yakiguri

Catching birds. Sandalwood incense, patchouli, matcha, cumin, white cedar, white gardenia, ti leaf, and vetiver. Amiuchi on my skin is pretty much all sandalwood incense. I can make out vetiver and patchouli if I really grind my nose into it, but on the whole it's akin to a wood shop. I'll let the decant marinate for a few more months and see if it changes.

Orris root, rice paper, red chypre, Siamese benzoin, Moroccan jasmine. Wet, Intercourse Through Folding Screen starts with a creamy vanilla from the Siamese benzoin (yum!), but this is short-lived as the dry chypre notes push through. Orris is non-existent, which is fine since it has dominated other blends I've tried (I'm looking at you, Roses Pearls and Diamonds). As it dries the rice paper wraps itself around the blend with a soft-and-subtle powdery dryness that I often find in asian scents, accentuated the whole time with jasmine. Eventually the chypre fades into the background and I'm left with soft vanilla-tinged jasmine powder. Overall it's a clean powdery scent, but not baby powdery in the least bit...more like some expensive body powder you'd pick up in Kyoto made of crushed pearls. Since I know a lot of forumites are jasmine-averse, I'd categorize the jasmine in this as the sharper, greener, "cleaner" type--I recognize this note from Salome. Unfortunately it's not my favorite type of jasmine, as I like my jasmine borderline poopy ( ). We'll see what the blend's like in a couple of months, but as of now it's a scent I'd rather dust on me as a powder than wear as a skin oil. EDIT: After a few more weeks of aging the powdery elements have softened and deepened significantly. There's still powder, as Intercourse Through Folding Screen has the dry elements coming from the chypre and rice paper, but it the benzoin is much more prominent now and gives the blend a creamier feel. It's definitely more like a high-end body powder that just melts against your body heat, and the crushed pearls description I gave before is much more apt. I get hints of jasmine here and there but all sharpness is GONE. It's so well blended with the rest of the elements now that it doesn't particularly stand out but you know it's there. The blend stays pretty true wet through (long now!) drydown, and I even got a "mmm, you smell nice" from Mr. Elf. I'll be keeping my bottle, and definitely recommend at least trying this even if you're jasmine-averse.

Exactly what it says on the tin: green tea and cucumber. I also agree with the comparisons to Elizabeth Arden's Green Tea, but this is MUCH softer and not acrid/synthetic smelling. Perfect for days when it's too unbearably hot outside to wear anything but the lightest of scents.

Daruma Doll starts off as juicy HAYYY RED MUSK as all red musk blends too, but quickly the almond and fig seeps in. I don't really get the blood orange (unless that's juiciness when the blend is wet), rose, or cognac. Hoping more aging will make this a bit more interesting. It's nice, but doesn't really stand out among my other red musk blends.

I totally agree that at first this is cologne with a whiff of coffee. As it dries it leans more perfumey, like Lurid Library with a drop of coffee, but the teak and coffee keeps it from getting too high pitched. Curious on how this will smell on Mr. Elf. Glad to have my partial!

Yum, milky, creamy chocolate, sweet but not too sweet. Definitely I'm glad it works on my skin, but since chocolate is not a note I reach for often I'm good with just my decant.

This is lightly toasted, buttery, fluffy, sweet-but-not-too-sweet marshmallows. Exactly what it says on the tin. This isn't close to Boo IMO, Boo is much drier thanks to the linen note. Now I'm craving marshmallows...and a full bottle of this.

Oh man, this is the good stuff. Booze is a note that only works on me when it's thick and syrupy, and in this Beans blend it's definitely thick like molasses. If I didn't know better I would say this blend has tobacco in it, as I'm reminded a lot of Red Lantern but a thicker, sultrier version. It's sweet, smoky, and spicy, and incredibly well blended. This is going to FANTASTIC in the colder months. I have a partial and may need to upgrade to a full bottle before the Lupers come down.

Starting off Phallus Parade is leather with a dash of cola (is that the tea melding with something else?). As it dries the blend turns into powdery incense with a dash of sweetness from the champa blossom, and unfortunately a bit of plastic. I'm hoping more aging will bring out the leather and tea more. Glad to have a partial but I think that'll do.

Has anyone been able to find a dupe for Variety of Pleasing Amusements? I just finished up my first bottle and I'm slowly nursing my second (and last) bottle. I saw a response here a few years ago that Perversion is close, but it has champagne (I can't handle booze notes aside from rum and cognac) and I don't currently have an imp of it.

On my skin this reads like Evil and more Chaotic...not the actual Chaotic blend, but the notes here are so discordant and just generally do not work on me. It starts off with a thick puff of opium and tobacco smoke, then devolves into a funky blend of plum and kush. Every now and then I get a whiff of salt from the ambergris. Evil doesn't smell bad (ha!) per se, just...WRONG. Which I guess is a kind of evil? /shrug

Scent-wise Neutral is exactly as it says on the tin, a skin musk that reads as slightly red to my nose. Mostly clean, but just a tad spicy. It's is like that coveted my-lips-but-better (MLBB) lipstick shade: nothing exciting, but just adds that little extra oomph to lift you from blah to, well, you-but-better. I wouldn't wear it on its own but it'd definitely help anchor other blends together.

