smallvoice

Wow, chemistry is funny - I haven't tried Severin, but the rest of those all smell completely different to me! (But I can see how they'd be similar if you amp the citrus, especially - I get very little citrus from Dorian and Baobhan Sith was very pink grapefruit, unlike the lime in Whitechapel or white grapefruit in Vampire Tears.) I think of those, the closest would be Babhan Sith (which was a sharp, sharp floral on me, surprisingly) and Vampire Tears... Dorian is super rich and sweet on me. Whitechapel is clean and the best lime scent I've gotten my hands on. Severin smells like nothing, to me. Seriously. It's like my nose blanks out or something. Vampire Tears is milder than I remember Baobhan Sith being, and smoother. Baobhan Sith has something in common with Aizen-myoo, as I recall. It is amazing how our chemistries vary! I love hearing things like that.

Hmm! On me, Kill-Devil is mostly Sugar Skull. I think it's got a boozier feel, though.

You should really consider trying Mag Mell if you haven't previously. It's worth a try. Let it drydown for at least 10 minutes.

Blood orange always reads as "gummi bears" to my nose. So when it first goes on and it's wet, it smells like peppery gummi bears. Then it gets on my skin, and the complexity begins. The frankincense must be what is smelling like pepper to me. I bet this is going to age gorgeously. It's smoky and sexy and extremely well balanced. I wish the candied orange would stick around longer, because it's completely gone on my skin right now. It's not exactly me, but it's a fantastic blend. Edit 6/22: You know, the more I wear this, the more I like it. I might actually have to start thinking about adding it to my wishlist! There's something provocative about it... a glimpse of something naughty, so short you almost missed it... maybe you even imagined it. Plus, there's gummi bears.

I agree with so many others, in that this smells generic and empty. It is a perfect execution of the idea. I also must add that I do NOT get along with tuberose, so this was especially awful on me. I love the label. I love the humour that has been infused into this blend. So, that's the short of it. I'll get into some more details: It's heavy florals on me, with an overwhelming feeling of a generic perfume in a drugstore. It's a little too high class for all that, though. There's a phase it goes through on me where the citrus makes it "sparkle," but that doesn't last long enough, and there's still the tuberose to contend with. I think the citrus actually turns on me and goes sharp after that. It's just not good on me. I'm glad to see it getting some love lately, though!

Vinland was 100% Irish Spring, to my nose. It's discontinued, but shouldn't be hard to find.

But isn't Chaste Moon pineapple and butterscotch? Not even a little bit... it's soft (slightly buttery) vanilla over pale, sweet flowers, on me. It's a little bit like a less icy Snow White. For a Bakeneko approximation, maybe Dorian and Shub, or Dorian and Katharina... but I don't know. That one was quite unique on me. Men Ringing Bell With Penises has the same tea note I remember, but lacks the fruitiness and the throw.

That's interesting- I do have a beloved bottle of Vasakasajja (Marked "V" on the top of the cap), but it doesn't remind me at all of Tiki Queen- I loved it because it feels very similar to Chaste Moon to my nose. How odd! I love hearing these recommendations, because it's so interesting to hear how differently things react.

The gin is totally there, making me blink, and my nose wince. I love the blueberry note, so I put a drop of this on, and...... it dries down to almost exactly what Midway smells like on me- which, while this would be a good sentence for most people to utter, it is not good for me. WTF?? It's dusty with a hint of sweet fruitiness- there's fizz to this one, where there was just dust in Midway, but... woah. There's something wrong with my chemistry. What a strange drydown! Will update if things change.

I've never found ANYTHING that smells close to the gorgeousness that is Tiki Queen, but I would love to hear if anyone else has, as well. Also? This thread has convinced me that I need both Galvanic Goggles and Antikythera Mechanism. And I apparently need a bottle of Antique Lace to layer with everything.

