valentina

I stayed away from this Snake Pit because so many reviews keep yelling "SPICE!! SPICE!!!" and especially in that cinnamon category. And on me, cinnamon normally means big ol' hot burnin' red streaks, no matter how much I love the way it smells.

 

OK, so then a friend gave me a bottle because she found out she's sensitive to cinnamon and I thought, "here we go again." I've also had middlin' luck with the Snake Pits because I love pure Snake Oil so much, and in general, don't care for variations on the theme.

 

So I tried it. Loved it! To me smells like a warm, mellow, spicy Snake Oil. No skin irritation whatsoever! Just lovely Snake Oil with a shake of spice over the top. I am so happy I have a bottle, for it is just lovely!

I received an imp of Vampire Tears as a part of a swap, thanks to a kind forum member. I tested it without reading the components, and here's what I thought...

 

In the imp, I get a hit of dusty florals that remind me of the night-blooming florals of Midnight on the Midway (makes sense, this is a vampire scent), although there's also something sharper mixed in. On initial application, I still smelled the florals, but then I was hit with a yummy tidal wave of tonka. That subsided when it dried down, and it took on more of a orange blossom-like scent, along with a jasmine-ginger smell that very much reminded me of Siren.

 

While nothing like its companion Shojo Beat scent Midnight Kiss, the one similarity that I will mention is that they are both soft fragrances. Not in the sense of being faint or difficult to detect -- for that is not the case with either -- but rather having a lovely, rounded quality without any sharp edges.

 

Normally I'm a wearer of scents in the Midnight Kiss/Mme. Moriarity/Snake Oil fragrance genre, but I'm also fond of Embalming Fluid, Kumiho and Siren, and Vampire Tears is part of the latter fragrance genre. I think it would be a fantastic spring and summer scent. I may nab a bottle before it's gone!

What's there to say about this scent that everyone ahead of me has said? Not a lot. It's very much like Monster Bait: Underpants without the sandalwood. For me, that is a reason to celebrate, for sandalwood can be a bit sour on me. Love's Philosophy does indeed have that buttercream frosting smell, but there's a darkness on the edge of town. I think that comes from the dry, exotic smell of saffron, which rescues this scent from entering into the realm of the cloying and adds an element of sophistication. It is rather straightforward, yet is very lovely. I am going to enjoy this very, very much!

In the bottle, Anactoria barely had a scent to me -- it seemed very mild, but in a pretty, sweet way. On my skin, things change... I do blame the daemondrops and currant, since florals and fruit are iffy things on me, and sure enough, they amp up when I apply the scent. The scent does not morph on me, and it smells very traditionally floral-perfume. DAMN MY BODY CHEMISTRY. I guess if I'd ever wanted to cover up the smell of kush, all I would have had to do was lay a bit of daemondrops and currant on my skin My bottle will go to someone who can appreciate the beauty and sex appeal that this scent does most certainly hold.

I overcame my reticence to try this scent and purchased a bottle, even though I don't do well with many complex scents and Dragon's Blood can often be problematic on me. It just sounded too intriguing to pass by and it had enough things that did work to make it worth a try.

 

In the bottle, I pick out the Dragon's Blood, wine and musk, and understand the comparisons to Mme. Moriarty, Midnight Kiss and Urd. When it hits my skin, I get an initial almond hit, but almond is a problem note on my skin that I always amp. The almond departs in around 30 seconds (yay!) and a spicy-sweet Dragon's Blood and musk emerge. Dragon's Blood can often smell a bit too feral on me (as in, it just flat-out smells like blood), and I think the grapey wine, resins, musk and carnation even it out. I can still smell the almond a bit, and my old nemesis is also helping tame the Dragon's Blood.

 

After an hour or so, I also get a nice little hit from the mimosa and neroli, adding a bit of citrusy sweetness to the brew. The scent is so complex that I can't pull notes when I smell it, but rather, it gives me impressions of things. One one hand, it reminds me of a good Dragon's Blood incense with an almost peppery undertone, but I also think of sangria wine. While this scent is perhaps in the same family as Mme. Moriarty, Midnight Kiss and Urd, I also find it very different, probably due to that citrus note that lilts out from underneath the Dragon's Blood and wine.