Tested on Mr. Elf. On its own, Fighter is COLD STEEL with clean leather in the background. No blood whatsoever. I guess he amps the metal note as the feel I get from this blend is cold and sharp. Testing with Neutral, the coldness comes back a bit but it's still piercingly sharp. Mr. Elf likes it, which is all that matters, but it's too sharp for my own personal tastes. Trying it on myself, more of the blood notes come out, but it's still too cold and sharp for me.

Tested on Mr. Elf. Sherlock Holmes starts off as clean, safe scent but quickly gets down and dirty with the leather, tobacco, and rosin. It's spicy, but not Middle-Eastern bazaar type spicy, but more aftershave+outdoors+I've-been-up-to-something-nefarious. This is the guy that seems safe and approachable at first but you later find he has a hell of a mean streak. My favorite type.

I completely agree that La Petite Mort is like a watered down O. LPM is nice, but, for lack of better term, too safe for my tastes. It's soft, sweet, and just a tad spicy. Since both are named after bedroom activities I'd say O is the raw, raunchy, bed-thumping, bodice-ripping kind of sex and La Petite Mort is the gentle, romantic, soft-sighs-between-the-sheets sort. If O didn't work for you but you'd like something in the same family, try this. As for me, O does work and does much more complex and interesting (dirtier) things with my skin chemistry. I'll enjoy my imp but can't see myself upgrading to a full bottle unless O suddenly ceases to exist. This could also work if you enjoy O but it's too raunchy a scent for the office.

Every whiff of this I get an acrid, chemical-powder note that I sometimes get from fresh black leather scents, but black leather isn't in this, right? Then I reread the notes. Orris. Orris = violets = one of my biggest death notes. Even though it's not on my skin, my nose just does NOT like the smell of violet. It always reads as "cheap dryer sheets" to my nose, and unfortunately it throttles the typically dominant red musk into brutal submission. Guess I was so excited about everything else in the blend I completely missed that orris was in this. Off to sales she goes.

I like to throw on anything with green tea before a run for that extra zing! of energy and freshness.

HUGE recommendation for Knight in Shiny Armor: Dapper lavender fougere with white carnation, sweet oakmoss, clary sage, crisp leather, bourbon vanilla, and a hint of armor polish. This is my husband's signature scent and I'm still kicking myself for not buying backups. To my nose (and on my husband's skin) it's in the same family as Dorian and Jareth but not nearly as sweet. The leather and moss is much more in the forefront.

I've always wondered what all the hubbub was about with Banshee Beat, and now I know. UUUUUUUUUNNNNNNNNNNNFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF Revenant Rhythm is just what's described on the tin: a thick, chewy vanilla'd patch with a light tinge of herbal woods from the hemp. It's unabashedly dirty yet sweet, gritty and soft. This, THIS is the magic sauce I've picked up in SO many of my favorite blends, so I know I'm going to have to get the atmo, the bath oil, and GALLONS of the perfume oil when it finally comes out.

I find The Poem Cloud not similar to Smut at all, but more like a lighter, simpler Third Charm. Want to wear red musk but don't want to overpower others (or yourself) with it? Then grab a bottle of The Poem Cloud. This is going to be lovely layered with other red musk blends.

Plum and blackcurrant are two of the very few fruits that work on my skin, and they're right at the forefront of this blend. Unfortunately something musty is lurking in the background, and as First Cry dries the mustiness becomes stronger and stronger. I don't get much of the other notes, but I'm hoping they'll come out more as the blend ages.

I don't know how Beth does it, but while The Cat doesn't actually smell like burying your face in kitty fur, it smells like the idea of it. It's musky and sleek thanks to the musk and cedar, but soft and sweet thanks to the honey and benzoin. The cedar and musk gain more prominence as the blend dries down and veers a bit too close toward pencil shavings, but as my bottle is lab fresh I'm sure more aging will smooth this out.

I took a gamble on this blend too since, while honey and musk are both phenomenal on my skin, the last honey musk blend I bought (Capax Infiniti) went all sorts of NO on my skin. I have nothing to worry about here. The vanilla here is the exact same vanilla I got from Impressions of the Floating World, with it's light but chewy peanut-butteriness. The magnolia here is strong but not headache-inducingly so as the honey musk reins it back and gives the blend a backbone of soft sweetness. This is quite lovely and if you're waffling on it, get it as I get the feeling this will be quite difficult to find once the Lupers go down.

Ohh, another win from this year's Lupers. I swear this year broke my wallet with the intensity of a thousand suns. >_< On my skin, the book is light, sweet leather with a whiff of boozy vanilla and bright roses. The mix of vanilla bourbon tar and tonka are thick and chewy, almost tobacco-like, and I agree that the roses are definitely pink with their candy sweetness. I can't wait to see what more age will do this blend, as it's already quite stunning.

I took a gamble on this one since citrus tends to ruin blends on my skin, but I LURVS me some lilac and fougeres, so... Initially I get a sharp, acidic blast that I immediately recognize as the lime turning the blend to pine sol yet again. Luckily though within a few minutes the honey and lilac strong-arm the lime into submission, but it's still thrashing and vying for my nose's attention. When the lime was more of drop as described, and not the firehose to my nose it's trying to be, was a quite lovely honeyed woodsy lilac with a zing! of freshness. Since my bottle is lab fresh I hope some aging will calm the lime down some.