ImperatrixMundi

The heaviest myrrh so far, like a very high quality pure myrrh resin with undertones of vetivert. Like you are half asleep in a darkened room chokingly full of burning myrrh, it is warm and dark and you just cant seem to get up.

Now this is spot on for Greed.

Just like the description says it is very earthy with flashes of gold here and there. Somehow the golden impression comes and goes while sniffing and this is like digging through the dirt for gold coins, slipping in the mud and getting dirty all over but the coins twinkle in the dirt and slip through your fingers. And as soon as you find one an other becons to you and there must be on other and an other and an other...

My dislike for intensly foody scents goes way back to the beginning of my BPAL addiction when I was frimped some of this. While that was very kind it is not for me. Nutty caramel and SWEET SWEET SWEET, so sweet it makes me very sick. Now the lab has "blessed" me with a frimp of this again in my most recent order and my dislike is still as strong. May someone else get happy with this

This is heavy pine at first and while I like pine in general this is one pine scent where I get the pine cleaner association. On drydown the pine fades fast and I am left with a dirty musk that reminds me of Czernobog and is the only type of musk I intensly dislike.
On my boyfriend Czernobog was actually bearable and he also wanted to keep this because he loves any type of pine. I guess it is ok on him but when he put it on and some of it gets on me I have to rush and wash it off. And this does not wash off willingly at all I tell you.

Hello violet. This is the usual GC violet note surrounded by more typical florals. While I can pick out the lilac too I have never smelled tuberose alone so I have no idea what it is like.

 

This is an other very dominant violet blend and where Ultraviolet is cold violets and The Raven is sweet and dark this is a floral variation. But not my favorite I have to say. I love violets and a few other floral notes like citrus blossoms or apricot blossom or iris but this is too typically floral and sort of sharp to my nose.

Huh? Was this not supposed to be floral??

Alright, I get a very soft and subdued sandalwood cologne scent. Odd. But maybe the moss notes are responsible for that and I dont know what hides behind the bone dust, maybe sandalwood or orris? So to my nose this is manly in a soft way, not floral. But maybe Phantom Cologne is not so wrong for a Phantom Wooer.

I have already swapped this but took down notes back then. Wings of Azrael is heavy on the lily of the valley. It is myrrh, lily of the valley and on top of that very woody and herbal notes, cajeput smells a little bit like tea tree (they are botanically related). I could pick out the violet as well but the lily of the valley was more dominant.

It was nice and right now I dont know why I gave it away. Probably frimped it away or figured I would not wear it terribly much but now I miss it a bit.

 

Very simply this is super sweet, thick brown sugar/molasses with maybe a little woody touch. I get the comparison to Sugar Skull but this is a bit different, heavier and woody. While I can wear SS this is actually too much for me. Molasses smell great but not ON me.

I really never reviewed this? Dance of Death is my first BPAL. Not really the first but my first bottle, the first that really matters, so to say.

So this is still special and I am very much in love with my only blue bottle.

 

Scentwise there are greater things but I still like it. But this is very aged by now and I have no idea about the fresh scent straight from the lab. Right after application I can still smell the myrrh and patchouli but the patchouli is very smooth and in the background. Black musk and myrrh always go very powdery on me so it turns to a powdery orris scent upon drydown. Orris is great but I wish it would stay in the wet stage longer.

Voyeurs among the Cherry Blossoms is my current favourite

 

Whitechapel - lilac makes me think of spring because of the many lilac bushes in my garden, the note does not smell that great on me but I love the fresh flowers

Salty, airy notes with musk and wood underneath, this really is quite true to the description. Calico Jack is salty/aquatic but warm and woody at the same time which gives an interesting mix. Rather unisex but would work on any seafaring man and landrats alike

This is all white musk and currant on me, somehow the ozone and resin were swallowed by them. Now I like white musk but currant is a bit of a problem. It goes from fruity to sharp and acrid in a short time.

Very strong throw and also lasts a good while.

 

I was curious to try this but it is not really for me. For berries and musk I prefer Dayu.

The Chapel from the Carnaval is definitely an evil scent - "black incense, bitter wine, brimstone, and blood." It makes me feel malicious.

 

Aaaaw, I wanted this to be pure evil magic too but all I got was sour grape juice from the winw note

Whitechapel, because of the lilac. We have so much lilac in the garden and it blooms relatively early in spring so it is a typical spring scent for me

I guess this depends on your perception of dark and evil but here are some blends I tried that I find evil-smelling

 

I second Bloodlust.