 

I am delighted I took the chance and ordered Blood Phoenix, it's complex, unique and mysterious. I'm going to be putting it in my rotation right away!

I've always been very curious about Al Azif due to my love of the BPAL incense blends, so I was naturally excited to try it. In the imp, it smelled like a dry incense with a bit of sweetness, but not stick incense. Instead, it smells more like the leaf incense of the sage variety.

 

On my skin, I get a shot of maybe maple or coconut sweetness with that incense underneath, and it's a very dry, almost musty incense. I keep thinking of a very ancient incense made of sage and wormwood leaves that were dried and crushed up. The sweetness really wears off after a 5 minutes, and I'm left smelling how I'd imagine an old underground temple would smell, with damp walls that have absorbed the incense smell. After a half-hour or so, that musty smell wears off a wee bit and a spicier, sweeter scent emerges alongside it that is a bit maple syrupy, but not in a Mrs. Butterworth way.

 

I know a lot of people find this scent foody and comforting and not ominous and creepy, but I'm going with ominous and creepy. I think I'm amping the creepy element of the scent, but whatever it is, it's kind of weird, but not in a "oh, that stinks!" way. I can't stop smelling it, even though I don't think it's fragrant. To my nose, it kind of morphs back and forth between sweet and musty. My body chemistry must be getting schizo with this scent! It's not a way I'd choose to smell when wearing perfume, but it brings many Lovecraft stories to mind by the aroma alone. Amazing!

Well patooey. My body chemistry strikes again! Black Lace starts out perfectly lovely on my skin, and is indeed a very proper, almost austere fragrance, except for the undertone of sugary vanilla and a faint whiff of cognac. It's one of those interesting juxtaposition fragrances. After a few minutes, the cognac becomes a bit stronger, but I still enjoyed it. Then my body chemistry started amping the cotton and tobacco and it became entirely austere, with no sweetness. I'm guessing that the musk in this scent must be a very pale, white musk, because in combination with the clean cotton fragrance, Black Lace turns to pure powder on me about a half-hour after application. Nuts. If my body could have held the initial elements of the scent, I would have cherished the bottle, but instead it's going to someone who can fully enjoy what this blend has to offer.

I am really rather amazed that all the BPAL limited edition fans aren't all over this one like bees to honey -- Kubla Khan has all the complexity of limited edition scents -- look at that list of ingredients! And it's a GC scent! Best of both worlds!

 

I purchased a bottle of this unsniffed, a big ol' risk takin' for someone with my frequently snarky body chemistry. My brain so wants to love many things, my skin so often objects. However, the Khan has enough of my favorite components in it for me to get brave and give it a whirl. And as many complex scents do, this one went through a number of morphs. The epic saga is detailed below.

 

In the bottle, I got a lot resinous opium and florals. Nice. When it hit my skin, I experienced a shot of rose-scented opium, with a goodly amount of jasmine shakin' around underneath. Then my nemesis rose really hit its stride in about minutes 5 to 20. I smelled a lot like very intense, rose-opium incense that was going to verge on the intolerable if it amped much more. I was ready to wail in sorrow. I was ready to run up to my computer and post a sales thread. But I was fixing supper and I didn't want to stop doing that, so I pouted and cooked for about 10 minutes. Then I put my nose back to my arm, as hope springs eternal, and OMG, the joy! That bitch rose had burned herself out and what is left, and becomes the scent that remains, is a dark vanilla-opium-tobacco incense. Gorgeous.

 

If I had to compare Kubla Khan to another BPAL, I'd go with Khajurajo -- a lovely, lovely floral incense, very complex. Where I like this scent better than Khajurajo is in the vanilla, which gives the scent a mellow richness that I find very pretty, especially juxtaposed to the opium and tobacco, which impart a certain dryness. I'd actually like to smell this on a man, I think certain guys might be able to pull off wearing this scent. But for the femme incense lovers, this is a must-try.

Time to drink my gin and tonica and review BPAL's Chanukkiyah...

