MadameGorgon

Dalliance with an Amourous Bat (Honeyed patchouli, sweet benzoin , s moky labdanum, and white sandalwood ) - 2020 Lupercalia

It is night.  You should not be out alone, but you needed a breath of fresh air from the tight cottage, fetid with the sweat of your kins’ sleeping bodies.  A quick stroll just to the stream running beside the boathouse.  You’ll splash your face and dampen your nightshirt with the cool, sweet, water on this interminable summer night, then just as quickly, run back to the cottage with a promise on your lips to go right to bed and right sleep, crammed next to your horrid, rankly unwashed, cousin in the too small, itchy bed.  No one will even notice you’ve gone

On your way back, instead, you saunter, enjoying the relative coolness of your thin soaked night shirt, after a day spent working the crops under the hot sun in the hopes that you’ll harvest enough to feed you and your family through the bleak winter.  Oddly, something catches your eye at the treeline of the very dark, very wolf-haunted forest.  Your breath quickens.  Your heart races. You think “RUN”, but notice queerly that it is not a wolf or bear or other beast, but…. A person?   

A deeply lovely, fine-boned, delicate fort of person.  A person that emerges from the trees with unbound, shoulder-length, wavy, mahogany-colored, hair.  He?  She? -Impossible to tell- Is dressed in an ornately embroidered aubergine velvet waistcoat splashed with dark, bloody garnets, a dark, smoky gray, watered silk, top coat embroidered along the cuffs and collar with bats woven betwixt sinuous snakes; all picked out in jet and onyx beads and deepest black silk thread.  The person wears skin tight, dove gray pantalons in a suede so soft looking that it begs to be stroked.  The breeches are cut to embrace every curve and muscular ripple, save one normally rather prominent one. 

Man?  Woman?  Even as they approach, you cannot discern.  Pale ivory hose with luxurious aubergine embroidery around the knee caress the taut, muscled calves.  A nearly sheer cotton lawn shirt peeks from beneath the velvet with a high starched collar and handmade lace cravate tied just so. Clearly this person; this impossibly beautiful creature is a noble; a courtier or courtesan. Who is very far from home.  Very far from ANYWHERE. All Alone in priceless finery and very unafraid.  With not a spot of mud on a boot heel or twig in a bit of that thick, lustrous hair after traversing very tangled, very wild forest. Even now you can hear the wolves begin to call to one another in plaintive, hungry howls.  

So unhurried the person saunters toward you through the mist roiling slowly from the wood..Approaching you so cautiously as if they were beast and you prey.  Their comfortably worn, jet black riding boots with delicate, gamet studded spurs hanging insouciantly from the rear leave no prints in the dust of road as they draw nearer to you.  Their eyes never leave yours even as the barks and tips of the wolves clearly draw nearer.  It’s cubbing season and she-wolves are hunting for any meal to keep their cubs milk fat.

They cross the dirt road, slowly closing the space between you until you can see the impossibly glowing, flickering green of their  eyes burning as if lit from behind by twin candles.  

it’s all so strange.  You should be blind with terror.  Just as every muscle in your body tenses to flee, they gently take your hand bending into a deep, courtly bow. You have no idea how to respond.  You feel so strange, so stupidly slow.  “Maybe a dream?” you whisper under your breath.

Unhurriedly, gracefully, the otherworldly and inconceivably beautiful creature rises and in a sudden startling movement strikes the riding crop that had been tucked into a boot across the top of their thigh in a deafening crack.  The wolves cease to howl.  And you.  You freeze in place as though you were made of stone.

You do not have any precedent for this in your short, boring life.  You’re a peasant not even a score of years under your tunic.  You have no courtly manners.  You’ve never even stood in the presence of a noble at a distance.  Yet here you are, standing in front of this creature of unsurpassing luxury as good as nude in your threadbare, drenched white nightshirt and stuck on the spot  like a rabbit surrounded by the huntsmen’s’  dogs.  You have never been so afraid, so curious, so inexplicably drawn to such a terrifying creature

As you stand locked in place by those mesmerizing, flickering emerald eyes framed by long dark lashes and lustrously pearlescent skin, a smile languidly parts its generous, pillowy lips.