Serpent's Kiss is very much in that category as well, both are Dragon's Blood based and are dark, red scents that are evil in a very agressive way, making me think of violence and bloodshed.

 

Not only evil but also vile: Malediction - the patchouli and vetivert are really dirty, smoky but somehow sweet and acrid together. Something I could imagine a demon from hell wearing. Not really pleasant. But fascinating, I still keep my imp.

 

And also look through the Picknick in Arkham scents and the Diabolus scents. Lots of evil concepts there.

 

Bluebeard is also very evil. Especially fresh from the lab the lavender and vetivert are very prominent and bitter and the white musk and violet are a very cold background. Nothing warm or friendly about this scent, just cold, seething hate.

 

Djinn. Smells like something is on fire.

 

And I almost forgot Czernobog! Whoa. I shudder to think of him. A combination of three musks, with splashes of dark myrrh, vetiver and mullein says the lab.

 

Hope some of that helps, sorry that I am not much help with sweet and boozy evil though.

Yet an other review for Dorian!

 

I swapped for a bottle without testing first and have no regrets! The bottle is already over a year old so I dont know if there is much difference to fresh Dorian. Possibly this is sweeter and smoother than fresh.

 

Musk, vanilla and tea are most prominent, the fougere blends in and without having smelled it alone I could not say where it begins and ends in the blend, maybe it has aged away a bit. On the whole this is a very smooth blend. I get no lemony scent or lavender whatsoever, which I am glad for. Theodosius, the Legerdemain is often compared to Dorian and disappointingly I only got citrus and little else from it.

Dorian, however, is very sweet underneath and the musk, sugar and vanilla would be infernally cloying if it was not for the tea that provides a refreshing top note and the fougere that must be the element making it elegant and gender neutral instead of cloyingly foody musk.

 

This is the first really popular vanilla scent that I have tried and liked. Unlike with Antique Lace and Love's Philosophy or Opuhi I did not get plastic vanilla. Also it was not too sweet like Snake Oil or Glowing Vulva. I finally got one where I can understand why it is so popular

 

 

The reviews mentioning a lemony quality had me scared! Luckily I was spared that experience. But Hay Moon does seem to depend on skin chemistry. On my fingers it does indeed smell sour and fades fast. But on my wrists it is completely different. At first there is a slightly dry and sour hay scent which quickly fades and develops into a very pleasant dry amber scent. Good thing that I love amber! And it even behaves and does not smell powdery. The cardamom does not stick out either, an other thing that had me worried.

I like it.

 

<snip>

Oh, you will never bore the regular Recommendations crowd, we LOVE this stuff and ask for it by name.

 

You will recognize sassafras when you smell it - it's the dominant flavor in root beer. <snip>

 

Well, I you love this I am happy to present some challenge

 

Ummmm... I most surely will not recognize the smell of root beer. Why? No root beer in Europe - well, maybe the Brits have it but they dont count (Just kidding, please dont be offended dear citizens of the United Kingdom - but you can get lots of things I know from the US in the UK too). It is pretty stupid, my sister lives in the US and I have been to visit her but never tried any root beer Maybe next time... But we dont have it here, dont know why not but it seems it has never come over.

 

Actually I dug through the snake pit right at the beginning of my bpal sniffing and the one I got a bottle of was Green Tree Viper, it is like Snake Oil light and I can wear it very well. Asp Viper is good too, all the others had something wrong with them. Loved Boomslang for some time too but after I got a bottle I did not like it any more Suddely all I smelled was the Snake Oil. And the one that keeps eluding me is Death Adder. One day I am going to catch her as well.

 

<snip> ImperatrixMundi, I think I may have found a vanilla scent twin (or cousin)! I had nearly identical vanilla experiences to yours. <snip>

 

Oooo, I has a scent twin!

 

Bengal was nice, I think I swapped and frimped both of mine away some time but it will one day come around again.

 

And hey, both of you recommended Lyonesse and the notes sound just perfect. It has been somewhere on my wishlist for ages but I totally forgot about it. The catalogue is so huge, no matter how often I did through it, I always come up with new stuff to try.

 

Thank you very much for your recommendations!

Thank you for all these many replies

 

Tombstone I want to try very much, maybe I can lay my hands on an imp some time.

