tajana

This perfume is complex. The night-blooming florals in Medea give me a headache when I huff them up-close. It's herbal and leafy, but in a poisonous way. The juicy black currant seems similarly sinister, there's a creepy wateriness to this scent, and the poppy (one of my nemeseses!) lends its trademark oppressive smoke. This smells positively evil and witchy. Appropriate for its namesake, but not something I can enjoy wearing! The throw is dark and floral. After some time passes this goes to currant-sweetened night flowers over cypress and myrrh.

I've never tried a scent with dragon's blood (as a listed note, anyway) so I was pleased that the lab frimped me with an Ars Draconis scent! Unfortunately, I'm not left with a very good understanding of what dragon's blood resin smells like, and the other notes here simply don't play nicely on my skin! The ylang ylang is ferociously loud, and the opium poppy (never a good note on me) gives this blend an oppressively smoky quality. There's s vaguely creamy undertone that feels misplaced, and the overall impression is too sweet. It's got wicked throw, but it's just too much of the wrong kind of flowers for me.

This is fantastic for the first half hour or so. Sage and lavender, with a citrus twist, laid over a base of dusky sandalwood and vetiver, with just a breath of ecclesiastical frankincense. Gorgeous. Resinous, cleanly herbal, almost spicy, in a chilled way: its sweet enough on my skin that I'd classify it as unisex rather than masculine. "Thin, dark, and shadowed" indeed. I was surprised by how much I loved it, but after some time passed the complexity faded away and I was left with vague powder. Tragic! On my boyfriend, it just disappeared.

I'm about to send this imp on its merry way, but I had saved a review of it. Wet, it smells really delicious: yellow vanilla cake with syrupy, tart currants slathered and piled on top. The fruitiness is the star player for a little while, but then the cakey vanilla takes over. It's not too sweet. It's at once powdery and buttery. When it sits on my skin for a while, though, it stops being delicious and starts being a sickly vanilla with a sour edge. Not for me. It might work well in a locket, but I personally don't want to smell like a human cupcake. I'm glad I got to sniff it, though, and I can see why it's so well loved!

Berries! I got a LOT of berries out of this, significantly more than I was hoping for. There's just a bit of booze and sharp leather at the edges, but start to finish this is predominantly fruity on me. I think I can catch a whiff of paper bag if I look for it. After it dries down the tart berries soften and sweeten up, and the fig gets more prominent, which does a lot to make this feel a little more nuanced. The creaminess is subtle, the edge off the leather chills out, the cognac isn't a major player, and the end result is a light and fresh berry cologne. Not much throw, but decent lasting power. It's not bad, but it's not the rich, debauched scent I was looking for.

A scrumptious blend of spices! The first day I put this on the brown sugar went a bit funky on me but since then it's behaved well, adding a lovely sweetness to the deep, rich spiciness. It is delicious but dry. This is a spice fiend's dream! The ginger is wonderfully prominent, with a fair dose of nutmeg and allspice most immediately noticeable after that, and the tonka replaces brown sugar as the primary sweetening agent after about an hour of wear. Not much anise, which is fine by me, as I don't care for that note! There isn't much dark chocolate here but I've got plenty of other scents to go to if I'm feeling like chocolate. I like this better than Shub, it has a more unique, complex, and intriguing blend of bakery spices (probably thanks to the strongly rooty/herbal undertones), and it doesn't do the buttery cookie or powdery resin thing that Shub does to me on a bad day. (Then again, I've only worn 13 three times, all within the past week!) ETA: This has aged very well so far, I'm very glad I have a bottle of this gem. It's gotten more potent, and the smoky, dark, herbal rooty scent really came into its own, and it's better integrated with the blend of spice and brown sugar. It's gotten smoother, but, thankfully for me, not sweeter. Weirdly enough, after hours and hours of wear... over eight... the only thing left is a hint of dark chocolate. Strange that it's the only survivor after being virtually nonexistent before.

Fresh from the lab, Bruised Violet Compound was full of tart and juicy currants, so I let the imp sit for a while. The bright currants calmed down: they're still here but they're darker and less noisy, just adding a fruity overtone that fades out after an hour or two. Now this scent strikes me as simultaneously dark and clean, it reminds me of a forest at the brink of a graveyard: lots of wet, clean, green moss (this note is really dominating the blend, start to finish), complemented by deep patchouli and sprinkled liberally with velvety violets. Freshly washed but gothy.

