The_Merf

Argh, curse you citrus notes and your strength on my skin! When I put this on it is a really awesome fig/cocoa bean spice, but that only lasts a minute or two and then I am overwhelmed by bergamot. This basically becomes a chocolate and orange mixture on me, and while there are worse things in the world, since I had a sniff of the tantalizing complexity that could have been (all the spices and foodiness and tartness mixed together must surely be awesome), it makes me sort of sad that citrus does me in once again!

I was kind of disappointed in the way this one played out on my skin--it's all aloe and sharp musk, very soapy on me, with little change. There's nothing from the vanilla or Egyptian musk (which tends to do better on me than other musks)--even the sandalwood isn't that prominent. I can certainly understand what the poster above me means when s/he says "I can taste it at the back of my throat." This is one of the "soapiest" BPALs ever with my skin chemistry.

For anyone who has trouble with honey in general, this might be a blend that you want to check out--my skin tends to have honey go all wrong, but it's not too bad in this blend. It's maybe the third most prominent note at best. Of course, my skin also sends lily up like crazy, so that might have something to do with it as well. This is basically a musk/lily mix with just the slightest bit of honey in the background. I don't really detect any amber at all, though light ambers tend to not be prominent on my skin. This blend does not do a lot of changing on me.

When I first smelled this, I smelled rose, lilac and lily--none of the sandalwood or the linen note. Wet on my skin, this smelled very much like Faith, except the scent was a little creamier (Faith layered with a vanilla oil perhaps). That phase is very brief and the lily note "pushes" the violet out of the way. I'm really not sure what to do about this one--I love Faith and I only have one bottle of her, and this might not be a bad substitution (yes, I know I could buy the CD set, but Hope really doesn't sit well with me and I get the impression that she's hard to swap). As this one continues to dry, it strikes me very much like Antique Lace with a touch of Faith thrown in for a good measure. In the third stage that the perfume goes through, the violet and rose seem to 'triage' with the lily, but the lily is still the strongest note. ADDED Oct. 30: When I tried this on for the first time without remembering that it was 'the time of the month' it was a beautiful stand-in for Faith--sugared violets with beautiful, creamy lilies in the background. It was heavenly. Unfortunately when I tried it again, it was mostly tea rose, a very muted lily, a dash of violet and white sandalwood, which had the odd effect of tempering all the lovely florals while not providing the usual warmth and woodiness that I'm used to with the sandalwood note. This one has good staying power and the lilies and violets do end up outlasting the other notes, but the sandalwood makes this too much of a muted bouquet (though, given the scent description, that means that Beth, as usual is right on with her craft).

As many other reviewers have noted, this is quite a yellow blend, with the rose taking the lead as the oil is initially applied (at least on my skin). There's also a bit of yellow-orange mandarin citrus scent, which is probably stronger on me than it is on most people because my skin amps all citrus notes like crazy. As it dries, it actually takes on a bit of yellow-green tea smell--very light and delicate, as befits the painting itself. The scent returns to the yellow rose, except it is not accompanied by citrus, but by the creamier notes and perhaps a bit of the honeysuckle. This is a really pretty scent, and for a "light category" scent, it retains strength and staying power pretty well.

The hyssop is tremendous in this blend and it strikes me as rather complex coming out of the imp. I can easily pick up on the hyssop, pomegranate and orchid. Initially it is all hyssop, as I expected, with the pomegranate also in there as well. It is quite juicy and fresh. However, the scent really doesn't develop much as it dries and fades off. There's no resin here whatsoever for me, which is odd, because my skin tends to amp resins. It's almost all hyssop, with the pomegranate at the back, even as it becomes very faint.

