EmpressPixie

Have you tried reading through the reviews for the Macabray? It might just depress you, but a lot of the time people will review perfumes against each other like..

 

AngelicRuin compared it to Snow White: http://www.bpal.org/topic/51369-the-macabray/page__view__findpost__p__1312198

 

or inurbanus comparing it to Cloister Graveyard in the Snow: http://www.bpal.org/topic/51369-the-macabray/page__view__findpost__p__1329715

 

I'm sure there are a ton more.

I wear this basically every time I wash my hair. The vetiver is crazy strong when my hair is still wet, but once it dries, everything settles into a nice, sexy vanilla. I constantly get compliments on it from those closest to me.

In honor of apparently being the first review, I unscrewed my bottle to sniff the hair gloss (which I've never done before). It smells almost like a very sweet patchouli in the bottle. It definitely sent me back to the notes saying, "is there patch in there?". I wanted this as an alternate (less sexy) hair gloss to wear to work and patch is definitely not my-office-friendly.

In my hair, it's sweet but with an almost watery quality to it. The oudh is very strong at first and there is a smokey note that I was hoping would stick around (it didn't). The ginger is definitely what's contributing to the "almost watery" quality I'm getting.

Now that my hair is drying, it's got a watery/earthy/peaty sweet quality. The biggest standout notes for me are white ginger and oudh. The frankincense is calling in support from way back in the back (it's a note that tends to disappear on me) and the amber lays out a nice sweetness to pull everything together.

It feels like a very feminine gloss, definitely more work friendly than Snake Oil (my current go-to gloss). And definitely very spring/summery -- almost floral or tropical in its sweetness. Also, work appropriate! Yay!

Liz?

A light, feminine vanilla floral perfume and a swirl of smoke and leather.

 

 

Hmm, have you sniffed her? I wonder how prominent the floral notes are. *goes to search reviews*

 

I don't find the floral notes to be prominent at all. I had actually forgotten there were florals until I posted the description. Most floral notes give me a massive headache, but Liz is lovely.

Liz?

You could try finding some Black Butterfly Moon: Lady of the Night orchid, benzoin, opopponax, currant, black chypre, white gardenia, ambergris, damp, wooded mosses, and black lily.

 

I have no idea how rare it is, but I think it matches in spirit in several ways.

Have you sniffed Male Nude, Arms Upstretched? It was with the 2011 Lupers I think. Dark musk, linen and chypre.

 

Some interesting GCs:

Incantation: Deep, wispy, and unfathomably dark: vetiver, dark woods, crumbling and burnt black sandalwood and a drop of lemon rind.

Coyote: The warmth of doeskin, dry plains grasses and soft, dusty woods warmed by amber and a downy, gentle coat of deep musk.

Aziraphale: Ethereal musk, blonde woods, and dusty Bible accord.

 

And another old LE:

The School House: Dandelion, white clover, balsam fir logs, and birchwood switches.

I liked lavender when I was younger -- it was basically all I wore perfume-wise, but when I got into BPAL, I dunno, I was just done with it. The lab's lavender note is also harsher in a way than I like. Anyway, I've been avoiding lavender perfume for a few years now, but I got some TKO in a swap as a frimp. And I was a little curious about it since everyone raves about it all the time.

 

At first sniff it's a somewhat harsh lavender. Very strong lavender with maybe a hint of vanilla beneath it if you really look.

 

Wet is the same as the sniff, but I think the lavender actually rises to the top and the vanilla just totally disappears for the moment. It's almost like italian dressing -- the lavender just floats on top like oil, while the vanilla sinks to the bottom like herbs. But after about ten minutes, they play together nicely. The lavender recedes a bit and the vanilla steps forward. And the rest of the time it is on, that continues until eventually I'm let with a nice toasted marshmallow scent and no lavender at all.

 

I have been wearing this on a daily basis lately because I was having some trouble sleeping. TKO just puts me right out. It's amazing and a total godsend. Realizing my little imp wouldn't last forever, I already have a bottle. Plus, I kind of love the "go to sleep smelling like lavender, wake up smelling like toasted marshmallows" effect. It's so cool.

Milk Chocolate, Cassia, and Bacon is the only bacon scent I can think of.