*Squeal* I love it! Fresh on the skin it's delightful, juicy tart grapefruit: like those awesome, sour grapefruit gummy candies encrusted in a bit of sugar. And ginger! There's candied ginger here to make the zingy grapefruit even more delightful. There's a fresh note that must be aloe, because it smells the way that a cut open piece of aloe looks. As it dries down, the brilliantly bright edge wears off and the smoky vanilla softens it up without overpowering anything else. All those notes, mixed in with whatever else I didn't mention, dance around atop a bundle of fresh, light woods. The only bad thing about HGM is that it doesn't have a whole ton of lasting power. That, and it would be a little tricky for me to find more of it. Even though grapefruitesque citrus is the only thing they have in common, it reminds me a bit of Aizen-Myoo, so even when my decant of Hungry Ghost Moon runs out, I will somehow survive the spring and summer months. ETA: Does it remind me a bit of Aizen-Myoo? Yeah, but the resemblance is passing, the dry-downs are completely different. I didn't realize how much I'd NEED HGM until the weather warmed up. I've never tried another BPAL like it. It's light and wonderful and all-around delightful, and the lasting power is actually pretty good the more I've worn it... it settles down close to my skin after a while, but I actually get hours of goodness out of it. Really lovely, I hope that that Beth serves up another scent with a ginger candy note sometime soon.

Juniper most prominently, with a piney feel: I'm initially reminded of Thanatopsis, another forest scent that's also heavy on the juniper. Loup Garou has a bite of cold eucalyptus to set it aparts, and tons of dark cypress. If the description didn't say 'galangal', I wouldn't have known. With all the deep green forest, the eucalyptus comes off as the chill of a winter night, and it stays as a low-level presence for a long while. (Unlike in Jabberwocky, where the eucalyptus is really prominent but ephemeral.) Very clean scent. Would make a better room fragrance than personal perfume, in my opinion.

I had to try this because, well, rocks! I'm an aspiring earth scientist. There is a quality that's strangely reminiscent of dusty stone here, which I really got a kick out of. But that is probably only because I'm thinking of the name as I sniff it. It's a soft vanilla, hardened, the top layers crushed to dusty powder and a hint of vague, delicate and pale florals. After a while I'm thinking of vanilla body spray and baby powder, not of minerals.

In the bottle, this smells delicious. Like the most delicious hot cocoa in the world! On my skin, though te cinnamon-sugar edge to the hot cocoa flattens out a bit. The coffee comes out more strongly and the delicious hot cocoa aspect is diminished. As awesome as this is to smell in the bottle, I don't like smelling like a walking mug of a delicious drink. I'm tempted to keep my lil' partial bottle just to sniff it, but the last time I sniffed it I gobbled up more than a few dark chocolate cookies! Oops.

Sweet, bright fruit at first, almost candy-like... I thought of apples and pineapple, lots of canned pineapple syrup. After a minute on the skin lots of other notes come out to play. Flowers, accompanied by a twinge of something that is indeed "cologney" are the first to appear... lilies, I think, and other flowers in the same scent family. There are some herbs mixed in there too to give the vaguest medicinal twist, which is just about the only witchy, Baba Yaga-esque thing I can feel in this scent. When it's dry, I get mostly canned fruit syrup, mashed up with heady florals (the kind that aaalmost give me a headache), overlying some herbal/green notes and light musk. Strange but interesting!

I thought this could be my signature scent. Tea, spices, and patchouli! But with such high expectations, of course Clémence let me down. She's not bad by any means, but it wasn't the orgasmic experience I was predicting from the listed notes. This is mostly black tea with a hint of citrus, like maybe the tea's got a bergamot element. There's nothing milky or creamy about this, so I don't think of chai. But there are certainly spices, they're just strangely demure... cloves, mainly, with a bit of crushed black pepper, soft carnation, a subtle dash of cardamom. The patchouli acts as a base, but doesn't really take charge. It's a simple scent, and the coolness of the tea balances the spices to make this an all-weather scent rather than one suited specifically to any one season. Nice, but I don't think I'll be needing more than my decant... not that the decant itself will last me for a particularly long time, as I need to slather this one a bit.

I snagged a partial bottle of this off the forum, 'cause I'm having a major love affair with chocolate scents. Yep, this is definitely a bottle you have to roll around before applying to mix up the cocoa with the rest of it. Wulric seems really striking to me, it's really different from anything else I've tried. The chocolate is deep and dark, and it's spiked heavily with sharp, wild, herbaceous notes, lots of sage and lavender. There's a hint of charred, burnt wood here that gets stronger as the chocolate note gets subtler. The notes are all on an even level, the chocolate-vanilla is there but it doesn't take over, it's well blended with the smoky burnt, earthy wood and herbal notes. The sharpness of the lavender and sage calms down after a while, and the musky base is more apparent. This perfume is definitely fitting for a wolfman, somehow! I find myself reaching for Wulric often: I'm contemplating buying a full bottle at some point. It smells really unique, I love it more with each wear. I tried this on my boyfriend, and it's significantly chocolatier on him.

