invisible iris

 

 

In the bottle: Very woodsy, piney (but in a tar pitch way, not pine-sol at all) and really deep black woodsy. I can smell the charred black sandalwood.

 

Wet on skin: Immediately a resiny sweetness comes through from in the midst of all the deep, dark, smoky woods. The nutmeg isn’t overwhelming, but subtle, and so is the chamomile.

 

Dry: Woods, smoky pine and cypress, with the edge slightly curbed by resiny frankincense and styrax sweetness, with an overall darkly ceremonial vibe. Something almost makes me think there’s vetiver in here, but if there is, it's got a light touch. I like the overall scent and it’s not overbearing. But it’s the scent of being lost and horrified, in the middle of a chill autumn night, in an evergreen forest with a bonfire burning somewhere and dark magicks brewing. It’s a nature-y kind of scent, no cologne vibe at all, but realistic and wild and darkly intense. I smell like a scary forest. It lasts a long time and throws heavily.

 

Verdict: It’s very evocative, and wonderful for a cold spooky night. Almost veers into masculine territory, but remains a woodsy, un-gendered sort of scent. I’m pleased with my bottle purchase.

In the imp: This smells sort of like sweet honeyed gardenia or tuberose to me, with a touch of resiny spice.

 

On skin: Pretty much the same as in the imp. The tuberose or gardenia is still there, and possibly there’s also honeysuckle, but the floral component is kept from being too heady by the sort of spicy honeyed copal scent.

 

Dry: Mellow honeyed floral and copal, with a touch of spice, or something similar. A languid, luxurious sort of scent, sweet and sticky and nightimey. A little like smelling cinnamon honey next to a cluster of tuberose.

 

Verdict: Not as repellent to me as florals often can be, this is on the dark sticky side of heady floral. Still not for me, but in my opinion it’s one of the nicer white floral bpal blends I’ve tried.

In the imp: Strong bitter, strong sweet! The herbs give it a medicinal quality, and the sweet fruits lay low in the imp.

 

Wet: Some sort of cypress or juniper is what I get when it’s first applied, still very antiseptic. This antiseptic quality doesn’t really go away as it dries, but it gets more dried out and ashen.

 

Dry: Gomorrah is a really strange scent, to my nose. It is quite burnt and ashen smelling, really like a burnt bundle of herbs, and then the syrupy sweet of fig and date sort of squeezes out the edges of the scent. The longer it sits on my skin, the more the syrupy sweet fig pushes the bitter ashy herbs aside, which makes sense because I tend to amp fig. After an hour or so, it’s settled into a slightly burnt FIG.

 

Verdict: Weird, not entirely unpleasant, evocative scent, but still too much syrupy fig for me.

In the imp: Dusty dry clovey cinnamonny orange with mayyyybe a hint of peach.

 

On skin: Still clovey and cinnamonny fruits, and the candy-like peach starts to come out on my skin. I’m getting a bit of a red hots, craft-store-fall-spice-candle kind of scent.

 

Dry: It’s not quite so generic once it’s dried down, but now it smells like a nicer fall-spice candle. A warm and comforting scent. All the listed notes come through for me, clove, cinnamon, orange, peach, with the earthy patch and incenses in the background. The peach I think makes it veer slightly into too-sweet, slightly artificial-smelling territory for me.

 

Verdict: Not what I’m looking for, on my skin it's too much a run-of-the-mill spice candle fall/christmas scent.

The first thing that came to my mind was Nosferatu (desiccated herbs and gritty earth brought to life with a swell of robust and sanguineous red wines).

 

I don't know if it's supposed to smell like blood, or if my experience is common, but to me Nosferatu smells nauseatingly bloody, like iron-rich blood, but with a definite fermented (or rotting) sweetness to it. The scent actually reminds me of

Something about the combination of the mineral-rich dirt note plus the color cue of the red wines, maybe? Obviously, your mileage may vary.

In the imp: Sweet, spicy, resiny darkness. It’s hard to describe. It smells like oozing resins in a dark seaside cave.

 

On skin: The seaweed gets saltier for a moment, and it reminds me of men’s shower soap, but the tobacco and clove come out too, and then the peppers, which counter the aquatic-leaning seaweed. The more it dries, the more assertive the myrrh and opoponax become, and the more the seaweed mellows.