In the bottle and wet on my skin this is very aquatic (I guess that makes sense, but silly me when I ordered it, I didn't see this as an aquatic scent)--there's salted wood here with lime. Lots of lime. My skin tends to amp citrus like crazy, and in the wet stage of this blend it is certainly following its usual pattern. When the lime calms down, I'm back to the salted woods note and the salt is starting to take on more of the qualities of ambergris. The other notes blend in the background--there is an indescribable freshness that I will attribute the coconut and the palm. That freshness and beachy quality starts to pick up when the salted wood notes that were there when the scent was wet move into the background. For people who really like beachy scents, this is a lovely blend--very subtle and not quite dark as Intrigue. I do wish I could pick up on more of the red musk or another grounding note for this blend, because I love Intrigue (the only beach/aquatic blend I have a bottle of) because of the depth of the cocoa This one's a real quality oil--lots of character and interaction with the skin.

Wow, folks, this one's a quick morpher! When I opened my bottle I was bowled over by the candied cherry scent--it really does smell like bright red Jolly Rancher candy. However, when I put it on, the Lab's chocolate/cocoa note was all I could smell. As the scent dried down, the cocoa note disappeared again, and I was left with a much paler version of the cherry, mixed in with wine and I can juuuust detect everyone's favorite, aged patchouli, in the background. The cocoa really recedes on my skin, which is a shame as I really like the warmth of that note. I don't get any of the grounding and depth of red musk or red sandalwood--this is all slightly faded cherry wine with patchouli in it. Unfortunately, I'm going to have to swap this bottle away.

In the bottle this really smells amazing--the opoponax, the pine of the galangal and the dragon's blood are a lovely blend that has a bit of earth, but is perhaps more reminiscent of the Gothic resin blends (Darkness, for example). It also reminds me a lot of Penitence. In fact, as I put in on and in the wet stage, Scorpio '07 is a dead ringer for Penitence on my skin. It's all oozing black-brown resin, with perhaps the slightest bit of red, black and purple mixed in with it. Something about the oil seems to invite you to engage with it at an intimate level, but it is also a frustrating oil (at least with my skin chemistry) because of the dominance of the opoponax. I know there are other notes lurking behind the resin, but I can't really reach them (one could argue that this means Beth has perfected the duality of Scorpio in this scent!). As the scent dries--and thankfully it does not disappear as it dries because these are long-lasting resins-I can start to smell a bit of the dragon's blood that I caught in the bottle. The scent continues to get more complex as it dries--from a bit of a distance I can more easily catch a whiff of the wormwood, but up close it is still resins and dragon's blood, warmed the slightest bit by basil. I think will get even more lovely with age, as the resin blends tend to do, and I'm quite glad I picked up a bottle, as I almost turned this one down. It is the first of the 2007 astrological blends that has really caught me (I am a Scorpio ASC).

"Black Orchid" is not a misnomer--this is the darkest orchid I have ever smelled (and I've tried most of the notable orchid blends from BPAL). It also has the distinction of being the only BPAL to ever make me sneeze. When I first smelled my decant, I didn't recognize the floral at first, but when I applied it, I was able to get the orchid spice from among all the other notes. I sense some sort of dirt note--perhaps an extremely clean patchouli (perhaps resembling the one used in Geek?) and perhaps some pepper (why I sneeze?). There's something that is really obscuring the whole orchid from coming forward--I think it's a resin, but I'm not sure which type (tbh, there's the slightest hint of the citrus that came out in Riding the Goat, and someone attributed that to frankincense). It's a fascinating blend, but I am going to have to swap my decant because of the sneezes. My loss is your gain!

Lord, Carnation is just such a lovely scent--it anchors personal favorites of mine like Morocco and Gypsy Queen. On its own this is just a beautiful singular floral, capturing the spiciness and the softness of carnation without being too "soapy" as some pure floral notes tend to do (there's even a bit of the watery-ness one might hope to find on the flower as it naturally grows). It's got beautiful throw and strength--I notice that it's even prettier smelled from a distance (when I shove my nose right in there it does get a bit soapy/floral). A fantastic note--I'm pretty sure I'll hang on to my decant.