 

(I'll refrain from lapsing into that Adam Sandler song as much as possible in this review.) Well, in the bottle, Chanukkiyah is very much molasses and sweetness, with a sharpness beneath it. It initially went on very sweet and dark molasses-y, but after 5 minutes, the olive oil, fig and pomegranate really take over for a while, along with a certain powdery amber. The scent becomes relatively sweet and sharp in a very distinctive way, but after a half hour or so, everything settles in and the components take their place. To me it's sweet without being cloyingly foody or sugary. It is so utterly different from the other holiday scents -- I find it dark, but not in in a sultry or ominious way, but rather a robust, complex way. It really brings to mind all the fragrances of a kitchen where a wonderful Chanukkiyah feast is being prepared!

 

Tell your friend Veronica to go test Chanukkiyah!

There are SO MANY reviews of Snow White, it's obvious it's such a classic and well-loved Yule scent, so while it's not in my normal fragrance preference field, of course I had to sample it (thanks to a decant from the lovely Sookster).

 

Starting out in the imp and upon initial application, I found the comparisons to Dana O'Shee to be very, very accurate -- I get a lot of milky creaminess with almond and a hint of greenery. Where it diverges from Dana O'Shee (at least for me) is in the dry-down, when some sort of sharp floral rises up to the surface, where Dana gets more subdued.

 

After a while everything settles into a smell that is a lot like Angel Food cake with a milky glaze and coconut sprinkled on top. Something I'd like to eat, but it's not my style as a scent. However, I've just described a food that is white upon white upon white, so it's yet another excellent evocation of the concept. For anyone who loves foody smells with maybe a wee bit of floral floating around, it has to be a winner. (And I know it is already!)

Incubus reminds me of Tiresias, except with musk instead of patchouli-sandalwood, mint instead of black currant and sage instead of muguet. I suppose that sounds like a rather significant "instead of" list, and I guess what I'm getting at is that Incubus is, like Tiresias, a scent where the sweetness of caramel is wonderfully juxtaposed with contrasting fragrance elements, such as resins, musks, tobacco and green, herbal smells.

On my skin, Incubus starts out with the white musk that I associate with scents like Dorian and the spicy, sweet, yet not foody, tobacco-caramel smell. The mint does bloom after a few minutes, causing me some concern, as mint can be a monster on my skin, but the black musk also kicks in with its dark, dry, almost peppery smell, and everything balances out wonderfully. The balance of the Incubus holds very well on my skin, and it's very long-lasting without being obnoxious.

I'd say that the musk gives Incubus a crisper smell than Tiresias with its patchouli, but I wouldn't call Incubus a light fragrance -- it's very, very true to its description, for there is a sweetness with a distinct dry, almost sour edge underneath. I just love scents like this, they have such dimension and contast. A bottle of Incubus may be in my future!

I received a frimp from a kind fellow forum member, and when I was opening the imp to sniff it, I got some on my hand, so my testing of Lysander commenced rather rapidly. My initial thought, when I sniffed it in the imp and on my skin, was that I rather fancied it, and I had so not expected to like it. Without knowing what was in it, I thought there was white musk, and something sweetly vanilla-caramel-spicy there. Reading what was in the blend came as a shock, for my nose went right to the warm, vaguely sweet tonka.

 

The second time I tested it, I was able to discern that yes, there is some lilac in the musk and wood violet in the blend, and they're most present from initial drydown through the first 15 minutes or so, although the tonka is dominant, along with some spice -- perhaps coming from the spicy resins of the benzoin. The lime then flares up and makes the scent much tarter and less foody. On my skin, the scent balances out and it's a clean, spicy-yet-citrusy masculine scent.

 

All I can keep thinking is that this is how Old Spice should have smelled, but if all the men in the 1950's and 1960's had smelled this good, the baby boom would have boomed a quite bit more.

Dragon's Claw smells really great in the imp, for I do love resins a great deal, and this is the merging of two resins. However, I was more than a little hesitant to put it on my skin, because my experience with both elements of the scent, Dragon's Blood and sandalwood, is spotty at best. Dragon's Blood gets a little too, well, bloody on me, to the point of smelling a bit gamey. Sandalwood can turn bitter and pungent on my skin, to the point of smelling like dill pickles and cedar. So the merging of these two scents should portend the perfect storm of UGH.

