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Showing results for tags 'The Fools Journey'.
Found 38 results
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The Red King and White Queen, sulfur and mercury, Rubedo and Albedo. The unification of opposites, putrefaction and individuation, the culmination of the Great Work. ὁδὸς ἄνω κάτω μία καὶ ὡυτή: red and white musks alight with frankincense, white oudh, sweet labdanum, and saffron. The way up and the way down are one and the same. Wet, this is a spicy, warm frankincense with a bit of a gummy, resinous sweetness from the labdanum. It's definitely very magical smelling, like the curl of a smoldering frankincense tear. The saffron is providing a bit of a dry pepperiness in the background. I think the oudh and red musk are making this a bit more 'warm' in tone, but strangely it's not super 'oriental,' and in fact remains very crisp and clear. None of the resins are 'gummy' per se. The musks are smooth and straightforward, and I think the white musk makes this have a bit of a chillier, bright tone. It's very nice, very magical.
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To save a trump card, sometimes you must make sacrifices: tolu balsam, leather, labdanum, black pepper, and benzoin. Update 2/19: I take it back I take it ALL back. The Scapegoat has aged into magnificence, rich and warm and sophisticated. Now, it actually reminds me more of my beloved Luper, We Believe That Death is Not the End of Man. The pine is lush, rounded, buttered by the leather and resins. The pepper is very well-blended, just giving it all a hint of piquancy. The lack of sweetness tips this into a slightly more masculine territory, which also makes it unexpectedly sexy on a woman . I *HAD* to have a bottle!
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Sometimes playfully walking with the Fool, sometimes tugging on his stockings, sometimes attacking in a pack, sometimes tearing the ass out of his pants, sometimes chomping him right on the nuts: feral and tame, guardian and hunter, loyalty and opposition. Sometimes guiding the Fool off the cliff and other times warning him of dangers ahead. A warm canine musk, trampled grass, a gleam of ivory-white fang, cardamom pod, and crushed yew. Ridiculously charming, in a cozy outdoorsy kind of way. The 'canine musk' is light and appealing and really does make me think of freshly-washed puppy. A thread of sunny grass and maybe the crushed yew is giving it the romping-in-a-field vibe, I think. I'm not sure what fang is supposed to smell like. Maybe it's what gives this blend its pale quality; this is not a 'brown' kind of fuzzy scent like Wulric, but very white-washed and lovely. I'm not sure I can detect the cardamom, but the overall effect is exceptionally snuggly. The only thing that is keeping me from buying a bottle? It has exactly zero throw. The fade is so fast on my skin! I'm going to try turning my decant into an eau de parfum and see what happens.
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Reviled and mocked, pelted by stones and set upon by dogs, all the while singing the song of divine madness: red sandalwood, tobacco absolute, palo santo, black copal and balsam dusted by burnt sage, soot, and an echo of frankincense. 2022 update: How amazing the journey of scents is! When I first started smelling BPAL, I was really sensitive to certain notes. Tobacco was one of them, and certain denser woods were another. Now, after four years of smelling so many blends, I have learned to distinguish infinitely more layers and it's really exciting to see that progress. So I just thought I would give this a new update, because I have in fact acquired a bottle of Il Matto and enjoying it! Anne Bonny's red sandalwood and frankincense is joyfully present, smudged with sage and soot (a la Smokestack) and roughed up around the edges with the scratch of balsam and palo santo (which is quite vocal in Il Matto, so tread with care!). The tobacco is also strongly manifested, but I'm not convinced it's French tobacco, because it's dryer and less thick/chewy/caramelly than most tobaccos. I wouldn't guess that there was copal in here with all the other more powerful notes, but this is indeed a quite woody, darkly resinous scent. I am calling Il Matto "Anne Bonny's OTHER boyfriend", her first one being Hanging Johnny. Il Matto is gritty and dangerous. He is a scent you wear with kohl-rimmed smoky eyes and a sexy dress and a long leather trenchcoat. Don't forget your ass-kicking boots. If you love Anne Bonny but you want something punchier (thanks tobacco and palo santo) and grittier (soot and balsam), this is the ticket. I just retried Antikythera too, and while they are equally as punchy, Il Matto punches in a direction I like now, while Antikythera still punches me right in the face. Alas! But they are not as similar as I once thought they were, and I'm enjoying my scent evolution as well as the effects of aging on Il Matto's bottle.