Eddie Izzard has a routine about the difficulties of pears--catching them just at the perfect moment of ripeness can be very difficult. The BPAL D'Anjou Pear note does a beautiful job of capturing that moment. As the previous reviewers have indicated, this is a very juicy and ripe and sweet pear, especially when wet. You can imagine the perfectly cut slices in your hand, and it is neither too hard (and thus lacking juiciness and scent) nor too soft (and smelling rotten). On my skin, the undiluted pear remains pretty constant, though it does not last particularly long on me and it almost seems to "go backward" as when it gets lighter it reminds me more of a pear that is not yet ripe (it is still very green and there is a hint of the juiciness to come, but we're not there yet) as opposed to one that has gone soft. When I look at my notes, I see that D'Anjou pear has a tendency to be overwhelmed by other notes when it is in a blend (at least on my skin), and indeed, it is hard to detect after 15-20 minutes. Still, in its moment of ripeness, however brief that might be, it is lovely indeed.

I wish I could pinpoint the exact type of ginger that makes me turn my stomach, because it can make a blend unbearable for me. All I could smell in this blend was that awful ginger smell--absolutely nothing else. I almost vomited (hand to heart--I'm not being hyperbolic) when I smelled this in the imp, and of all the 400+ BPALs I have tried, this was the one that was hardest for me. This was worse on me than Saw-Scaled Viper in terms of the ginger acting up. I had to remove it immediately.

In the imp and on my skin, this is a pretty clean patchouli scent (though I really can't pick up on anything else in the blend). It doesn't really do much on my skin, but as it dried down, it gave me the strangest scent association ever. Some of the casinos in Las Vegas (especially the Tropicana) have this sort of "chemical beach" smell to them that is a weird mix of sand and sunscreen--it's really weird, and not everyone picks up on it. For reasons I cannot fathom, on the drydown, this scent started to resemble that smell on my skin. I'm guessing it was the coconut coming out in a weird way as the scent evolved on my skin.

I expected this to be a more floral counterpart to Pele, and I think that's not a bad way to describe it. In the imp I was really able to pick up on the florals in this blend, as well as the white (i.e., not as evil) ginger. When I put it on, I picked up on cool florals--probably the moon flower and the orchids (I'm not familiar enough with these blooms to say definitively). However, at the back of the scent, as it were, was this odd creamy note. It was almost like coconut, but a little creamier and not quite foody, but almost foody. It really didn't sit well with me, and because of that note, I think I'm going to have to take a pass on this one, which is a shame, because the flowers are really quite pretty and not terribly overwhelming.

This is one of the strangest BPAL experiences that I've ever had. If ever there was a scent tailored for me and me alone, at least by the description, it was this one. Yet, when I tried it on, what happened? Lemons!? I saw people mentioning lemons here in the reviews, and I couldn't fathom it; I've never had a resinous blend do this to me before, except for Nyaralathotep, and I thought that was because of the ozone notes involved in that blend.. The wood behind the resin is a very polished wood, and I didn't get any pipe smoke at all. I think I'm going to have to swap this one out--I'm really stunned at the way my chemistry interacted with this one.

When I try Succor, the descriptive phrase that comes to mind is 'cotton-wrapped.' This is soft lavender, herbalness, with the olives that others have mentioned, but it is wrapped by something nearly transparent, something that obscures and dampens the full olfactory power of all the notes. I think Succor is meant to work by inviting its user to imagine being wrapped like that, being sheltered and defended from the world in that way. The image it evokes is very strong for me, but unfortunately when I visualize myself like that I feel trapped, not protected, and I struggle to break away mentally--it becomes very difficult for me to relax and be still. I don't care for the scent enough on its own to keep the bottle, so I'm going to swap it, but I must say that there is a strong mental connection and image-making ability with this oil, and it is most impressive.

This is going to be one of the shortest reviews I've ever done, but I think anything longer would not do justice to this singularly evocative and perfect blend. Beth does it again--this is easily my favorite Hallowe'en BPAL oil ever! October is autumn leaves, freshly fallen and mixed on the ground--leaves in the twilight between life and death. It is this exactly. There are no notes in parts, just this exact scent, captured in full.