 

But that didn't happen. It's really quite nice -- the sandalwood cuts the blood smell and the Dragon's Blood cuts the bitterness of sandalwood. It's certainly not a sweet, innocent smell, but then when the hell did I ever really care to wear demure, innocent-smelling fragrances? I find that Dragon's Claw smells the most like the Dragon's Blood incense that I love to burn, and likewise sets me in the same mood as the incense. As a result, I find this scent evocative, yet calming. Dragon's Claw is also a very unisex blend, but certainly is working for me as a smouldering, dark scent. Truly, a very nice blend that is wonderfully balanced.

In the imp. Asphodel is light, green, almost innocently floral. I picture wee springtime flowers. Upon initial application, it's green with a bit of a floral scent that I associate with bubble bath aromas when I was a little girl.

 

Drydown sends this scent into a momentary flare-up of florals, but that's typical of my body's reaction to florals. It calms down rather quickly, and while I still smell green and floral aromas, I'm also getting a dusty sort of dryness, and a floral-herbal smell that reminds me a lot of what I smell when I'm in the garden and brush past my artemisa plant. And since artemisia is a grayish-green plant, that makes sense. The smell of mugwort also comes to mind, and mugwort is in the artemsia family...so I'm going to imagine there's artemisia/mugwort in this scent somewhere. And the longer it's on me, the spicier it gets...almost a bit woody. Whatever it is that's underneath the inital impression of green florals, it certainly gives this scent a bit of melancholy and brooding, evoking the inspiration of this scent.

 

For someone who loves flowers and loves to grow flowers, I can't wear floral scents especially well, but I think Asphodel is a masterful creation. I had an absolute riot trying to figure out what was in it, and it has me stumped. I think it would certainly please people who like more cool, delicate florals and some of the drier, herbal-woody blends, like Hamadryad.

The Lab is lovely, for I was frimped with Midnight Kiss in my last order. They are evil little enablers, but I shall forgive them for it, because this scent is beautiful.

 

In the imp, I got a lot of wine and musk. I thought it smelled like the love child of Urd and Smut when it first hit my skin, because what I smelled was that dark red muscadine wine smell of Urd, the patchouli in Urd, and the red musk of Smut. Since these are two favorites, you know I was happy. Things sharpened up for a bit after 15-30 minutes, seemingly a result of the sandalwood and nicotania. Didn't get much cocoa in the blend, except as something that perhaps gives this scent a rather indefinable softness around the edges. What I ultimately end up with is with something that is drop-dead beautiful, in that dark, Urd-Smut-Mme. Moriarty-Boomslang sort of way. A gorgeous scent, indeed.

I have a recipe for a Mexican hot cocoa mix that I usually give to people for Christmas. It is not for sissies, and no one mistakes it for Swiss Miss when they drink it -- it has in it both cocoa and chopped up bits of Ibarra chocolate, a heavy dose of cinnamon, just a bit of espresso mix, and brown sugar. I sound like Martha Stewart, but this is going to come into play in my review! El Dia de Reyes obviously jumped out at me when I saw it in the 2007 Christmas LEs, and I was very anxious to try it.

 

In the bottle, it's rich, spicy, chocolate. When I put it on, I initially got a strong hit of cocoa, the same sort of cocoa that I smell in Boomslang. The cinnamon fires up on drydown, and the top notes of cocoa and cinnamon hold on thereafter, without a lot of morphing. I also get a bit coffee, because I'm reminded just a bit of the coffee fragrance in Misk U. The brown sugar isn't especially apparent to me, except perhaps as a means to keep the scent from becoming too dark or bitter.

 

I find El Dia de Reyes dark, rich and rather potent, and exactly like Mexican hot cocoa. The scent seems more gourmand than foody-sweet to my nose. On my skin it has great lasting power and while it could be worn alone to great effect, I also agree with the others who think it would layer beautifully with other scents.