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The Leap of Faith or the Apex of Irresponsibility. One foot remains precariously touching the earth, the other hovers towards enlightenment or oblivion. Green tea, neroli, and osmanthus, patchouli root, Spanish moss, tobacco absolute, and vetiver. In the imp: Neroli and moss, with a hint of patchouli. I'm worried this will be mostly neroli on me. Wet: Ooh, there's the tea! Fresh green tea, spilled over tobacco leaves and moss. The neroli has turned more into a citrus twist in the tea, thankfully. The osmanthus and vetiver are just dancing around the edges with the patchouli. Dry: The vetiver has fallen off the cliff with the patchouli and is lost, along with much of the tobacco. What remains is sweet green tea and moss, unexpectedly cheerful and bright. I don't think I expected this one to dry down so similar to Embalming Fluid, but here we are. I don't mind at all though! Not super long lasting so I don't think I'll commit to a full bottle, but will keep this decant for sure. Worth taking a leap of faith to try.
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Speaking truth to kings, beggars, and popes alike, immune to retribution and lordly wrath as he flings wise quips like cream pies and barbed arrows. A motley tunic, festooned in bells: red currant and lemon peel over sugared patchouli and a bit of buttercream. A huge "Huzzah" to this Jester! Opens with a bright citrus-like sugar. Fresh and sweet, like smelling a lemon poppy seed cake. As it wears the Red Currant supports the brightness of the lemon, keeping me away from the scent memory of a lemon scented cleaner. The Patch is playful, delightfully tethering it to the ground or it will all float away. Substantial longevity and mild throw. Now I want to get out my bottle of Cherophobia 2016 and side by side test them.
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Wherein the Magician and the Fool are one, spinning the story and juggling the knives that drive a man’s fate. Frankincense and star anise, bergamot and clove bud, rue and green cinnamon, saffron and carnation, cedar and vanilla absolute. In Bottle: The saffron and cloves and green cinnamon dominate; it doesn't smell sweet at all, instead being a wild spice blend. Of the three bottles from the Fool collection my datemate J sniffed for me, this was the one she didn't say was a very 'me' smell. Too confident, I think. Wet: As I was walking to the train station after putting it on, the dominant notes were the saffron and the cedar, to my surprise. The woody note behind the saffron was rich, and took over the spices for a bit. Dry: By the time I got to work, the spices were poking back out, including the bergamot and anise that I hadn't caught, at the 'edges' of the smell. The cedar died down quick, yielding to become a grounding bottom note. End of Day: I was catching mild spicy whiffs all day long, and at one point thought I caught a hint of tumeric. Maybe the saffron interacted with something interestingly? I liked it, though. I'd love to try layering this with Wrath at some point, to stoke more of the cinnamon clove note. This didn't go sweet on me, like most scents do, but the end result was still very food-y. In all, a nice scent I'll be wearing again.
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Purity of ideal, unsullied innocence, liberation from base desires and worldly trappings. White rose, frankincense, verbena, and angelica root. In the bottle It's almost like sour lemon candy in the bottle, I think owing to the verbena and frankincense. Like Lemonheads! Wet on skin It's still a very candy-like scent but not as much so. I can smell a little bit of rose, but the frankincense and verbena still dominate. It's not what I was expecting, but it is pretty. It's a happy scent. Dry on skin after 30 minutes Once this has a chance to sit for about ten minutes, a bit more rose peeks out, and the rose continues to peek out rather than come forward and say "Hello!". It's not a citrusy scent, but the verbena and frankincense continue to give this that lemon candy edge without being overly sweet or, well, citrusy. Sophisticated herbal lemonheads, if there were such a thing. I like it. Thoughts I thought this would be much more rose-forward, but it ended up being more verbena-forward. This is not a scent meant for seriousness! This is a lot of fun and a blind bottle I don't regret buying.