”My, but what big strange teeth you have” you think nonsensically.  And faster than you realized was possible, the creature’s mouth is at your throat, long, sharp teeth barely grazing your skin.  Its arms are wrapped gently around you as you hadn’t realized you have swooned.  The night is dreamy.  The stars swirl with color, the pack of wolves weaves around your strange embrace gently whimpering like puppies.  

the beautiful, monstrous creature presses it’s lips to your ear and so gently, so quietly croons the following song like a lullaby as it’s pointed teeth brush your earlobes:
 
Make up your mind
Decide to walk with me
Around the lake tonight
By my side
I'm not gonna lie
I'll not be a gentleman
Behind the boathouse
I'll show you my dark secret
I'm not gonna lie
I want you for mine
My blushing bride
My lover, be my lover, yeah
Don't be afraid
I didn't mean to scare you
So help me, Jesus
I can promise you
You'll stay as beautiful
With dark hair
And soft skin, forever
Forever
Make up your mind
And I'll promise you
I will treat you well
My sweet angel
So help me, Jesus
Give it up to me
Do you wanna be
My angel?
Give it up to me
Do you wanna be
My angel?
So help me Jesus.

I dont think of myself as a floral perfume person.  I associate florals with “high femme” style, which i decidedly am not even when i wear dresses and makeup and paint my nails.  “Girly” has never been a word people use to describe me.

But honestly, that’s such a silly, narrow view.  Masculine people can smell wonderful in florals and some very typical masculine coded fragrances are formulated with florals like lavender and neroli, and others.

I like the other notes- cream, amber, teak- but was unfamiliar with lotus, so i was prepared to pass on this scent.

However, rave review after rave review after rave review convinced me to give it a shot.

In the bottle it was kind of non-descript.  Nothing special, but not offensive.

Dabbed some on today and it really is just lovely.

It stays close to the skin.  It’s fresh without being too clean.  A “your skin, but better” kind of scent.  It’s very soft, but i wouldnt describe it as “girly” in spire of the pretty whisper of floral.

I’m always going the be a gritty incense person and a lover of the butteriest and fruitiest gourmands, and a zippy zesty citrus sniffer.  But sometimes you don’t want to smell like a funeral dirge, or a dessert buffet, or an exhilarating squirt of lemon juice to the eye.

Sometimes you want to smell like a fluffy, cloud, soft as a warm bunny.  The palest peachy pink cupped by delicate blue lavender shadow. 

Sometimes you don’t want your sillage trailing behind you in a heady miasma for the entire world to smell.  Sometimes upu want to keep it between you and the one who embraces you just the way you like and gently lays their head on your shoulder, nuzzling your neck.

Glowing Vulva of Ryogoku is that moment.  Not femme, but the fluffiest cloud of baby bunny warm fur nectar drizzled sweetness.  For Softfolk when the world could stand to be a little fuzzier around the edges.

Rich, melty, milky, chocolate with smooth warm musk.

it reminds me of another “Chocolate and…” but I can’t remember which one. I’ll try to edit if I remember.  But where that other one was raspy and sharp edged, Chocolate Musk is smooth, round, friendly, and gloopy in the best way.

i can’t pinpoint the exact musk, but it’s not white musk, black musk, not red musk, or Siberian musk.  My best guess is brown?  It’s a very nuzzle your face in a friendly cat’s belly fur or snuggle up with your soft puppy kind of musk.

There’s not a lot to expound on here.  What you see is what you get.  But oh how they come together.  So seemingly simple, but a perfectly balanced marriage of two of my most favorite notes.

if you like chocolate and you like musk, RUN, don’t walk.  It’s back-up worthy.

Imagine an Edwardian ball, glittering candlelight illuminating everything in a warm, flickering orange glow, bouncing reflections from silvered mirrors, ornate gilt frames, uncountable cut crystals dripping from the chandeliers, the jewels twined through ladies’ hair, dangling from ears, draped around necks.

