Al-Shairan

[valentina]

The enemy of God, also named Iblis, He Who Despaired of the Mercy of God. Al-Shairan is the leader of the Jinn, a tempter who whispers false suggestions to men enticing them into evil and perfidious acts, and is the sworn enemy of all of Adam’s children. His scent is fiery, bright and thick with sweet sinfulness: clove, peach and orange with cinnamon, patchouli and dark incense notes.

In the imp, this is very dark and spicy, lots of clove. Lots and lots of clove. Once on, it's clove-cinnamon-orange. I smell like one of those orange pomadors that people make at Christmas, with cloves stuck on the orange peel and cinnamon sticks laying around beside them. My body chemistry has an unfortunate habit of turning lovely, exotic scents into Christmas potporri. The scent doesn't morph that much, but interestingly, fades away within an hour. Amazing, considering how intense the spices begin... they just went poof!

This might make a great room scent, and I'm hanging onto it for that use.

valentina Edited February 2, 2006 by Shollin

[Neely]

FRIMP! Feel the love!

 

In the bottle: Big Red gum.

 

Wet: Big Red gum with a funky ,STANK , under it. Umm this isn't peach, or clove. It smells like those paperwhite flowers do to my nose, skunky. Oh dear.

 

Dry down: Big Red gum stuck to the sides of a pot of paperwhites. *sings* Whose got the funk? Gotta have that funk!

 

30 minutes: I can't even believe that I let it stay on me so long. Do I get some sort of BPAL medal for this? Big Red gum and some sort of powdery industrial soap. You know the kind, it is at all the big public bathrooms (like stadiums). That pink chemical liquid soap. YUCK, YUCK, YUCK!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! OMFG!!!! Get it off, get it off! Ok, can you say, "melodrama?" Hehehe, really though, this is just vile with my chemistry.

 

Conclusion: No go on this one. Another BPAL scent I thought from the notes I would do well with, WRONG.

 

Rating 1-5 on my skin, this is a 1 ( I would give it a -1, but the rating doesn't go that low, heh).

[Lizzie]

In The Bottle Peach, clove and incense. I kinda like it!!

 

Wet On Skin Now I can smell the cinnamon and clove with a hint of incense. Don't like it as well as the scent in the vial.

 

Dry Hmm, not what I hoped it would be. The peach is all gone and so is the clove and incense (I never smelled the patchouli in this) and now it pretty much smells like cinnamon and oranges, much like Lush's Oranges and Spice soap to my nose. A nice scent for winter, but I'm not sure that it's something I want to smell like. It's the type of thing I'd like to bathe with before bed and wake up and not smell like it anymore...I don't think I'll be wearing it out anywhere. Certainly won't be buying any more, it's just not my type of scent. I had hoped for a peach and cinnamon scent out of this.

[Voleuse]

This is definitely dark on first sniff, a sweet and brooding combination of cinnamon and clove. It's not cloying, but it gathers and claws at my throat. (Metaphorically, that is. I'm not allergic!) This is warm, but it isn't bright at all, like I've found other cinnamon-influenced scents. The dark notes, I think, are mostly the patchouli, grounding the spices and keeping them down. I like it.

 

As it dries, the clove becomes the dominant note, swarmed by incense. I don't smell any peach, specifically, but there is a lighter note shining through everything else. This is fascinating.

[amrita]

I get very strong cinnamon and pepper. Al-Shairan is quite potpourri-ish on me. It's sharp and makes my nose twinge. 20 minutes later, the potpourri is still going strong.

[Pachelbel]

I love cloves, and peaches, and cinnamon...I forgot about the patchoulli when I bought this! Patchoulli hates me

 

For the first half an hour or so, it's cinnamon and clove--very strongly so, though if I try I can pick out a little tiny bit of fruit. But then it goes all soap and patchoulli.

 

The bright side is, it's an amazing Christmas/Yule-time room scent! My apartment smelled great!

[telesilla]

Why I tried it: Notes, middle eastern hook and um ... Jinn. What? In our vampire universe, the vampires are considered Jinn. Yeah. Nothing to do with Qui-Gon. Really.

 

In the bottle and wet: Mmmm .. spicy oranges.

 

Drying down: Ok yeah the patchouli is showing up a little but it's not too bad and my skin chemistry likes patchouli.

 

Dry: Oh man I might as well just buy big bottles of every single middle-eastern scent Beth makes that doesn't have roses in it. This is a very luxurious scent, very much a "come viz me to ze Casbah" kind of thing, all spicy fruit and incense. It's like the other spicy scents--almost foody but not quite. Big bottle for sure.

[malanna]

Al-Shairan starts out very spicy, reminding me of Gingerbread Poppet or Shub-Niggurath. After half an hour, I thought I smelled something like rosewood--something floral yet woodsy. However, after and hour, I'm definitely picking up on the clove and incense notes, although it smells rather soapy. It smells less soapy, but also less of incense over time and is practically gone after five hours.