 

Dry: Predominantly tobacco, and peppery clove with sweet resins. Some darkness comes from the peppers, but it also has a sticky sweetness from the opoponax and tobacco that dominates the bitter elements. There’s some note at work that I don’t care for, and I’m guessing it’s the seaweed (or possibly mandrake), that makes it smell just a little wrong, kind of herbal or salty or chemically. The word narrow comes to mind, a narrow scent, but I realize that’s not very helpful at all.

 

Verdict: I thought I would really like Ekhidna, but in the end I think it’s just okay. I’ll keep my imp for a while and give it a few more tests, but right now it’s not for me.

In the imp: Lemony ambery, with the slightly effervescent scent of black musk. I love golden amber, and black musk often works for me, and I hope to love this blend. But BTBT went horribly powdery on my skin, so if, as they say, this is the same black musk note, then I’m in trouble here.

On skin: It’s sharply resiny, I agree with the reviewer above who said lemon pledge. The effervescent quality of black musk has died a bit, but I think it may be going to powder.. yes, especially in the throw, I’m starting to get that harsh, empty, flat, nihilistic powder note.

Dry: Lemon pledge baby powder, and now I understand what it means for a scent to smell like a diaper. Not a dirty diaper, but a fresh, chemically, plasticky powdery diaper. Brings me back to the babysitting days of my youth. Yuck-o.

Verdict: A skin chemistry fail from a blend I really liked the sound of. Ah well, there are other BPAL fish in the sea (er, the G-sea ). I think I’ve done my due diligence and it's time to go shower.

(eta scent description)

In the imp: Weirdly effervescent (lime?) piney vanilla with dark stuff lurking. It smells kind of like 7-up spilled on a forest floor of pine needles.

 

On skin: The vanilla is immediately more prominent and smooths out some of the effervescent quality, but there’s still a strong pine component. Earthy notes emerge more, and I smell almond, but it’s basically merged with the vanilla and pine and adding to a cookie-smell. It’s like an almond cookie smashed into the (now dried up and sticky) 7-up-soaked pine needles. Weird, some combination of notes here is giving my nose a sassafras accord.. or that might just be the vanilla note going a bit plasticky and reminding me of Tombstone.

 

Dry: Almond/vanilla with a hint of clove and pine (reminds me of Pickled Imp), and hardly any influence left from the patchouli/vetiver that could have saved this from being too cookie! for me. And plasticky. It turns my stomach a bit.

 

Verdict: I’ll keep the imp on hand in case it improves with age, but for now I don’t like it. Sad, because all of these notes (except vetiver) are theoretical winners and I had high hopes for the blend.

In the bottle: Cocoa and strong, harsh wood with a hint of bitter mandarin and galangal, and I detect the salty masculinity of sage. Straight away this reminds me of Atlas, and also Wulric, both of which were ruined for me by an implacable vetiver. I have high hopes that this will work much better.

 

On skin: On skin this is immediately gentler than in the bottle. I get softer woods with dry cocoa, faint tonka, and a mysterious matcha note. With a deepening, folding-inward influence from sage and galangal. It is already an interesting and well-blended whole, and everything just converges to become smoother and softer as it dries.

 

Dry: Softly, gently harsh woods, smooth bitter warm galangal/mandarin, a hint of salt-watery sage, and a dry sweetness from cocoa/tonka/matcha. Complex and blended so that each time your nose recognizes one note, it’s carried along smoothly to another counter-note, and this happens again and again, so that you want to keep inhaling the scent because it’s almost like your nose is being led along by a melody. The components here are diverse, and most aren’t what I’d call pretty. But the whole here is greater than the sum, and the way the notes play off of each other in their differences is… apt. When I think of the inspiration for the blend, and that it is for RAINN, it makes sense. Out of bitter and dry parts, to grow something that is full of life and beautiful.

 

Verdict: Holy moly, this is a crazy success. I love it. How does Beth do this? Tree of Life is amazing, heart-breaking lovely. I think it goes on my short list of ‘anytime’ scents, elegant and mysterious but also powerful & comforting.

Oh how I've grown to love my bottle of Half Elf v5. At first sniff, it's sweet honey with a hint of something I hesitate to identify as creamy floral because I don't find it unpleasant at all. Very quickly the scent settles to become sweet, fresh honey, maybe with some tonka or vanilla?, and what I'm almost certain is oud. The scent of the oud is faintly woody but also slightly musky, creamy, even a little musty. It adds a chewy depth that I can't get enough of, in fact I think I am obsessed with that oud note. Or whatever it is in reality.