Two young ladies catch one another’s eye, one swathed in a thorny neroli gown, the other in a candied champaca gown.  They have a secret no one can know.  The love that dares not say its name.  The attraction undeniable, drawn to one another like the moths to the flickering candles.  

The dance begins.  A ballroom full of handsome people in their finest, swirls and dips around the room.  The men in deep gray frankincense and warm brown amber; the ladies in a multitudinous shimmering rainbow.  As the dance intricately weaves around the room, exchanging partners in the various lively steps, our lovers remain locked in one another’s gaze, whether temporarily wrapped in each other’s embrace or on the opposite side of the room with a “perfectly acceptable” gentleman.  Each time they come back together is a silken vanilla sigh that feels both like coming home and like the thrill of first kiss.

Join the dance.

You know how people say to skin test EVERYTHING?

Well, Hearth has 2 of my absolute death notes, leather and tobacco.  They *never* work for me.  
 

But I thought this sounded so cozy and took a chance.  
 

And it works.  I can’t pick out individual notes aside from smoke, but it all blends together in a sweet, warm halo with the most beautiful salty smoke.  It is such a “human” scent.

I wish my memories were as nice as the images this scent evokes.

It is safety, comfort, and warmth in a bottle.  It is the feeling of being small and having someone strong, loving, and safe protect you from a cold, cruel world.

The smoke clings to my coats and sweaters for days reminding me that there are people in the world who love me and wish me well and who would keep me from harm.  
 

Thank you Elizabeth for this embrace in scent form.  This reminder of our duty to guard fragility and innocence and make the world a softer, more sheltering place for those with tender hearts.

This is so much better than I hoped for and I had high hopes.

It’s hard to describe and difficult to tease out individual notes aside from the clove, but to my nose, the order they appear follows the order of the description.

Clove can be an overpowering note for me, but this is delicately wispy tendrils of clove smoke woven into a lover’s sweater.

In fact, the whole scent is like snuggling into a new lover’s “borrowed” sweater you both know you’ll never return. You can’t bring yourself to wash it because it smells like them and you gather the cloth to your nose to inhale their scent when you have to be apart.  It’s soft and comforting, but also seductive and flirtatious.  Truly gender non-conforming and steeped in longing, as any good art referencing Goth culture should be.  Also surprisingly and seriously sophisticated given the label art and scent notes.

Middle notes have the feeling of vanilla- that cozy, enveloping sweetness- without any actual vanilla.  I’m totally spitballing, but maybe labdanum or benzoin with wine-stewed plum flesh?  Some kind of deep, warmly resinous sweetness.

It’s floral adjacent without being ~floral~ Soft rounded notes of Nag Champa Incense made of Golden Champaca Flower and resins with a pleasantly astringent spritz of Aquanet barely peeking through to bookend the dry clove, both serving to embrace and contain the pillowy clouds of smoky, velvety sweetness.

I predict this is going to be a classic and I’ll need more than one back-up. Definitely a new favorite and a much needed soft place to land today.

Sniffed from the bottle, this smells exclusively and EXACTLY like Belvita Breakfast Biscuits, which are one of my favorite quick and easy breakfasts, but absolutely not what I want to smell like all day long.  
 

Honestly, I was kind of thinking WTF, Elizabeth!?!  Is this another Day Old Ham or Rapidly Solidifying Mashed Potatoes?  Gore-Shock or Pruno?  WHO WOULD LIKE THIS? Then my son bravely dabbed on a drop and I thought “okay, it’s not as bad as I thought, but still not for me”.  I came so close to putting it in my swap pile without ever skin testing it.

Boy would that have been a HUGE mistake.

In seconds, the oaty biscuit note drops way, way into the background.  I really can’t even pick it out as an individual note anymore.

What emerges is a dark wildflower honey with unctuous floral notes and chewy bits of comb poured over a devastatingly expensive, melted, fruity-floral, single origin chocolate lightly sprinkled witb digestive biscuit crumb dust all wrapped up in a snuggly, warm musk with just a seductive little wink of something funky- primal and pleasantly mammalian.  Not stinky, but deliciously dirty.  

