Reedsong

The Lovers is the strangest BPAL I've ever tried. I've received three imps of this in the past. The first one was a dead-on ringer for gin and tonic. The second was a strong, soapy lilac, and the third and most recent, a sweet, spicy berry with boozy overtones, the nicest of them all. Maybe it represents the fact that love is confusing?

I wish I knew what notes were in this so that I could buy up every BPAL scent with them. Val Sans Retour is wonderful and is one of my favourite BPALs ever. It's sweet, fresh grass, very green, with a hint of lovely flowers lingering in the background. It's exactly as I would imagine a tempting, beautiful forest clearing would be, and it's perfect for its name/legend. My only complaint is that it lasts only about fifteen minutes on my skin, thirty minutes at most if I use unscented hand lotion first. I love this fragrance so much and wish it would stick around for me to enjoy longer, especially since I'm down to a half-imp! If the Lab ever releases this one, I'm in line for a bottle - and judging from some of the other reviews, I'll take their bottles, too.

Wrath and White Rabbit, eh? So what we have is basically Enraged Bunny Musk, the Remix? This should be interesting, as I liked Wrath for its piquant scent and hated White Rabbit's "wet rodent" bouquet... ...aaaaaand, that's exactly what I get from this blend. Fiery, spicy wet rodent. This is a rather unhappy rabbit that's been dipped into some root beer and then dried off with a cinnamon-scented hand towel. Worse, it's taking on this weird powdery/chemical-y quality! It's strong! It has throw! Auuuugh! It's everything I could want in a perfume: colourful, funny, has great staying power, would make a good conversation starter - except it smells just awful on me! A suggestion for the BPTP: Black Phoenix get-this-off-of-me hand soap, for scents that your skin morphs into hellish hazes of non-delight.

I'm getting bamboo and eucalyptus at the beginning, and the impression both in the imp and on initial application is sharp, watery, and dank. There's a bit of woodiness, too, maybe spruce. The image is of being lured into a tunnel by a dark, scary VapoRub pusher who whispers, "Pssst - you need mentholatum, I got what yer lookin' for..." As it dries down, the "New Shimmer is a perfume, AND a home disinfectant!" antiseptic quality fades, and what's left reminds me not of dark tunnels, but of the crisp, woodsy mountaintop air from my family's vacations in Tennessee! Reading all of the "dank stone" reviews, I wasn't sure I would like this one, but it's a definite winner - a very distinctive and pensive sort of blend.

The red musk and the magnolia combine into a fresh, almost fruity quality, softened by gardenia. It's good for about five minutes, until that fruity sweetness starts to combine with a strange creamy note, and not in a good way. My hand is starting to smell like honeydew melon dipped in caramel - which smells about as odd as it would probably taste. I'm wondering if there's dragon's blood in here, as The Unheavenly City has that same sickly-sweet quality that every single Ars Draconis blend has on my skin. Awwww. I had high hopes for this one, but looks like it's not going to work.

This is a screamingly sharp, very soapy white floral at first, and fortunately loses the obnoxious soapiness as it dries down. I get star jasmine from this, perhaps white rose and a tiny bit of orange blossom as well, with a little bit of green like a fresh-cut stem. This is so lovely, and I wish it lasted longer on my skin. Sweet, beautiful, very soft. Edit: Trying this again some months later, I think I know what I'm smelling here: gardenia, and...could it be? My darling beloved tuberose?! I actually have a tuberose bouquet for comparison, and I'm pretty certain that's what I'm getting. How marvelous!

I'm reading all of the other reviews making comparisons to Closet, Gluttony, Sugar Cookie, and even yes, crumpets, but on me, this scent is very much like Treat #2, except it's sort of a blackberry-sugar bonbon rather than anything chocolate. It's quite strong, has amazing throw, and I'm very glad to have an imp because I know it will last me for a long time; a little goes a long way! Edit: Holy toledo. It dries down more, and suddenly it is indeed a buttered crumpet with blackberry jam! How did they do that?! Dammit, I want breakfast now...

I love BPAL amber in the bottle, but my skin usually turns it into baby powder, so even with its rarity I was hesitant to try this one; eventually curiosity won. I mean, come on - it's Ded! And Moroz! It starts with that soft mint that edenssixthday describes so well, like a cool forest wind, and then softens into a light, only slightly powdery (woo!), resinous amber. This scent brings up good memories for me, because it reminds me of an old curio or antique shop full of old woods and dusty knick-knacks. My grandmother had a small antique shop, and I'm reminded of that and her when I smell this. It's a warm, kindly, sweet scent, very appropriate for its name, and I too hope the component issues are resolved one day. I wouldn't often feel like wearing this fragrance, but would keep at least an imp around for those days when I was feeling...you know...moroz.