 

So, an interesting, subtle, natural-foresty-loamy honey blend that I think would be perfect for, say, a half-elf maiden with a creamy moon-shaped face, hair all tangly from being wild in the woods or some such. It's on the light side, so I find myself slathering whenever I wear it, which gives it plenty of strength and throw. I haven't tested the released version, but I kind of wish that this wasn't just a prototype.

Game of thrones:

 

Cersei: Hellcat

Jaime: Sin

Jon Snow: Black Forest

Dany: Dragon Blood

Tyrion: no, not Imp. He wears Sed Non Satiata

Catelyn: Prurience

 

I'll think of the others later.

ooh fun.

 

Ned Stark: Highwayman

Catelyn: Whoso List to Hunt

Jon Snow: The Black Rider

Arya: Anne Bonny

Sansa: The Lady of Shalott

Joffrey: Whitechapel

Cersei: Hunger

Jaime: The Bow & Crown of Conquest

Tyrion: Perversion or Wilde

Littlefinger: Envy

The Spider: Viola

Drogo: Wild Men of Jezirat al Tennyn

Danaerys: Dragon's Milk

Viserys: Wrath, or The Sea Foams Blood

 

Now all I want to do is curl up and read...

The first time I tested Eat Me was from a lab-fresh imp. It started off buttery, then turned to delicious currant & cake, and then turned to powdery powdered sugar. It wasn't bad, but it wasn't very interesting. So I said meh and forgot about it.

 

A couple weeks later, I read some suggestions that there was red musk in Eat Me. And red musk, which , always does better on me with (at least) a couple weeks of age. So I thought hm, and tested Eat Me again. With much better and more delicious results.

 

On skin: It still starts off extremely buttery cake, and while wet it remains rather buttery, more like scones than cake, with a schmear of red currant jam.

 

Dry: As it dries, the buttery note burns away to naught, leaving vanilla cake with a hint of red currant combined with the addictive sweetness of a tiny bit of red musk. Not many fruit notes work for my skin/nose, so I cherish them when they do, and the currant here definitely works for me, not cloyingly fruity just red faintly tart-sweet. The overall scent still has a barely powdery texture, but it doesn't overwhelm the cake. So, vanilla cake with a hint of red currant & musk. While it is a delicious blend, I would not ultimately call it foody, especially the scent that throws. The red musk holds it back from foody. It still says "eat me," but more in a figurative sense, you know, like "eat me."

 

Verdict: Yes. Bottle ordered.

In the vial: This smells like cologney peanut butter. Weird!

 

On skin: A little less peanut butter and more cologne. I *think* the peanut butter is coming from vetiver, strangely enough. And what I’m calling “cologne” might be a combination of olibanum and ashes? I dunno. As it dries down, the black mosses become more and more prominent. (Peanut butter completely disappears!) The whole scent really mellows.

 

Dry: Dry black moss on scorched ashes with an underlying earthy sweetness. I can detect the vetiver, especially in the earlier stages Elli’s Song has a small amount of the deep black green sickly sweetness that I get in other vetiver blends, but here it’s massively dried out and held under control by the ashes & moss. The overall scent is dessicated and empty in a gentle and resigned sort of way. Like the smell of the fireplace the morning after you’ve had a fire, with moss. Or a bonfire in the woods the misty morning after. I find it oddly comforting, earthy and damp, and there's a nihilistic, organic purity here. It does an amazing job with the concept. It has excellent (& not too heavy) throw.

 

Verdict: Beautiful in its own way and irresistibly haunting. I'm shocked at how I love Elli's Song, considering I was about to write off vetiver as a note of doom. The scent has gotten even better with repetition and as I've adjust my expectations to what it offers. (I love it when I feel like a BPAL blend is educating me, and this is one of those times.) Over a couple weeks of testing, it's gone from an intrigued “maybe” to a definite bottle purchase with my next order.

Hmm. I ordered my black moons on 6/30, and it took them a while, and at some point I emailed customer service and they said there was a backorder on Luna Negra, and that was causing the delay. So I know at least at one point they were having delay issues with it.

 

But then I got my CnS last Monday (the 25th), and it arrived on Wednesday. So I think you're right to email the lab and make sure.

A tester from Mellifluous.

 

In the vial: Like a white musk cologne. Some kind of wood (oak or teak? or maybe dried leaves), and a chemically note, like white musk or white metal and leather (reminds me a little of Palladin, actually).