This is so unexpectedly wonderful.  And is yet another data point in favor of my Never Judge A BPAL Until You Skin Test It hypothesis.

I cannot belief how different this smells from bottle to skin warmed.

If you like honey notes, RUN! Don’t walk.  And don’t judge it until you try it.

I should have bought 1,000 of these.  My kingdom for a lifetime of warm, oozy, melted chocolate over raspy Snake Oil.

The chocolate notes brought out the musk and patchouli in the Snake Oil.

it was a wholly different experience than Boomslang.  
 

Boomslang is smooth, sleek, put-together.  A city predator in a bespoke, tailored suit.

Mega-sized Chocolate Bar is a hot, mess, bad idea who’ll might wreck your life, but will leave you melted on the sheets.

Sweet, smooth cedar with warm vanilla.  I don’t really get an evergreen note.  
 

I agree that it’s like Tombstone without the sassafras.  A little smoother, less raspy.

Since recovering from Covid, I sometimes have trouble with blackberry notes, but when they’re right, they’re oh so right.

I put this one aside for quite some time, but it jumped into my hand tonight, so I dabbed it on.

Top note of ghostly, ethereal ylang ylang over middle notes of thick, syrupy blackberry wine, with an undercurrent of dirty patchouli, a tangled thread of distant cedar smoke, and something blacker than black hiding in the shadows.  The notes don’t blend so much as float over one another in murky layers. 
 

Distinctly eerie.  A child lost in the woods at night.  A disembodied face peering through a dark window.  A pale blue butterfly delicately sipping tears from the sightless eyes of a corpse.

Moody.  Dangerously dark.  A little sadistic.  Terribly vain. 

Oh yes.  Salty, savory, creamy skin scent.  A touch of sweetness swirling through layer upon layer of thick, warm cream.

Oh guys.  This is so delicious.

This is the scent of a honey-dripping hive, rich and intimate with bee musk, almost salty.  It’s no pale, flower-scented, tame honey.  It’s the dark honey of wild honeybees.  Floating on top is a zesty, pleasantly bitter orange, barely sweet and a swirl of heady orange blossom like it has blown in on a breeze.

COCOA AND CUBEB IS SO FLIPPING GOOD.

I love both and it’s even better than I imagined. It’s pretty straightforward, no hidden notes.  What you see is what you get.

The cocoa portion smells very brownie-like.  Almost a dead ringer for Lump of Coal or Chad.  In other words, a hyper sweet, fudgy chocolate or hot cocoa with marshmallow kind of scent.  Addictively foody, liquid and sticky (artistically sticky, not actually physically sticky).

Cubeb has a pleasantly dusty scent that’s mostly bright lemon zest with a hit of warm black pepper.  I am assuming that this is Piper cubeba or Long-tailed pepper that’s used in some Indian Masala chai blends and has a sweet spice type flavor like allspice.  It could also be Litsea cubeba or May Chang, but I am assuming it’s the first.

These combine to make something like a chocolate covered lemon drop.  Or chocolate cake with tart lemon glaze.  It does carry a bit of that musty dusty undercurrent and pinch of warmth from the cubeb.  It’s a delightfully weird little combo and I love it.

Oh guys.  This is so beautiful.  My nose is very stuffy right now, so I will do a full review later, but it’s a gorgeous Palo Santo heavy resin.  It is instantly calming.  

It’s a sweet, fruity, green floral.  It’s almost impossible to pick out individual notes, but you can definitely pick up on each category- summer fruits, heady florals, and clean musks.  This is the closest to a commercial fragrance house I’ve ever smelled from BPAL, although it is mostly top and middle notes without base notes.  It’s like eating a cool juicy melon on a hot day and having the sticky juice drip down your chin.

Shockingly pretty!!

This is a perfect springtime fragrance. Very soft and green in a damp, misty kind of way. Fresh and verdant and just a bit earthy.