Just purely looking at scent descriptions:

Harvest Moon ('04, '05, '10, & '11) all have it.

Dia de los Muertos ('04, '05, '06, '07 & '09) all have it.

Capricorn, Vasakasajja & Larentalia all have it.

 

And in the GC: Odin.

 

Hopefully someone with a bit more specific knowledge can help out past this.

Softly floral vanilla musk.

 

I don't get the ASL comparisons at all. Wet, I get a rich, creamy, floral and ever so slightly spicy vanilla. Dry, I get a soft, floral vanilla with a very, very light musk. I'm thinking there is a very, very soft sandalwood maybe because amber does not work on my skin. And a softer musk, but not white musk because white musk has never once managed to smell remotely attractive on me.

 

Whatever this is, it is stunningly gorgeous. It was a bit sharp in the bottle (I actually hesitated to try it for several week because of this), but just breathtaking on the skin.

You aren't missing anything obvious. I turn mine upside down (gently) and then right side up again. Then I use a q-tip to grab whatever is on the lid and dab that on my skin.

 

Except for Eat Me which is so hardcore mine and I will never, ever, ever sell. That one I stick my finger on the end up and upturn. Then I dab some all over me: wrists and hair.

 

Some people use a toothpick inserted into the oil.

 

Some people insert the q-tip into the oil, but I always worry it will soak up too much.

 

Some people use a cotton ball or cotton pad.

 

Edited to add: With the exception of the Eat Me example, all of these are "clean" ways to use oil -- your own body oils never come into contact with the oil. That both means that your body chemistry doesn't alter it and that you can sell it later if your tastes change and you don't love something anymore.

Honestly, I think the best way to get better at recognizing and picking out notes is to get in on one of the circle swaps with imp boxes. You get to sniff a metric ton of things and when you do that, you are more able to pick up on the differences -- especially when you look at the notes and sniff really similar perfumes. So I guess my advice is to sniff a LOT of perfumes.

So, I'm super thrilled that I was gifted with a little tester of this. At first sniff it smelled like lush, juicy black cherries -- it was amazing.

 

Once it was on and dried down, however, it turned into single note: coriander. We hates it, the coriander. We hates it. It ruins perfectly good beers and now this. Blech. (I believe this is known as "dodging a bullet".)

 

Wait, on second sniff, it dries down to slightly sweet, a bit vanilla coriander. Not quite single note. Still.

Midnight Kiss! It's my favorite (or at least, one of my big favorites). It's red musk + cocoa+ plus a few other things -- http://www.blackphoenixalchemylab.com/shojobeat.html

 

MIDNIGHT KISS

Eternal desire, unquenchable passion: red musk, cocoa absolute, Nepalese amber, red sandalwood, aged patchouli, nicotiana, and blood wine.

 

Edited to add: I would not have tried it if I'd known the notes ahead of time because amber never works on me, but if you are a person with amber troubles, this one is different. At least, it was for me.

I got this about nine months ago and never tried it. I opened the bottle to sniff once and went, "Oh, headachesville". But today, when I opened the bottle again saying, "Hey, maybe that one..." it was not only not headachesville, but just lovely.

 

It dries down very similar to how Mahogany Hall smells in my room, which is just super (this is what I was going through my BPAL looking for this morning). It's a bit sweet, very resinous. I can recognize the resins as what usually bother my head, but either time or masterful blending has mixed them in an EmpressPixie friendly fashion. The oil definitely reminds me of falling leaves -- or more exactly, of wet leaves in a forest. A bit woodsy, a bit wet, and a bit autumn.

Western Diamondback is completely delicious, but I don't get any leather from it (oddly enough, I tend to get a nice, spicy sunblock, but that's another discussion entirely).

 

For the leatheriest leather to ever leather in a leatherly way, track down some Traveler. You won't regret it -- it's like dusty, worn leather and so leatherily leather.

 

Red Rider was some good leather, White Rider was too much chemical and not enough of a leather smell to my nose (I suspect it would settle in a bit over time, though).

On my skin, this smells like a thick, molasses-y gingerbread. Brown sugar sweetness and delightful spices. It's like a really classy incense shop and a high quality gingerbread bakery opened up next door to each other. I love it. It's definitely a nice "hoping for autumn" scent.