At first, the orange goes psychotic and makes me smell like that awful fake orange punch that groceries sell in the dairy case - you know, the stuff that's right by the orange juice, but obviously shares nothing in common with an orange-fruit except the colour? Anyway, for about ten minutes I smell like a kid's dream come true, and then (WHEW!) the evil fruit fades. What's left: the exact blend I hoped for, ambergris and civet! I smell musky, a little powdery, very masculine and almost animalistic. This is marvelous, and I'm so thrilled to have an imp of it that I could just dance around like a little kid with a glass of...um...not orange punch. Edit: And then...fruit punch Kool-Aid. It goes into this very bizarre cherry dry-down that makes me want to scrub my wrists. I almost want to cry at the disappointment. How could two of my favourite notes betray me so?!

Pulse Points makes me think of a deep, lascivious, pouting plum hue; it's an extremely sophisticated, mature scent, almost too posh and brooding for me to get away with wearing. Clearly, these are evil pulse points being anointed here. This is a pulse that quickens only slightly as its owner kills people. Pulses that quicken a lot more as everyone in the vicinity gets evilly seduced and then has their wallets rifled. Obviously, I really love this scent. I look like a librarian, so it takes something extraordinary to make me feel dangerously sexy; Pulse Points is it. I'm going to treasure this imp, and hunt down more if I can. (Hey, here's where the 'wallet rifling' above could come in handy... )

My nickname for this scent is "Crème de Smex." In the bottle, it's indeed forest, herbs, and sweet air, but on my skin it goes to a dark, creamy musk. It actually gets stronger on my skin, radiating all around me (so that occasionally I get lovely whiffs), and just smells so appealing and sensual in a very primal way. To me, this is as much an aphrodisiac as TAL Flame of Desire, and I don't wear it very often because it's awfully distracting! Love, love, love Buck Moon. (No, not like that. )

Spoooooooooky! I purchased a half-bottle of this from The Great Pru, Provider of Spooky, and I treasure it. It's very strange because I normally hate chocolate and mint together. I scoff at green ice cream with black bits in it; I never order Thin Mint Girl Scout cookies; I don't brush my teeth and then drink hot chocolate, so why the hell do I like Spooky?? But it's so awesome - nice rummy buttery chocolate-y minty decadence on my wrists. It has decent throw and fades rather gracefully into a thin chocolate vapour. This is my comfort scent; I usually reach for Spooky when I'm having a really bad day, and it almost never fails to make me smile. Because...you know...it's Spooooooky, and there are very few things that cannot be cured by the Vaunted Spooktacular One. SPOOOOOOOOOKY!

I got to try this out from a friend who submitted to the Inquisition, and I wanted to steal her bottle. Trick 2 is deep, dark resin, a smoky perfume, like burning pine branches outdoors on a fall night. It's sexy yet woodsy; if Druids made aphrodesiacs, this would be their best-selling blend. What an awesome scent.

Oh, White Moon. Thy idea beauteous, thy shirt design exquisite, thy description perfect. But I receivéd the bottle, sank to my knees, and cried, "Oh, my gods, why hast thou forsaken me?!?" For yea, verily, it smelleth familiar and soapy, and not the cleanliness of the angels but something more sinister... But I did open my mind and heart, and applied the White to my wrists, radiant with hope that skin chemistry would purge the soapy revulsion from mine nostrils. Then, a familiar fragrance did surround me, and I knew it at once for mine enemy: Toilet Duck. Out, foul fiend! Out of mine sanctuary! Thou shalt not join my imp box to pollute my other scents with thy washrooméd quackery! Alas, White Moon hath failed me, or perhaps it was I who failéd the White.

In the imp, this smelled like bubble gum, and I was immediately wary. On my skin, though, it transformed into the exact description: flowers and sugared incense, and it's lovely. I expected to like this one the best of the CDs, and it's lived up to my expectations.

Okay, okay. Normally my reviews are kooky, but I'll try to play this one straight since this imp of CTIII: DCCCL (850) traveled all the way from England and the loving hands of Colere to be with me today. Imp: In the imp, I smell butter, cream, cake, ginger, and - I hate to say it - vanilla. It smells sweet and inviting, like a warm kitchen full of baking smells, like a less biting Shub. Skin: The cream and ginger are the two predominant notes, and something slightly deeper is starting to emerge. It's not quite a musk or patchouli, but something that reminds me of that "dark" feeling... Skin +10: The ginger is almost completely gone, and now only a hint of the butter and cream. The main fragrance now is something flat by comparison, and woody. It's not sweet enough to be sandalwood, but more like pencil shavings or a fresh-cut log. Creamy wood? Huh? Skin +15: Still a bit of the butter and cream. The 'cream' is going more flat, and I'm wondering if there's actually some beeswax in this. A tree with a beehive in it. Skin +20: This stays very close to my skin and is almost completely gone. Still a beeswax-wood with a tiny bit of the spice lingering. (However, you have to keep in mind that my skin is bizarre and managed to transform Carceri d'Invenzione (rosewood/tobacco), for example, into tuberose.) I like this, but I'm not heartbroken to pass it on; I'd have to really slather to get any kind of staying power from it. Still very glad I got to try it!