Black amber ruins another one for me--black amber is iffy on me, my skin chemistry makes it smell sort of "off" and stale (same thing happens with black musk), but I thought that the other notes, including khus (vetiver), which is strong on my skin, would balance it out. However, Death of Autumn always holds a dominant note of black amber, even though I can detect really interesting things going on underneath it, like the earthy vetiver and the oud and something else (the galangal? heck, the saffron even?) combining to create this very enticing spicy smoky scent--if that scent had been able to emerge as the dominant part of the blend, then I think it would have been one of my favorites. Alas, the black amber on top makes it always smell just a little bit off. This one will have to go to swaps.

I really hemmed and hawed over this one initially. In the bottle and initially on my skin, this is a dead-ringer for Alecto. Honestly, in the bottle I cannot tell them apart, which to me indicates that my nose hones in on the raspberry and patchouli. Now, the fact that CQ smelled so much like Alecto isn't a bad thing in general, as Alecto is one of my favorite GC blends, but there's no need in having two perfumes that are virtually identical. I was pretty sure that I was going to list CQ for sale, but I decided to wait for a few days and give it another try. When I tried the scent again (and all subsequent times I have worn it), the blend had settled enough to allow the pomegranate, rose/plum and pepper to become more prominent. The result is a gorgeous, more merciful version of the "leaf" scents like Alecto, The Jersey Devil and Lear. I would say that Crypt Queen is the most feminine of all those scents and it is definitely the rose, plum and pomegranate that do it. This is a red blend, but unlike a lot of the other "red" blends, like Scherezade, Mme. Moriarty, Loviatar, Fenris Wolf, etc., this one is more ethereal; it is many shades of red, ranging from deep plummy reds, to the bright reds of roses, to the cool, juicy red of raspbery, and instead of one shade of red being constant and giving the scent an unrelenting force, the shades move through quickly and constantly--sometimes you catch the plum, sometimes the rose, sometimes the raspberry, sometimes the pomegranate--and the flexibility and mystery make this a really cool blend.

Yggdrasil has received multiple plaudits on this thread, but I'd also like to add in another related scent: Ochosi. Ochosi is the same fresh, live woods as Yggdrasil, but without the greenery. It's very clean and I find it unisex (though some others argue it is more feminine).

Tintagel is definitely a winter cinnamon (it's also the only cinnamon blend I've ever tried that gave me a reaction). Chimera really is fantastic, and I would wear it year-round. Al-Shairan is a spring-bordering-on-summer blend, as the clove and cinnamon blend together. Wrath is a really bright cinnamon, Priala is fall/winter (dry cinnamon bark). And then there's Three Witches, which you should never look for ever, ever because it's just dreadful and not the ultimate fall cinnamon blend, not at all. /it's miiiiiiine, allllll miiiiiine!!!

I would go with Bess (fruit and citrus, very clean and fresh); Erato and La Belle au Bois Dormant (both "pink" florals, but light and seemingly appropriate for a young lady); Dirty and The Unicorn (clean and just lovely). /of course, those are culled from my favorites, so I may be biased!

No. 5 is the only non-BPAL perfume I will wear--the oils that have given me that "feel" are Nyx (the jasmine and rose--my exact testing note for this oil is "warm, Chanel-like") and La Petite Mort (which has ylang-ylang, another note in No. 5). Of course, I did not get the No. 5 sense from Ozymandias at all, so take what I have to say with that grain of salt!

In the imp: Marzipan! Wet: Marzipan! Drydown and wear: OK, unlike a lot of other almond scents that I've tried, this one does start to develop some complexity from the amber and musk. This really does have a nice, creamy drydown. I can even hint at a bit of saffon here (a la Scheherezade), and one nice thing about the powerful almond is that it appears to beat the lotus down. The almond and amber really work well together. I'm so glad I've tried this--my previous bad experiences with amber had caused me to put this one off over and over, but it really is gorgeous after a few seconds of straight up marzipan smell.