Aside from the cool, powdery fern, the notes meld together into a harmonious and happy whole and I really can't pick one from another.

I do get the occasional whiff of a resinous lavender floating around in the air, but I can't pick it up when I smell my skin.

The scent does skew floral which makes it lean toward the feminine side of Unisex. It brings to mind a fresh faced Swede with blonde milkmaid braids and ruddy cheeks.

While this isn't my usual scent style, I could see reaching for this during the Winter and early Spring when I'm longing for those first few green buds.

Oh my! This is lovely! It has aged amazingly well.

This is one of those "never say never" scents. I haven't had success with pomegranate, but it lends a dark, juicy undertone to what is otherwise a somewhat masculine, outdoorsy scent. The other "never" is Fossilized Amber, which I was not find of as an essential oil. But it is a standout in this blend and I enjoy it here immensely. It adds a luscious dry mustiness.

The soaring beauty in this, though, is the balsam. It is absolutely magical. It is both the light and the shadow of the forest. Sunshine, green leaves and fir needles and evergreen sap and mouldering leaves.

And while I am usually not a fan of alcohol based perfumes, the alcohol in this makes the scent swirl around me in a heady cloud and that seems less personal scent and more mobile personal atmosphere.

I so wish this were a regular scent because I could smell like this for ages.

Patchouli is definitely the dominant note in this blend. And I have an iffy relationship with patchouli.

In this case, I find the patchouli amps like crazy when wet, swirling around my head in an oily kind of cloud. Just as I think I have overdone it... Poof! The patch settles down and the other notes begin to emerge.

Dry, it is still patchouli dominant, but the pine-tinged balsam resin and slightly sour, rich, leathery Oude fence it in and hold it closer to the skin.

Vanilla absolute has a surprisingly woodsy character and, while I can't pick it out individually, likely smooths the raspier edges and helps everything blend.

I also can't pick out Champaca as a single note, which makes me a little sad as its a favorite. However, there's a kicky little exclamation point on the end, a little fruity and resinous, that could be Champaca.

I haven't a clue what pepperwood smells like, but there is a strong woody flavor to the whole blend and I wouldn't be surprised to find that the pepperwood adds a wee hint of sour oakyness.

Taken as a whole, this is an assertive, DARK scent that skews masculine. It smells EXPENSIVE and rich and calls to mind sweet, musky, well-worn suede and moon dappled, dry leaves on the forest floor.

Thanks Wren12 for giving me the chance to try this!!

This one morphs like crazy! As others have said, it starts off with a sharp, but sweet fresh cut grass note that is absolutely gorgeous.

Riding on its heels is an effervescent candied sweetness with a whiff of menthol and something resinous. It's a brighter resin, maybe myrrh?

Up next is a bubbly, boozy, slosh of honeyed beer!

It finally settles into smooshed grass with a hint of upturned earth; gooey, sticky remains of 1000 candied apples and cotton candies; and wafting over all, sweet, effervescent spilled beer.

Unbelievable!

I thought about doing a second round seed swap, but I also have no time. Not to mention, I now have over 100 varieties of seeds. I need to get rid of seeds, but need more seeds like I need more holes in my head.

If anyone would like to do a second round for folks who didn't get started so early, please be my guest!!

Several months ago, I managed to nab a few precious drops of a Snake Oil Chaos Theory with Heliotrope as the primary mixer. Thus began my current love affair with all things Heliotrope.

Bpal's berry scents can be really problematic for as I tend to amp them like whoa and they often turn very waxy and artificial smelling like bad scented candles. But I've had a run of good luck with some cherry scents lately and Strawberry is usually pretty good, so I wanted to give HB a try.

So glad that I did. While this is not a dupe of my beloved Chaos Theory, it does have the same dark, resinous vanilla, incense-y musk, and uplifting, golden heliotrope.

The strawberry is more of a head shop strawberry incense than a -real- strawberry, as those tend to smell a little sour even when dead ripe. This is sweeter and richer.

The cherry blends with the strawberry giving it a bit of dark juiciness.