This is one of those "how did she do it??" scents, for smelling November virtually paints a picture in my mind. In the bottle and upon initial application, I thought November smelled very much of pine, and reminded me a lot of other forest-in-the-snowstorm scents. Then, after 5 minutes, the fragrance of leaves arrived, and I was astonished! November smells exactly like wet leaves and snow-laden trees after the first snowfall, before the leaves and the plant life have utterly frozen and died away for the winter. On my skin, there's also a heavy element of ozone in this scent, evoking for me a late autumn storm, when rainfall turns into heavy, wet snow. Finally, I get whiff of wet earth underneath the leaves and the the snow.

November is unisex-to-masculine without being dark and heavy, and I think this scent will please greatly anyone who loves fragrances that smell just like the outdoors. I think it is an utterly precise and lovely olfactory evocation of walking through a park after the first snowstorm in November.

I received this scent as a frimp and was exceedingly thankful, because while this scent is not my style, Kurukulla is one of my favorite Tibetan dieties. She's also known as the Red Tara, and this fragrance is certainly in keeping with the red floral imagery associated with her.

 

On me, the initial drydown is roses and lots of lotus, and lotus tends to turn into a herbal, dry, almost wintergreenish smell on my skin. It makes me think of pink wintergreen lozenges that my grandma used to have around her house; not a bad association whatsoever, but sort of incongruent when I'm thinking of a lotus and a Tibetian diety. Anyway, since rose tends to be a thundering scent of doom on my skin, the lotus actually serves an excellent purpose in toning down the scent and making it not so heady and traditionally floral. After a time, the lotus mellows out a bit and the rose takes center stage, but again, it's spicier and more herbal rose. It makes me think of wild roses growing in a herb garden with bees buzzing around, which again is very evocative of Kurukulla.

 

I think this scent is an utterly perfect evocation of Kurukulla, and I'll keep it and use it to scent some dried flower petals from my garden, and maybe put it on my meditation altar. And for anyone who adores florals, especially a spicy, wilder rose, this scent is a must-try.

I could swear I'd reviewed this scent, but I think what happened is that the first time I received a frimp, I promptly gave it to my spouse, for he is inordinately fond of vetivert. This time I had to try it, and it is, indeed, a very masculine scent, but in a rather classic, traditional way. On initial application and drydown, the sandalwood and lemon are top notes that add a lot of sharpness and the vetivert and woods are stronger mid-to-base notes that make the scent smell very earthy and dark. My skin has a way of making sandalwood and lemon go exceedingly sharp, so that was a bit difficult to take, but after an hour or so, the darkness of the scent really takes over. I'm just not a wood or vetivert lover, so while it's tolerable, it's nothing to get really jazzed over.

 

However, it was great on my spouse the first time and it still smells wonderful; I think this scent should be up towards the top of the best BPAL masculine-style scents. Both men and women who love to wear more masculine scents should not hesitate to give this one a try, because if your body chemistry likes it, it's a gorgeous, amazing scent.

I received Nocnitsa as a frimp, for it's something that I wouldn't typically try. Any sort of woodsy smell is usually way too woodsy on me, so of course, that's what I expected here.

 

On first application, it was pine. Pine-pine-pine-pine-pine! Not bad, just rather, uh... piney.

 

After about 15 minutes: What the hell? It's pine, but with a very nice sweetness. I'd almost say it was honey, and maybe a wee bit milky? It's a bit like Dana O'Shee, gone to the pine forest. Pretty, not as masculine as most piney scents can be on my skin.

 

After an hour: Mmmm! To me, it smells like pine, with some sweetness, and a big dose of patchouli. This dirt smell is more a dark patchouli than the dirt smell in other blends. I love patchouli, so this development makes me quite happy.

 

While wearing pine is not my #1 choice of ways to smell, I see myself hanging onto this imp and wearing it as the season moves into winter, because I do thoroughly enjoy the way this scent morphs. I end up smelling the way I think I'd smell if I had a sweet patchouli scent on my body and was out hiking through a pine forest, and that's a lovely association for me.