And I have no idea what Sassafras smells like but I'll try everything once (well... ALMOST everything!)

 

With Sugar Cookie I definitely was tempted by the cookie smell even though I usually dont wear foody stuff. Not that I dont like foody smells per se but I cant bear to smell like that myself. And many reviews say it is buttery, that butter accord makes me really sick, I still cringe when I think of Drink Me. But a decant cant hurt, can it?

The exception to the general no food-rule are Sugar notes, like in Sugar Skull or especially the Lick Its and Faith. Love them!

 

I dont want to bore you to death, you really dont have to read all of this but these are the things with vanilla I have tried:

 

Antique Lace - see above

 

Black Opal - to me it is a weird, watery vanilla scent, really odd but in the end it does the same as Antique Lace

 

Golden Priapus - amber, mainly. my brain still thinks it is smelling gingerbread so I gave it to my boyfriend to wear and after about a year the vanilla has really come out and I am thinking of snatching up a bottle

 

Hunger - the vanilla behaves well but is really dominated by the florals

 

Snake Oil - I dont like it much, it has a sort of 'dirty' thing going on, same as Smut. Still letting the decant sit around to see what happens

 

Le Serpent qui Danse - GARDENIA. Smells like Monoi oil. Where are the other notes?

 

Mr. Ibis - The Vanilla Flower note! Not really dominant vanilla scent but I like Mr. Ibis a lot overall, one of my favourites.

 

White Rabbit - hard to describe, vanilla not dominant

 

Tamora - sounded nice, does not work because of peach blossom

 

Mme. Moriarty - the vanilla bean hovers at the edge of the scent smelling nice. If I could always get vanilla like that I'd be happy

Lady Una just arrived and over all the blackberry I get the same effect.

 

Theodosius - I get all citrus from this

 

Cytherea - love this one, mainly sweet sandalwood, vanilla is behaving itself

 

Hellhound - jumped on the bandwagon and snatched a bottle, the vanilla pushed me over the edge. And where is it now?

 

Love's Philosophy - you broke my heart. Many people smelled wintergreen, guess saffron is to blame for that. I was one of them. When the fake wintergreen was finally gone I got plastic again.

Hi there!

Could you help someone who likes Vanilla but has skin chemistry that does not?

My problem is that some of the vanilla scents, like Antique Lace for example, smell incredibly fake and like plastic on me.

 

But the Vanilla Bean note in some of the blends seems to be much nicer, richer and a little bit more buttery. I dont like rich, sweet, buttery foody stuff usually but that is the vanilla I like.

Am I just imagining things or are there really distinctly different vanillas? I'd very much likr to find one that my chemistry likes too.

If Satan would wear perfume - this would be it. EEEEEVIL

 

Lol. This is incredibly dark, heavy and acrid vetivert with a really, really weird, smoky "sweetness". Very hard to describe. The patchouli is the raw, earthy, green kind that I actually like. So when the vetivert has faded a bit it actually smells a bit like Lush's Tramp showergel underneath.

Could I please have that patchouli as single note? I'll keep it for aging, maybe the vetivert fades a bit with time as it does in other blends.

A recommendation from someone who does not really like the berry scents - Daiyu!

I dont even like berries but it still was very nice, first juicy berries and then when they fade away it has the nicest creamy musk.

Most GC leather scents that I tried have a very similiar leather note. I dont remember exactly which ones I have tried but Loviatar, Hellfire and Dragon's Hide I am sure of, and currently testing Iago, plus some others I dont remember right now. What I see as GC leather is mostly an oily, brown leather, like well-worn leather clothes. But that note is always very faint on my skin and quickly overwhelmed by the other notes in the blend. Iago is different somehow, though.

 

But Brom Bones, now he is something different all together. He is like smooth, soft, chemically dyed black leather, very new-from-the-shop-leather. And that note is also lasting and dominant on skin. The smell fascinates me but at the same time it is too chemical for me.

Yeah, well, if it is popular it is bound to be an utter failure on me (though there are a few exceptions to even this rule, fortunately!).

A sweet golden scent but unfortunately faint and powdery-soapy Carnation, cedar and myrrh dont like me much, so I blame them.

A very complex scent with so many notes. All the notes can be picked out if I make an effort, it is like the blend rotates through all of them. Unfortunately the hint of red wine is a lot more than just a subtle hint on my skin, it soon overpowers everything else. Which is a pity.