 

Chocolate? What's that? None of that here. Nope. Not a bit.

This is straight up my mother's potpourri on me. Woodsy, orange-y, a little spicy, and a bit powdery. The potpourri that we had in the hallway from the time I was eight until I left the house. Once it has dried down for a while, it's like someone spritzed some cologne on my mother's potpourri. Still mostly my mother's potpourri, but a wee bit of classic men's cologne back there.

 

Probably delightful for many, but I just don't want to wander about smelling like that potpourri. Perhaps I'll give the imp to my mother...

I got this at C2E2 after everyone started raving about it on the C2E2 thread. Half of the notes are things that usually do not work on me: most cocoas turn into cheap tootsie rolls, amber goes powdery, patchouli just takes over, and wine smells like rotting grapes.

 

Midnight Kiss is not that kind of scent. Wet and in the bottle, midnight kiss is glistening red fruits on top of freshly baked brownies.

 

As it dries, a deep, red incense and whisp of tobacco smoke begin to emerge still overshadowed by the red fruit. The brownies wave goodbye, which is a shame because they were delightful. The scent goes from dark forest brownies to red, deep, and sultry.

 

In the bottle, this smells exactly like: imagine walking down the street (of a nice, clean city) while someone is doing laundry in the basement. That warm, soapy, vaguely sweet laundry scent that reaches up to you in a cloud of steam? That's Tony. I love him.

Wet, it smells a lot like industrial complimentary hotel soap with a splash of sweetness to it (a splash -- not much at all, maybe a drop).

Dry, it gets a bit sweeter and the sweetness is a cologne-y, hair gel-esque style of sweetness. It's more cologne in the male deodorant kind of way than actually splashing on perfume. And the soap is definitely classic Dove. Because this basically smells exactly like my fiance after a shower. Which, since he lives about 600 miles away from me, makes it the best perfume ever for me.

In the bottle, it is quite sharp. I really can't smell anything other than this engulfing sour smell. It's not terribly pleasant and, to be honest, I only got the bottle because I really like getting the CBLDF scents.

Wet, this is sharp but sweet. It's almost got a touch of honey in it. It's also got a really clean sweaty smell to it -- like working out right after a shower.

It dried pretty quickly. The sweetness is drying into almost a molasses scent -- thick and sweet. This is often how I interpret sweet and boozy scents. It still has a slight sharp and sweaty note to it (I suspect what I'm picking up as "sharp" is the laudanum), I'm not really getting any tobacco, but after quite some time am getting a lovely whiff of cigar smoke.

Overall, I quite like the scent once it is on and dried. I didn't care for it in the bottle. There is still a vague sour/plasticky note if I huff my wrist, but the throw is lovely. The longer it sits on my wrist, the nicer it smells, even huffing. Yeah, definitely the longer it sits there, the nicer is smells. At this point it is to the "share with my fiance and let him fall in love" scent level of nice (sweet at first whiff, but complex underneath).

This smelled just like grape soda in the bottle to me.

 

On and dry (it dried like it was in a marathon -- on and dry almost immediately), it reminds me of these little tins of fruit candies we used to get -- both the fruitiness, the sweetness, and the powder scent from rumbling around in a metal tin and grinding up a bit. It isn't a baby-powder scent at all. It's nice, but probably not really an every day scent for me (it's a rare day that I wake up thinking, "I should smell like candy today") but a perfect candy scent.

Lemony tart candy and ozone, ozone, ozone wet.

 

On dry down, I'm getting that laundry vibe complete with a tad of powder, some sweetness, some lemon-tartness. The sweetness makes it a very pretty, feminine perfume on me. I miss the ozone, though. I want to feel like I'm standing in the middle of a storm, but doing some pretty household chores.

In the imp, it is really fruity and juicy smelling. Yummy, yummy.

 

Tragically, on my skin it is apples in the rain vying with bandaids. I dabbed some on one wrist not even five minutes ago and the scent is already gone from that wrist. I'm actually timing the other, but in short? My skin eats this. Just straight up eats it. For dinner. It's lovely while it lasts, but 5 minutes isn't exactly what I'm looking for in a perfume.