 

On skin: Cologney wood and leather, but again with a light aura of chemically white musk. As it dries more of a sweet vanilla/tonka comes out, and the hint of leather stays. The wood mellows or even disappears as this dries, or blends with the leather. After some time the leather mellows significantly too, and blends in with the light musk, which is still chemically and astringent.

 

Dry: I get notes of tonka and maybe tobacco or a hint of sarsparilla (something brownly herbal and softly creamy, and something that makes it chewy, like almond milk?), and then either dried leaves or teak, a small amount of leather, I think there's oakmoss, and white musk. I read it as a masculine white musk blend (with a tonka/oakmoss fougere but no lavender). The longer it’s dry, the more the harsher notes (dried leaves/teak, leather, white musk) mellow down and the sweet brown creamy chewyness of the tonka becomes dominant.

 

Verdict: I haven't tested ASL, Celeste, or Elf v4, so I can't speak to those comparisons. At first I was going to say that Phyllocrania Paradoxa v1 is like a chewy brown Paladin, but as it dries It becomes more like The Organ Grinder with tonka and white musk. So, like a cross between Palladin and The Organ Grinder. It’s nice in the late dry stage. I wouldn’t seek it out, because I find the white musk (esp. when combined with the hypothetical dried leaves or leather note) to cause a chemically irritation in the back of my throat (I have a similar problem with both Palladin and 51). I was glad to have a chance to try it though.

In the imp: An interesting mossy and warm rose, you can tell there’s more than just rose going on here, like the musk and amber are ready to burst out and take control.

 

On skin: Rose with a sweet but organic brown woody resiny musky atmosphere around it. In this context, the amber and musk combination reads almost as caramel or treacle, but definitely as furry and warm.

 

Dry: Fresh, subdued rose juxtaposed with a cloud of brown foresty furry warmth. Not overly woody, but wood softly adds to the warm brown notes cushioning and contrasting with rose. It’s on the sweet side of floral/resin but not in an especially heady or headache-inducing way. I still get an odd almost treacle-like sweetness, which is probably coming from the somewhat unusual warm/cool combination of amber and rose. The brown musk does a good job of evoking the wild body-feel of the hind (I don’t detect a leather/suede note). When I sniff close to my wrist it smells ever so slightly musty, but further away the overall scent is much nicer.

 

Verdict: I usually dislike wearing rose, so I wasn't expecting to love Whoso List to Hunt. I don't love it, and I won't be getting a bottle. Still, this is probably the most pleasant rose and the most successful rose/resin blend that I’ve yet come across. It strikes me as a good rose scent for those who don’t often like rose.

I was a bit saddened to find there weren't many suggestions for Dumbledore, who is my favorite character. No. 93 Engine is, so far, my favorite blend for him, but I'd love to try more. Anyone have any other ideas for Dumbledore? ETA: I love that Aureus was recommended for him, too, because it's such a sexy scent to me, and I've always said that I would be all over a younger Dumbledore, despite his proclivities.

Hm.. It's hard to argue with No. 93 Engine, but I like the idea of Philologus for Dumbledore too. It suits his warmer, more serious moments, I think.

 

eta: Plus, on a man? I can report that Philologus is very nice.

In the bottle: Frankincense, palm fronds, and river reeds.

 

On skin: I’m getting similar notes as from the bottle. Frankincense, olibanum, river reeds, and palm frond. Shortly the orris appears, adding a violet-like slither---that has the potential to ruin Meskhenet for me if it takes over.

 

Dry: When sniffing close to my wrist I get frankincense/olibanum (can’t really distinguish the two), palm frond, river reeds, and orris, in that order. But the throw loses some of the frankincense and is therefore surprisingly light and mild, consisting mostly of palm frond and river reeds (it actually reminds me of how hearts of palm taste, almost salty in an odd but good way). Thankfully the orris is tame, and I never detect any real floral, so no hibiscus or hyssop (unless hyssop is an herbal blending with the other plant notes).

 

While not aquatic, this is an organic take on "clean". It’s mild, ever so faintly milk-soapy, refreshing, but also vital and calming (not energizing), with a lingering date-like sweetness (this is how frankincense usually develops on my skin, and I find it wrist-huffingly pleasant). The blend smells vegetal but also arid, the interior milky sap of a desert plant accompanied by sweet frankincense.

 

Verdict: Organic and pure. Meskhenet is nothing like what I expected, but I’m glad I got a bottle before the CD went dark because I really enjoy it. Especially nice to wear after a shower or bath and definitely work-friendly.