I definitely get the Snake Charmer comparison (not so much Snake Oil), but this is smokier and fruitier than Snake Oil. Patchouli leaf is very prominent. There's a dark, juicy red feel from the pomegranate. Mme. Moriarty is a bit sharp, raw and a touch herbaceous. That aspect gets smoothed over by the other notes later, but the patchouli is wonderful, and definitely more prominent than the musk. It's very smoky, which is definitely the key word for this scent. Not like burnt black smoke, but the fragrant smoke of the best incense you've never smelled before. It dries down and that dense and dark smokiness is infused with lots of vanilla and dark red/purple fruit. It has good lasting power and throw. It's strong and it is dramatic, and also definitely not a summer perfume, as it's heavy enough to be cloying in the heat. I really liked this when I first tried it, but since then I've sort of... fallen out of love... I swapped away a back up bottle I got, and I'll probably swap away the bottle I have now, too. It might be a skin chemistry thing, as sometimes it just smells sharp-powdery, like the fruit is going a bit too noisy and the vanilla just isn't sitting well, but I think it's also a taste preference thing.

I Boomslang! When I tried Snake Oil, I wasn't really blown away or anything. It was nice and wearable, but it wasn't amazing... I figured it needed some aging to get good. But Boomslang... Boomslang was divine fresh from the lab. Rich, dark, delicious chocolate with a delightful twinge of delicate white rice milk (I love rice milk!), spiced with Snake Oil goodness. When it dries down the rice milk disappears and I get a lovely hint of wood that really meshes well with the Snake Oil. The chocolate tones down with wear... the initial burst of dark and rich chocolate melds into the spiced dark vanilla patchouli-musk-magic of Snake Oil, elevating it to a new level of decadence. The medicinal twinge of fresh Snake Oil smells great here, gives it an almost tea-like touch that gives this even more character. The extra notes are working some real magic here, because it never gets powdery like regular Snake Oil does on me. The lasting power is superb, the throw is just right. It feels like a more complete Snake Oil to me. It's warm and comforting, but still a touch sensual. I love it! Edit: I often go back and reevaluate scents after my initial glee, don't I? Well Boomslang is one of those scents I really have to be in the mood for. The first hour or so of wear is great, its sensual and decadent, like I said. But Boomslang has major lasting power, and after the complexity evaporates I'm left with a whole lot of chocolate and vanilla... delicious, but I feel strangely displeased, almost nauseated, after I've spent hour after hour smelling of almost straight-up vanilla and chocolate. I think I'll keep the decant I have, but I can't see myself using up a whole bottle.

Wet, it's a delicious blast of rich cardamom... makes me crave some kheer or some chai. The most cardamom-heavy perfume I've ever tried. As it dries around, it gets, most appropriately, wierder. It's a mix of very dry and very, very creamy. There's sweet golden hay and wood, over ridiculously creamy base spiced intensely with cardamom, along with other notes I simply can't identify... a bit herbal/medicinal. Really fascinating. It's not something I want to smell like, but it IS something I like to smell, if you can understand where I'm coming from. I wondered whether or not to keep my imp, but after about an hour on my skin the hay really took over... the other notes were still there, but there was just too much hay. I tried it twice, and Bezoar developed the same way both times.

When I first dabbed some on I got a ton of frankincense, which surprised me for a moment: I forgot about the frankincense! I was thinking all about the patchouli and sandalwood. But this was oodles of frankincense, with patchouli and sandalwood rolling around in the background. Now, frankincense usually strikes me as churchy when it's very dominant, but it isn't here. The earthy patchouli and dry, strong woodsiness of the red sandalwood tone it down in equal parts, and as the scent dries and wears for a while the three listed notes blend together. Unfortunately, the end result doesn't have enough pizazz to keep me interested. I love some good sandalwood, incense, and patchouli, but this smells a little too straightforward, almost crass, in a piratey sort of way.

This is really nice when it's wet: clean bright coconut, reined in by some musk and light incense. As it dries down the incense peeks out, and the overall effect is nice and furry. But in less than an hour, I was left with nothing but a powdery coconutty musk... not the best musk, either. It smells awfully similar to a note I got in Devil's Night that went strangely foody and almost rancid on me. I'll stick with Goblin for my coconut fix.