Thirteen is the shortest enablement turnaround I've ever experienced. Let's review the sequence of events: Thursday: Receive sniffy. Apply to skin. Am instantly surrounded by rich white chocolate with just enough of a touch of mandarin to keep it interesting, just delicious and wonderful. Sniffy now completely empty. Crap. Friday: Look for bottle. Must have bottle. Ah! Bottle located! Send PM. Saturday: Receive reply. Buy bottle. Well. That was quick. If you look in my box, you'll see clearly that the last thing I need is another bottle. But that's what Thirteen did to me!! I think it represents the number to which my IQ fell while I was sniffing it. Rich pale chocolate-y goodness. Mmmmmm. Thirteen.

It's hard to pick out individual notes here; the florals work so well together that the overall impression is of a mildly sweet, rich scent. The scent starts off wispy, almost nonexistent, but deepens and develops on dry-down, with a light throw. I definitely get stargazer lily and peach blossom, and I think even a bit of the beeswax and vanilla bean! It's so refined, and...well, the description says it. There's a distinct 'love' energy to this one, if that makes any sense, a shy and lovely feeling in wearing it. This is so perfect to the verse and the concept that I'm stunned - and thrilled to have a whole bottle!

This is a dark, wet lily, perfume-y and languorously sweet. It's like someone took a regular lily and coated the petals with despair and angst. Oddly enough, though, it lasts for about ten minutes on my skin before getting eaten. I can only surmise that Black Lily has osmosed into my bloodstream and is now transporting fragrance through my entire body. Cool.

This is such a lovely honey - golden, mildly sweet, very warm and 'intimate.' It's not at all cloying, as I would afraid it would be. I understand now why I've loved all of the Lab's blends that include honey! What a wonderful scent. There really isn't much more to say - I can't exactly wax rhapsodic about the nuances of a single note. "Honey single note - there are distinct shades of lemon and petunia!" Uh... no.

With all due respect to the Master of Lightning...ewwwww. In the imp, this is a very intriguing scent; I can actually smell each different note of the ofrenda listed, and I was excited to try it. Typically, though, my fruit-hating skin chemistry took over, and once the oil hit my wrists, it morphed from "interesting mixture of different offeratory elements" to "overripe bananas, overripe pineapple, and sickly coconut." I wish this smelled half as good on me as it did in the vial!

Smelled the imp. Watermelon. Applied it to my skin. Watermelon. Dry-down. Watermelon. Dammit. I smell like a pre-teen girl's lip gloss. It's a pretty safe bet that sweet fruit blends will hate me, and this one's no exception, I'm afraid.

When I apply this, it dries down to kind of a musky sweet cinnamon, very sexy and appealing, with a short wear length and average throw. Then I went and read the description. There's no cinnamon in this. And after reading the description, I can smell the listed notes more distinctly, particularly the amber and rosewood - but how on earth did I get cinnamon out of this? I've always said that my nose is dumb enough to be confused by Blue Cheese SN. I now have my proof, with this imp of Golden Priapus. Still, since it's TEH SMEX, I don't really care what's in it!

"HELLO!" screams this blend on my skin. "I AM A LARGE PERFUME-Y ORCHID!! DID YOU SMELL THAT? NO?! *WAFT WAFT WAFT* HOW ABOUT NOW??" So..yeah. My skin amps this one just a tad. It's good for when I'm jogging and want to be enveloped in a haze of scent that will help me forget how much it hurts to jog. This is a dark, perfume-y floral, and is almost exactly how I expected the blend to smell, from the name. I'm pleased that my imp is going to last forever because I only need a little bit.

Flame of Desire is my absolute favourite TAL. I love everything about it. In texture, it's thick and viscous; in colour, a perfect deep mahogany; the scent is such a wonderful dark, musky civet, very sexy and powerful. When I use it alone, Flame of Desire helps put me in a desirous mindset, and I mean this in a very general sense. It reminds me of my deepest dreams, the things I keep hidden and might otherwise ignore. With a partner, it does exactly as the name implies: kindles a passionate flame, intensifies desire, and the wonderful fragrance certainly doesn't hurt. In fact, my only regret is that Flame isn't available as a general BPAL scent; I'd wear it all the time if it were!!