In the vial: A somewhat darker, woodsier Snake Oil, including a stronger (black) musk and a bit of cocoa.

 

On skin: Cocoa Snake Oil with hints of the woods, I’m also getting juniper berry I think that makes it slightly medicinal and sharp to my nose. This is an incredibly complex blend.

 

Dry: I get red musk slightly more than black musk, but black musk is there being heady and dark. Black musk is sometimes more than my headache-prone self can handle, but here it’s okay. Also chocolate (with an extreeeemely faint breath of peppermint), and a bit of vanilla, but their sweetness is being pulled aggressively back down into the murky musky furry depths by the complex darkness of all these middle notes. Sandalwood is the most recognizable for me, but something also smells like tar or pitch, which I think must be juniperberry or ferntop ash resin or a combination of the two. And patchouli is roiling down in there too, adding an earthy warmth to the deep wood/tar. The flowers are way under control or maybe overpowered by these other darker notes.

 

WILF to me smells like an extremely moody SO. I find WILF more pleasing and wearable than Wulric, as it doesn’t have the death-note of vetiver, but in a similar dark furry vein. All in all it’s a powerful, moody, animalistic blend.

 

Verdict: I like WILF. The one problem I have with it is that it is a lot of work for my nose… which has been lazy, of late, and often it doesn’t want to deal with this kind of olfactory complexity, and it would rather wear something simple and reliably pleasurable like Snake Oil. So even though I was excited to try it, I kind of doubt I'll be springing for a bottle.

 

ETA: Nope, nevermind! I love it and a bottle it is!

In the vial: Rancid fizzy white chocolate. This is really unpleasant so far. *ahem* I get what Midnight Aeval means.

 

On skin: Same as in the vial. It seems like it’s trying to be gin and white chocolate, but it smells like rotten fakey chemically white chocolate to me.

 

Dry: Okay, this is much better dry than it was wet. But I still don’t like it. It’s like white chocolate with a side of herbal mouthwash. Or juniper, I guess. It’s very sweet and white-chocolatey in its throw, but also kind of curdled and weird. It smells like a white chocolate Easter bunny with a hangover. My nose alternates between thinking “mm, creamy!” and feeling queasy. Admittedly, it does soften significantly over the next hour.

 

Verdict: Easter bunny analogy aside, I believe this faithfully replicates the smell of a white chocolate martini. I guess I just don’t want to smell like a white chocolate martini. D’oh.

This is the 2010 version with no apple.

 

In the Bottle: Musk and cognac, so potent and heady that it's difficult to distinguish notes, sweetened slightly with vanilla. At first I worry that it’ll give me a headache, but it doesn't.

 

On skin: I get a cream cotton note--the cotton is more of a texture for me, not a "clean linen" note--with darker incensey/musky/tobacco swirling around behind it… and a boozy, brain-tickling cognac. It’s still very “bam,” heady and woozy in this stage.

 

Dry: Prominent notes of tobbaco and boozy cognac, with sweet cottony vanilla and an unobtrusive but haunting musk. The headyness has really calmed at this point. For a while I thought it had faded down to a relatively light scent because it didn't seem intense when I put my nose close to my wrist. But then I realized that my skin was giving off huge wafts of dramatic but at the same time delicate throw. The cream cotton has a definite feminine and almost velvety texture. I agree that this scent is more aloof than Red Lace, Black Lace is elegant and buttoned-up, high-waisted or corseted sensuality. Victorian gothic in style, a scent that makes me feel underdressed and in the wrong context, like instead of sitting at home I should be at a dimly-lit salon where somebody is solving a murder mystery.

 

Verdict: I don’t know how often I’ll wear this, as it’s got a more formal vibe than I normally go for. But I think it's lovely and I’ll be glad to have my bottle for special occasions.

Banshee Beat is so amazing, simple, and basic, that I've put off writing a review because I have no idea where to start.

 

In the bottle, freshly applied, and dry: It is a straightforward blend, it does not morph. It smells like patchouli, black vanilla, and hemp. It's one of those blends where the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. The fibrous quality of the hemp in combination with the deep and complex patchouli makes the overall scent like sticking your nose into a freshly-split, moist, sticky, and earthy vanilla bean. It's amazing, beautiful, sweet and black and earthy and sexy and prescription-strength comfortable.

 

Verdict: I die for Banshee Beat every single time I put it on. It is without a doubt the single most nose-pleasureful blend I've yet tried. I stashed over ten bottles, thinking that would give me a few extra to swap or whatever. But in all seriousness, I don't know if I'll ever be able to part with any of them. I want Banshee Beat forever, and I'd like whatever I don't use please to be entombed with my dead body for use in the afterlife.