The amber and vanilla drift up to meet the fruity berries, giving the blend the most gorgeous resinous bottom note. Its a rich, warm, sticky amber with less of the dry, powdery notes that don't work so well for me with a creamy, lush vanilla that stays surprisingly subtle.

The red musk NAILS this to my skin. It does not budge for HOURS. However, it also increases the throw by quite a lot. Just a few drops on my skin can fill an entire room with scent. That's wonderful when I'm alone, but I don't like to impose my scent on others against their will so I've got to be careful how much I apply.

Laid over this whole wonderful melange is a haze of golden heliotrope. It makes the scent so much rounder and more complex. And it mellows the red musk, adding an air of innocence and playfulness to the blatant sexuality.

I'll most definitely be buying a bottle of this scent. Love love love it.

While the Lab's chocolate notes are to die for, Cherry is a bit problematic for me and Orange Blossom can either be lovely and fresh or a little screech-y. But lately, I've had a run of good luck with scents including cherry so I wanted to give this a try.

Big fat cherries, restroom air freshener and burnt hair. wtf.

I have never had the lab's chocolate note go so very very wrong. And it seems that berries and I don't often play well together. I amp them like whoa and they tend to smell very artificial and waxy like very bad scented candles. Boo.

I'm in a terribly pissy mood right now and I thought this might soothe my ragged edges, but apparently not.

I'm willing to give this another shot since I've never had the experience of a BPAL going so horribly wrong on my skin, but my hopes aren't high, what with the cherry ampage.

One thing to consider if you choose is that some essential oils and alcohol based scents are not allowed to be sent by mail. Some of these have flash points that are low enough that the Post Office considers them to be hazardous materials. I would assume that if you received it by USPS and not Fed-ex or UPS, it would be fine to ship by mail as long as you know the seller to be reputable in this respect.

I'm probably just being paranoid, but the post office rules do state that if you ship undeclared or banned hazardous materials and those materials cause damage to anything for any reason, the sender is liable for the damages.

Just sayin'.

The star jasmine and musk have always made me write off Vasilissa, but I got to test it as part of a traveling imp box and was surprised to find it very very lovely and soft.

While I can somewhat pick out individual notes in this, the components blend so well together that the impression is more of a unified whole rather than a collection of notes. If that makes sense.

The musks lend this blend the most luscious creamy almost coconut milk quality, while Star Jasmine swirls gently through the background adding a delicate sheen of humid tropical sweetness. The sandalwood and myrrh ground the more airy notes and give a smooth warm depth. And amber surrounds the whole with a hazy cloud of golden light.

I usually prefer my blends a little grittier and a whole lot less delicate, but under the right circumstance I could see myself dabbing on a bit of Vasilissa.

It would make a great first date scent... feminine and innocent with a hint of unconscious sexuality.

Floral lovers will find enough breezy flowers to love while those on the fence about florals will not be overwhelmed by the Jasmine.

Definitely worth a try. A lovely GC find!

oh. my. god. This is so good.

For several years, we had these decrepit old White Pines in our front yard that towered menacingly over our house. The sap got all over EVERYTHING. My car, 3+ years later, still has spots of sap on it. The Dogs would get it in their fur, and god forbid you tried to sit in the courtyard under the pines. You'd most certainly get pine sap on your clothes and it never washes out. I hated those trees. But I loved the way the sap smelled. So gooey and resinous. Crisp and refreshing, joyous and comforting all at once. This is ~that~ pine. A little astringent, in a very very good way.

Surrounding the pine is the ambergris, a luxurious cloud of sweet, golden light.

I cannot actually pick out juniper or cypress in particular and suspect that they add a good measure of complexity to the pine.

Unfortunately, that gorgeous pine and ambergris combo fades quickly and the black musk begins to dominate. To be fair, the black musk does evoke a certain inescapable, inevitable darkness. The shadowy, dangerous part of the forest where wolves lurk and curious children vanish.

Black Forest calls to mind the sense of both elation and fear that being alone and small in a very large, very wild place brings.

So glad this is GC!