[sh1mm3r]

I was sent an imp of this by my Switch Witch, Babylon. I went through an adoration stage of cloves, so I'm not sure how I missed this one, although I'm not sure I would have tried it because of the incense and patchouli notes.

 

I really like it! It takes me back to the holiday bazaars I used to go to with my Mom (in a good way) and I think I'll stick this in the holiday section of my imp box. It ends up being a very clovey peach, with just a background of the incense and patchouli.

 

Similar to Tintagel with the spices and apricots, but without the evergreen and wine notes (that end up the strongest in the Tintagel blend).

[elphaba]

Gorgeous, complex spiciness in the imp. I was really excited about Al-Shairan because it's full of notes I love - clove, cinnamon, patchouli, incense. On my skin, though, the fruitiness really comes out and I ended up quickly smelling of orange and peach. Granted, it really is a dark, complicated fruitiness and I suspect this is exactly what was intended with this scent, but it doesn't strike the right chord as a personal scent for me, so I shall be passing it on.

[Diva Urd]

Cloves, cinnamon and fruit? All the things Urd doesn't really like all that much...

 

But since I've sworn myself to sample any BPAL scent I can get my hands on, no matter how off-putting the description might initially be, I gave it a shot.

 

However, the predictable happens: The fruit turn into extremely cloying, sticky candy on me. At least the cinnamon and clove weren't too strong on me, since I hate both those scents, but I can't say I wanna smell like a Jolly Rancher, either, so... off to the swap/sell pile!

[Chrysantza]

Someone (forgot who) frimped me this in a swap.

 

In the imp: OMGCLOVE

 

On me: Clove, apricot and spice. It's really nice but unfortunately, the clove and cinnamon appear to irritate my skin...so it's off to the swaps.

[TheStormCellar]

This is probably the first cinnamon and clove scent where the cinnamon and cloves actually stuck around. It's beautiful, spicey, sweet, and warm. I might purchase a 5ml of this simply so I can have a cinnamon clove scent I can actually wear without it vanishing in 10 minutes.

[fiddledragon]

Scent in bottle: A very edible spiced orange scent.

 

Scent on me:

Wet -- Mmmm...incense and spices and the orange becoming much less sweet.

Dry -- Very dark spiced incense fruit.

 

Conclusion: Yum! There are several like this, though, so I may swap it and keep one that has a less...disconcerting name. Why is it that the demon/antichrist/etc ones always smell so glorious on me, but the angelic ones are these wimpy floral things?

[pennydreadful]

In the imp: Generic spicy scent with a hint of fruit

 

Wet: Yum! Sweet cinnamon and clove. I can't stop sniffing. The faintest hint of juicy peach is there as well.

 

Drydown: I can still smell the cinnamon and clove, but the peach is gone, replaced with the incense notes. The incense smells somewhat soapy, which I'm not a big fan of.

 

Verdict: I wish the cinnamon and clove stayed a bit stronger and that the peach didn't disappear. This might be one that needs to be slathered on regularly throughout the day.

[Caltha]

Al-Shairan

Immediatly after application, Al-Shairan has a nice, dry, woody spiciness going on, but then it turns to sharp soap and stays that wat. Slightly spicy, woody soap but definitely soap. Damn my skin chemistry.

[Naamah_Darling]

From the description alone, that sounds like quite a tangle of scents. And it sounds delicious!

 

I can immediately tell this is going to be a horse-stunner. In the bottle, it's a medicinal blend of cloves and orange and patchouli, with a dash of cinnamon. Stinky. I'm not sure about this.

 

It smells much the same on my skin. The clove and cinnamon and patchouli all blend to make a solid foundation, while the orange skates around on top. This is like a wickedly spiced cider, with a wedge of orange to tart it up. It smells more than a little like ginger beer, and reminds me of the time I tried to drink some of that crap and nearly choked. A nice spicy smell, but not foody in a way you'd ever, ever want to put in your mouth.

 

This is really nice, but it's a little too spicy for me at the outset. I can see using it to punch up something that's just kind of lying there, though, because it's distinctive and powerful.

 

It wears down to an incensey and faint spice finish, and it smells like there's some amber in this, way underneath. Quite pleasant once it's settled down. Doesn't last all that long, though. It starts out powerful, but spends its force quickly.

 

I like it but on me it never seems to decide quite what it wants to do.

[septima_pica]

Well, damn. Iblis, the Great Enemy, the Whisperer of Lies, He Who Despaired of the Mercy of God, smells like...cinnamon bubble-gum.