 

And just to imagine how good it will be when it ages!!!

In the bottle: Minty, with a hint of bergamot and tea.

 

On skin: The vanilla of the snake oil is immediately evident, and it goes really well with the bitter orangey bergamot. There’s still a fairly minty green tea present, as well. Oh my, I love this. It’s fresh, cool, and deep, and a great blend for warm weather.

 

Dry: The mint is still there, with hints of bergamot and a leafy, matcha-like green tea note, so that the whole top of this blend is cool, green, and refreshing. The SO, as the blend’s base, contrasts so effectively with the cool top notes, that this scent almost defies logic. It is green and cool, and simultaneously deep and vanillic. I find it to be the BPAL equivalent of green tea ice cream, but with a hint of SO spice.

 

Verdict: Another variation on SO that, while substantially different from the original, works extremely well. Green tea vanilla coolness. Green Tree Viper is amazing and I love it.

In the bottle: Intensely hot cassia and red ginger. It’s a very red- and dry-smelling heat.

 

On skin: Still hot cassia and red ginger, but now cinnamon joins the fray and a hint of SO emerges. I feel a faint burn where I applied this, on my inner elbow, but it doesn’t last.

 

Dry: The spices have mellowed some, but not much. Saw-Scaled Viper is for serious spice lovers only. I get a very dry almost woody spice, you can sense the ground bark texture of the cassia and cinnamon. Cassia and red ginger are most prominent, with cinnamon in close third. It's a very heated and heating blend--it seems even to have an ayurvedic-like heating effect. (I’m testing this on my left arm, and Green Tree Viper on my right, and going between the two is like going between red hot fire and green leafy ice). Snake Oil fits right in as a base to these spicy top notes, as would be expected, but its vanillic sweetness is only barely detectable under the bitterly hot spices. Much later in the drydown (6 hours), it’s still going strong but the SO comes out more, and the effect is ground cinnamon/ginger spiced SO. Impressive throw, long lasting.

 

Verdict: Saw-Scaled Viper isn’t messing around. This is the spice blend I’ve been looking for. It’s spicier, hotter, and longer-lasting than the other cinnamon/ginger blends I’ve tested in the GC, and doesn't have any foody sweetness. It's amazing and I love it.

Spoiler for possible TMI.

 

In the vial: Hay, treesap, hemp, almond blossom, rice milk… this smells really good.

 

On skin: It smells like a summertime romp in the hay. It’s hay and rice milk, grainy and sweet.

 

Dry: I don’t find Brood XIX foody. Even so, a part of it does recall cereal, oatmeal, or creamy grains. I’m guessing that’s the acorn and rice milk. The rice milkyness is much nicer than regular milk/cream blends I’ve tried. It seems less artificial, less blatantly gourmand, and less prone to unpleasant (powdery/rancid) shifts. The creamy grain scent is prominent and delicious, but it’s reined in from edibility by other players. The hemp note, for one, is stunning. I don’t know how to describe it but I recognize it from BB and Rogue, its sort of grassy/woody/fibrous and it pulls the blend back from being edible so that instead it’s earthy and warm. There’s a green note detectable too, which must be corn stalks or tree sap. As a result there’s just enough plant matter, living and dried, to evoke a lazy day on a farm. And the amber gives it a hypnotically fuzzy haloe, which is conceptually apropos, given that Brood XIX was unyieldingly hypnotic to the point of ecstasy or distraction. There’s something idyllic and pleasure-promising about the blend that echoes the feel of surrendering to the intense sound and atmosphere of the cicada brood.

 

Verdict: It’s hazy and lazy with farm-sweet notes that are comforting and absorbing while being earthy and nature-y. This is a definite 5ml purchase for me, and backups are possibly in the works.. although I might want to respect the natural rarity of the cicada emergence by letting Brood XIX be a single beloved bottle.

 

ETA Revised Verdict: I've worn Brood XIX solo now a couple of times, and both times I'm sad to say I've found it less appealing than it was when I was just testing it. I can't say that it smells any different, but my reaction to it has been different I think, I've found it not comforting but weird, cloying, and slightly sickening. Maybe it's a scent that I enjoyed sniffing, but not one that I want to smell like. So I actually don't think I'll be getting a bottle. Which makes me sad, but it's okay because there are other bottles on my list...