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A jester’s balloon, a vagabond’s pack. The riddle and the punch line. The Consequence, the Mystery, the Untapped Collective Knowledge of All Mankind. Jasmine petals tumbled with a panoply of spices, suffused with incense smoke. The Bindle offers a jasmine-dominant blend with a dreamy, summery, honeyed quality, like there's a hidden honeysuckle in it. My first thought was actually that I smelled honeysuckle, and then jasmine, and I thought of Eostre of the Dawn, one of my favorites. It's a lovely jasmine, full rather than high-pitched, and closer to Winter Jasmine SN than a jasmine from some of the GCs I've tried. Freshly applied on me, The Bindle reads as mostly this jasmine and honeysuckle with a diffuse waft of gentle, calming incense smoke. This isn't the strong incense of walking into a shop where it's burning in the same room, but rather of incense burning from the next open door or two down the street. It's a mellow incense, like frankincense sleeping in a hammock, or like some sticks I would've bought in a Saturday market to burn years ago. I don't catch any spices from this until it dries, and even then they are barely there and seem part of the incense. This is a surprise for me, as I often amp spices, but something here is giving the dried Bindle a more exotic air, reminding me of India. The flowers have settled down by this point, leaving a really lovely exotic skin scent. Unfortunately, I'll probably want a backup of this.
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The unknown factor, the outsider entering your town uninvited, unannounced, and unknown: a narcotic black chypre with crushed violets, indigo lilac, patchouli, oakmoss absolute, labdanum, and clove. Super intrigued! Wet, it smells very cold, almost like a splinter of blue-black dark. I bet there are some opium notes in this because I get that soporific swell in some of the poppy-containing blends. Labdanum is one of those notes I love, but also jumps out on me, and the poppy-black-musk opening becomes gummy with warmth on my skin and lets out a spicy-sweet cloud of labdanum, made gritty and husky with the patchouli. This is really, really heavy and basically is prowling off my skin. Interestingly, it isn't until at least 15 minutes later, that I can get a bit of the oakmoss/lilac/violets. These are not whomp you on the head florals or greens... a tangle or dark crown or wreath of gray-green foliage scattered with dark, subtle petals, but still a menacing arrangement, lurking in the shadows. I like this, but it is farrrrrr to dark for this bright violet-wearing metal-aquatic werewolf. Still, this is super dark, moody, sexy. Complicated and layered. Even with the florals, I think this is unisex and may even transform based on who's wearing it... again on me, a guy, it's an unconventional, dark musky in tone with bruised purple florals lurking but not showy in the background.
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Divine ecstasy and divine madness. Ambivalence and absolute faith. Frankincense and lemon peel drifting on a cloud of lemongrass, white coconut, sandalwood, and vanilla absolute. In the bottle, this is surprisingly less citrus than I would have guessed from the notes. It's mostly a whiff of a lemon kiss gliding over the meat of a coconut. The lemon like notes then veer more towards lemongrass, but it's subtle and not super sharp, as that note can be. With a little more time and heat from my skin, the coconut becomes more apparent, deepening, and then kissed and brushed with dusty medium brown sandalwood (a sweet, not super sharp, but just thrummy enough woodsiness to ground the higher notes)... and there's a bit of gourmand from the vanilla. Certainly not truly foody, but having elements of both the resinous citrus and yet creamy spice variety. With even more time, the lemon notes deepen and I can swear that the spritz of a lemon rind is now more apparent. On me, the scent does become quite subtle, and mostly a tasty buttery lemon-coconut.
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At peace with recklessness and abandon, the serenity of accepting the embrace of disorder and obliquity: pink pepper and honey. This reminds me of the honey from Fortuna Dubia, with pink pepper instead of Dubia's herbs. The honey is stronger on me than the pepper. At first I also got a little something that felt sugared, like a powdered sugar, but my skin ate it. This blend lives under two hours on my skin.
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The affable fool who uses his own obtuseness and ignorance to his advantage: milk, honey, and wild fig with ambrette seed and almond buttercream. Narr opens thick and rich and sweet. It's a buttercreamy milk, heavy with almond and honeyed fig -- that's about the order of strength of the notes on my skin. At first, the ambrette is just darkening the blend a bit, its nuttiness blending into the almond. But in drydown, after the initial honey cream rush (which was pretty heady stuff), the ambrette comes into its own on my skin, building its nutty sort of musk. It reminds me a little of the ambrette in Fortuna Primigenia, which was kind of ambergris-like to me, but here it's mingling closely with almond and harder to separate. The buttercream milk and honey settle down surprisingly fast. What begins as omghoneycreamheartattack quickly mellows on my skin into a nutty, sweet ambrette with creamy and figgy qualities.