 

There's a little of something patchouli-ish in there too, which salvages it slightly -- this changes the impression to "hippie chewing cinnamon bubble-gum" -- but that's really not a huge improvement. I can't even smell the cloves or incense. Damn, damn, damn. I was looking forward to this one, too, with those notes...I guess stone-fruit and I are just not meant to get along. Ah well.

 

ADDED 12/20/07:

 

Octopod already tried and reviewed this.

Kalirren: The complexity is actually coming out, as it didn't on Octopod. Hurrah! Slightly soapy at the beginning, but the cinnamon and clove are also apparent, plus something unidentifiable, and orange makes it sweet. Not too sweet, though. Gets better as it dries -- warm, smooth, and spicy. Unfortunately a bit potpourri-like for a little while, but it's still really good, and that goes away.

[juniperus]

Bottle: very sweet and very spicy. heer be cinnamon.

Wet: oh, that orange is coming out, as is the ginger. no sign of the patchouli yet, interestingly enough.

Dry: I can just catch the peach if I look for it, lots of spice and orange here, and an undercurrent of incense.

Later: I can catch the barest hint of the patchouli under all of the syrupy-sweet spicy-ness. This smells to me like very sweet spice tea. Al-Shairan may be my enemy, too, as my skin does not like him. At all.

[darkitysnark]

Al-Shairan

 

A wonderful gimp from Valentina!

 

Me + clove = a deep and abiding love

 

Me + patchouli = casual, sometimes hostile acquaintances

 

Me + fruit = sometimes it's pull-my-pigtails like me like me, and sometimes they just wanna pull my pigtails

 

Me + incense = the love that dare not speak its name (while clove is around, because clove can get kinda jealous)

 

So add that all up and you get a real jumble. This is heavy and sweet but also a bit light and soapy, and the sweetness is grounded (and sometimes ground out) by incense and pathouli. I really can't make my mind up about this one. It's both compelling and repelling all at once.

 

I can say with certainty that this is a scent best worn by me in cooler months, so I'm gonna let this one age a bit and save it for either an upcoming cool night (we still get those around here) or next fall.

 

This is probably one of the more complicated blends I've worn in a while.

[dtp]

In the bottle: Very rich and spicy. I'm not sure how it'll work as a perfume on me--it reminds me a little bit of a room scent, or perhaps something I'd use in the bath.

 

Wet: Oranges! I couldn't really smell the citrus in the bottle, but as soon as it's on my skin the orange note comes out of hiding. I'm not a huge fan of citrus, so I hope it'll tone down.

 

Dry: The orange fades, and the cinnamon and clove take over. I love both these notes--they're warm and comforting, and make me think of delicious spiced puddings and winter-scents. Not sure that I really like them as perfume on me--I'd be much more likely to use this as a room scent in winter, rather than as a perfume on me in the middle of summer.

 

Later: Cinnamony orange is what's left. I don't dislike it, but I wouldn't wear it as a perfume. It's a shame the incense and peach notes weren't stronger, because I like them as perfume. I'll probably keep this to use in an oil burner on a cold day in winter, when I need the warmth and a pick-me-up scent.

[moonarcana]

reviewed courtesy of Quikslver's GC circle swap

 

 

Al-Shairan

 

first sniff: cinnamon...not sweet, just strong cinnamon.

 

tested wet: still cinnamon...maybe a touch of other dry bark spiciness, like maybe clove, but definitely no fruit. (peaches?...oranges? um...sorry but they're lost in the cinnamon)

 

tested dry: the cinnamon has mellowed nicely now, and I can smell a faint incense note...rather ethereal in relationship to the spicy note. Never did find the fruit notes on this one.

 

conclusion: the end result was nice, but more in a comforting room scent sort of way. I like cinnamon, but not when it overpowers everything else. This one is not for me.

 

1/5

[sarahj]

Al-Shairan

 

in vial: clove and patchouli

 

wet: slightly medicinal...kind of smells like band-aids and cloves

 

dry: much better...clove, cinnamon, patchouli, and a hint of an unidentified floral

 

verdict: a nice scent, much lighter than I expected, I will use the imp but don't need a big bottle

[HennaFairy]

bottle:

cinnamon, warm/spicy

 

wet:

cinnamon/clove

 

dry:

cinnamon and clove, hint of orange

 

overall:

nice, although I think seraglio is similar and better…

 

rating: 7/10

[filigree_shadow]

The Lab has frimped me Al-Shairan imps three times (and they're all different colors), so I've tried it a few times. From the notes, it does seem like something I should like -- and I do like it but the cinnamon will keep this from being a favorite. If it weren't for the cinnamon I would like it a lot. There's a sweet, thick scent underneath (the kind of scent I like), but the cinnamon makes it too hot and spicy for me.

 

After about an hour it's a great clove and peach scent, with very light oranges. Exactly the type of scent I like. The only problem is getting through that initial cinnamon stage.