I was really, really anticipating this one, and usually that's the kiss of death... sigh. But not this time! This is just a great scent -- I love the combination of ingredients, they play off each other so beautifully. The pumpkin and tonka initially tend to soften the champca flowers and tobacco, two components that can be a little too much for me at first if they aren't properly tempered with something else. The carnation emerges after an hour or so, and gives an almost clove-like fragrance to the blend. I can't say that I get lots of pumpkin in this scent, except it's there, but only as an undercurrent. This isn't a "granny's cookin' pumpkin pie in the kitchen smell," this is a "granny's smoking clove cigarettes and burning nag champa on the balcony while you eat some Village Inn pumpkin pie that she picked up on the way home from the head shop." And I mean that as a compliment! I don't want to frighten away people who love the comforting food scents, my body chemistry tends to insinuate head shop smells, and I find them comforting and endearing. Anyway, I think this is a beautiful scent, especially so if you enjoy a fragrances like Urd or Madame Moriarty. Very bottle-worthy, perhaps in multiples.

This one confused the hell out of me until re-read the scent description and figured out what was going on. My sniff and initial application reaction was "pure nummy," and that's always what I think when I get a scent with pungency and caramel mixed together. (As in, Tiresias.) It hung out being creamy caramel-white chocolate pumpkin decadence for a bit, but then after a 15-20 minutes, it went a bit sharp. Huh? I re-read the description and realized it was the pomegranate flaring up. It didn't take long for the pomegranate to settle down, and Pumpkin III is one of those pungent-yet-sweet kind of scents that I really enjoy. I don't find it especially foody at all. There's an element of it that rather reminds me of Mme. Moriarty, another of Tiresias, and another of the old Pumpkin Patch 2. I love all three of those scents. I am one happy camper.

Lots of people are getting incense and musk out of Lurid Library, but what I'm getting is a very proper, yet vaugely dark and smoky vintage perfume, circa the 1930's - 1950's. Peeking out underneath is is a dry layer of dustiness, that same dry note that is found is Miskatonic U. This doesn't especially morph scent-wise on me, except to get perhaps a bit darker and a wee bit more floral. Where it does morph is to start out rather faint, and to gather more strength as time moves along. It is tradtional, yet not. I keep getting the mental picture of a librarian in a creepy old library who works late at night, wears her dark hair up in a bun, puts on very dark red lipstick, and when she stands on a ladder to restock books, you can see that under her proper dress, she has on a black garter belt.

Everyone's body chemistry does its own thing with scents, but if I had to describe this scent in a few words, I'd call it the embalmed pumpkin, because it reminds me a bit of Embalming Fluid and spicy pumpkin blended together. That's not utterly deranged and nonsensical, because Pumpkin IV has cactus blossom and Embalming Fluid has aloe, and there may be a bit of similarity in those two succulent-derived scents.

 

But overall, Pumpkin IV starts out pumpkiny and green-spicy, but the sweetgrass blooms strongly on drydown and becomes a bit intense. If I sniffed it too hard, it tickled my nose, and that is the sweetgrass talking. After a half-hour or so, the scent takes on a very green spicy smell with the pumpkin largely in the background. This takes me to a pumpkin patch in September, before it freezes and things are not yet dried out. Someone has run into a patch and broken open a pumpkin -- you get the smell of the green, oozing vines, the trampled grass, spicy late-season florals and the smell of a freshly-broken-open pumpkin. Very much, there's a green, fresh, still-growing quality to this scent that certainly evokes the pumpkin patch in an earlier stage of of its life.

I am reviewing the 2006 version of this scent... I'd always shied away from this scent because I'm not really that into fruity or foody smells. Then I started reading reviews and thought hmmm... In the imp, I get strong incense, with more pungency than sweetness. I had the same reaction upon initial application, and I do think that some of the pungency comes from the currant element of the scent. For about 5 minutes, I get a slightly bitter incense smell with a little sweetness. AND THEN. The pungency burns off and the sweet, warm, smokiness takes over. It's like someone is burning incense that has pinon and cedar in it while they're in the kitchen baking sweets. An absolutely spot-on evocation of All Souls Day, and very beautiful and mysterious. I really love this scent, and I am glad I finally woke up and tried it!