Uruk was hearbreaking on me... all nasty jasmine! Salomé, too. Uh, the same thing happened to me with Salome and Uruk! It was terrible. The other notes sounded good, and I expected almondy goodness, but got nothing but jasmine. That said, on *me* Eclipse turns out to be close to the skin but surprisingly almondy for ages... last week I dabbed some on at after breakfast, and when I offered my wrist to my boyfriend to sniff late in the evening... I was wearing a completely different scent further up my forearm that I had applied much more recently, but he immediately said I smelled almondy with a bit of cinammon and incense!

Wet, it's beeswax, like a just-starting-to-melt candle, strongly scented with light orange blossom honey and a faint drizzle of olive oil. The olive oil note adds an unexpected twist, it keeps the fragrance spare and elegant in its simplicity, but keeps it from being too straightforward or unsophisticated. I can almost see the flickering candlelight and feel the warmth of the tiny flames. While it's a nicely done scent, in its early stages it doesn't really grab me as deeply as I expected: I think I've simply come to realize now that I don't really like smelling like honey. When it dries down, it's delicate and beautiful: bright creamy beewsax and a curl of smoke. Earlier on the beeswax seemed to be coated and floating in honey, but by the drydown it smells like an expensive candle, sparingly scented, with another candle somewhere in the distance just blown out. At the beginning and the end (a few hours later) there is very little throw and it's close to the skin, but the area in the middle, when it's drying down and settling and morphing, is when the throw is actually quite strong. It's a beautiful scent, but I'm not sure about how often I'll wear it... I feel like I would have been better off with a decant than with a bottle. This would be the ultimate scent for someone who wants to smell like a pure candle, or like beeswax. EDIT: I'm so glad I clung to this one instead of hastily swapping or selling it away. I tried it again and it's just gorgeous. The excessive honeyed sweetness that bothered me last time is gone... Hanerot Halalu dries down to this amazingly pretty orange-flavored beeswax, evoking the warm glow of a candle. Close to the skin and appropriately natural smelling. Light and lovely, appropriate for almost all weather. Awesome awesome! Proof that if a scent doesn't quite seem 100% right the first time, you should revisit it a little later before making a final judgment. I LOVE this so much.

I was excited to try this. It sounded great! Woodsmoke, ginger, autumn "night", a bit of sugar? Sign me up! But on me... a tiny dab turned into... a roaring Halloween night barbecue. Greasy breakfast sausages (well, perhaps not sausages, but something about this smells like food to me, and I mean savory food, not cake/candy), transplanted to an autumnal campground, drizzled with maple syrup and a HEFTY dose of caramelized sugar, roasting over the smoky open flame. The woodsmoke note would be beautiful if it wasn't for the fact that it was melding with that disconcerting food smell. A bit of lovely ginger and spice is detectable inside the swirls of caramelized sugar, giving me the impression of lots of candy, and there are crunchy leaves being stepped on near the fire. There's a splash of cheap booze, which completes the rowdy backyard Halloween party imagery I'm getting in my head but doesn't help this smell any prettier. I guess the "thuggish" musk may be going berserk on me? Who knows! I suspect that if I had tried this in a locket I would be all over Devil's Night, but since my skin is hellbent on ruining it I'm hoping to find it a more appreciative home!

I was excited to try this scent because it sounded similar to my beloved Intrigue (black palm [reads as coconut to me], cocoa, fig, and woods). Eden has some similarities, but even the shared notes express themselves differently. It smells bad (kind of funky, really strong) in the vial, but on the skin, at least at first, it gets better. It's figgier, creamier, and sweeter than Intrigue. Lovely almonds, sweetened with a bit of soft honey (a softer and more delicately applied version of the honey I get in White Rabbit) are most prominent near the beginning, but after a while it's just a general honey-sweetened, milky/creamy coconut. The impression of color I get from that is a creamy beige rather than a clean white sort of cream, and it's drizzled all over a bunch of sweet figs, served on a bed of fig leaves. The fig leaf not is subtle but it is a distinctive sort of green note, and I catch little whiffs of it now and then. But... I do not get much woodsiness out of this... the sandalwood acts as a grounding note rather than as a central element. Unfortunately this goes kind of gross, cloying, and sour BO-ish after a while.

Anubis is pure, strong golden honey for a while. The strongest honey scent I've ever smelled, as soon as I opened the imp I felt like the whole vicinity smelled like honey. When it dries down the honey is blended with a bit of smoky myrrh and herbs. Not foody at all.

This was a lab frimp. I tried it right after I tried Gluttony (another frimp) and was struck by the similarity. Grog is really candy-like too, but it's just pure BUTTERSCOTCH, flavored with coconut and drowned in buckets of rum. Stays really constant and incredibly sweet and STRONG for about an hour before losing intensity. It changes from rum-flavored candy to rum, rum, rum, alcohol and all. All in all, it's too sweet and simple for me.