, and cinnamon or even hops in variable proportions; many of these ingredients may have psychotropic properties too. Some gruit ingredients are now known to have preservative qualities.

I didn't see this one up, so I suppose I am the first?

Oh, the pressure!

I had to get this one, partly because of the hay absolute. It's been a note I was looking forward to trying, and this blend looked like the perfect chance!

This didn't change much from the bottle when I put it on, and it hasn't changed much in the two hours that I have had it on. It hasn't faded much at all, either. I think this one likes my skin.

I smell hay...dry hay on a really warm afternoon. All the scent of walking through a ripe grainfield, without the prickles of straw in your socks. I can find the hay scent, rounded out by the amber and sweetened by the honey. It's a warm, relaxing, summer scent.

I want to go curl up in a hayloft.


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The first time I tried this was right after I opened the package...This time it has had some time to settle.

This time, I smell the cardamom and lemon in addition to the hay. Mmmmm. It is even more yummy than it was.

Nice!

 

The frankincense was the first note up, but it stepped back fairly quickly and the scent became less peppery and more smooth and sweet. There's still a little resiny punch to it though.

Wet, on me, dusty resins.

 

Drying, frankincense, possibly myrrh...and wood of some sort...cedar and pine? Possibly other wood as well, but the cedar and pine are the most identifiable. I smell a woodshop...fresh woodchips all over. What I am hoping will happen, is that the myrrh will sweeten and come forward, and the wood will drop back a bit. It needs the wood to be different from Penitence, which I love, but maybe not this much wood.

 

I tried this one again, and I do love this too. The pine scent stays fairly close to the skin, and the resins waft about more freely. If I sniff close to the skin, the pine *is* the dominant scent...but, I crave this scent and it is different enough from Penitence to be its own lovely craving.

 

Wood and resins also really love my skin. It lasts forever on me.

On me, wet, orange peel.

 

Drying, I get a whiff of almond as the orange peel fades, and then I smell rose. At the moment, all I smell is rose, which, since I do seem to amp rose is no surprise at this point. Bulgarian rose seems very nice, but, it's covering everything else up very thoroughly.

 

Ah well. I had to try. Chalk this up as another rose perfume on me.

On me, snake oil and chocolate. Yum.

 

I'm looking forward to what it will smell like later, after it has had a chance to settle some. =)

Sweeeeet! Very very sweet. In the imp it was cherries and chocolate, but, on...OMG, sugar and cherries. Cherry candy.

 

As it is drying, it is getting to be less intense. It's still so sweet that I can barely get anything past the sweetness.

In the bottle, chocolate, yummy chocolate.

 

Wet on me, flowers! A whiff of honeysuckle goes by. Then it settles into chocolate sweetened by nectar rather than sugar.

 

Drying, I smell the apple blossom go by. I doubt it will linger on my skin, but, it's pretty.

 

Actually, it's lingering pretty well. This is a much lighter floral chocolate than bliss or velvet, which are my experience with chocolate scents so far. The apple blossom and honeysuckle...and possibly the frankincense... are hitting the higher lighter notes, and the chocolate is the smooth, creamy base. If this were actually a candy, it would be a very expensive, very fluffy truffle, barely sweetened with organic honey from bees fed exclusively on honeysuckle and apple blossoms, coated in silky white chocolate and just enough specks of spice to give visual interest, that would just about evaporate when eaten.

If such a confection existed, I'd only be able to afford to smell the candy shop, not buy the chocolates made there anyway. =)

In the imp, caramel, almost.

 

On me,wet, buttery caramely sweetness.

 

Drying, some spices are managing to swim to the sugary surface.

 

We'll see what it dries down to, but, so far, I like snake oil better...which would be good, since it is far far easier to get ahold of more snake oil, than more Anaconda.

 

Dry, I'm beginning to like the way the scent is changing. The OMG CARAMEL and brown sugar are making way for the spices and there's ....something...providing a base. It might be the tobacco others have mentioned, but if it is, it is rich sweet tobacco. There's still too much sugar covering it to be certain. It's becoming a more rounded scent.

Wet, this smelled slithery and green. Don't ask me how, but, that's the impression I got.

 

Dry, it smelled like smashed green plant stems.

 

Then, about one hour in, it vanished. Gone. Poof.

 

Ah well.

This one started off clean and refreshing.

 

After a bit, the scent seemed to warm up, and then? Most of it just vanished.

 

What was left smelled like ozone, and maybe one other note with it. The two notes left don't behave well together to my nose when left by themselves.

On me, wet, coconut and rum.

 

Drying, the tobacco comes forward a little bit, but, it isn't playing nice with the rum and coconut. Maybe I just don't like the three notes together? The coconut reasserts itself and comes out in front again, and I start to like it a little bit more.

 

I've seen alot of comparisons between this and Red Lantern, but, beyond both being sweet scents that also have tobacco, I don't see it. I loooove Red Lantern, but, it dries down to a caramel tobacco scent on me. Elegba is mostly sweet coconut with rum. I'm not quite certain that this is either a GC equivalent for Red Lantern(on my skin), or the coconut scent that I was looking for.