This immediately smells like pine and smoke on me, which is unsurprising. Once I get over my initial flinch away from pine, because it always smells like pine sol or car air fresheners to me, it actually does resemble being out in the woods, camping. And then something strange happens. It's threatening me with soapiness- man soap, if you know what I mean- and then... eventually, in the drydown, the opaline notes from To Helen show up, and nonchalantly act as though they belong there. To Helen goes camping on my skin, folks. And she takes a dip in the river with the soap she brought... yeah, that's what this smells like on me. I'm such a freak of nature!

Valentine of Rome is ALL wrong for me. That's why I didn't order it. None of it appealed to me. The notes sounded too dark for my tastes... it was just not me. Then reviews came in, and the things I read about it made me wonder if I could be wrong. It's happened before, after all! So up it went on my wishlist. And then I scored a bottle in a swap. And it is amazing from the first bottle sniff to the hour later drydown. This is a treasure. The spicy note keeps making me think of Chimera, and I think there's some almond... or is it something else? It reminds me of Eclipse, too. I love it. I am SO glad I tried it.

In my mind, Indiana Jones wears Mechanical Phoenix when he's "teaching" "archaeology", and Western Diamondback (Yes, a snake) when he's "gathering artifacts."

My favourite lavenders are Villain and Wulric... and I don't usually like lavender.

Just going to add my support for Katharina as one of the all time best apricot blends out there. I love it. I also really love Yerevan, and it is in a completely different category to me than Katharina is.

I'm in the minority of people who didn't like Underpants. It was NICE, but nothing that I wanted to sell my soul for. I don't do well with sandalwood, however. Love's Philosophy, though, has a really rich cream soda scent to it and it's on my top 10 list of LE's. So... I don't think they're similar at all. I do think Tombstone is really close to Love's Philosophy, if you've tried it.

Marae smells quite a lot like Euphrosyne on me. Anactoria smells quite similar to Black Lace- sweet musk. It lacks the tobacco and that hint of vanilla, though. The anniversaries actually are usually blends that were discontinued from the catalog- Midway was a (welcome) anomoly.

So, this smells remarkably like Dr. Pepper in the bottle... if somebody added almond liqueur to it. And burnt it. I was SO worried. It really does smell fizzy. On my skin, though? It's so strange. I love it, though! It has really good lasting power, not a ton of throw. I totally get the Doc Buzzard comparison... but this is so much better. It smells like cigarette smoke a little bit, but expensive cigarettes. Then it's warm and spicy, a little like Port Royal, and then I smell cotton candy. Seriously. Don't ask me how that got there, because I don't know. It doesn't smell like cotton candy trying to smother me, I just catch hints of it from time to time. The rest of the time, it's a rich, warm, lovely blend that is absolutely gorgeous, and absolutely nothing like I would've expected.

Huckleberry, white rose, tangerine, nicotiana, lemon blossom, and Fool's Parsley. This is sort of sharp in the bottle- probably the parsley. White rose, apparently, loves me more than red roses. It is smooth and soft. I was worried the huckleberry would be sharp or that the nicotiana would be heady (due to unfamiliarity with it, maybe?) or that the rose would be overwhelming. It's none of those things. It's a soft, happy blend. It's like being curled up on the couch in the arms of someone who loves you with a warm blanket while it rains outside and reading a favourite book or watching a favourite movie. It smells like contentment, to me. And I must agree, the label is stunning.

A couple of quick corrections, if I may Gennivre is from Carnaval Diabolique and Pollution is from the Good Omens collection. And a comment on the one I know of: Persephone and Libra may be in the same scent family, but for me Persephone is a whole lot more wearable. The rose from Libra still has a hit out on me, I think. Also, I need to check out Imp because IIRC, there's no red musk in it, and it may be something in the Smut family I can actually wear!

I totally get the comparisons to Love's Philosophy. This, on me, is like a less sweet version of Love's Philosophy, but still wonderful. I remember sniffing this in '06 and wrinkling my nose and thinking, "Eww! Cedar!" as I tend to do. Cedar has a habit of going pencil shavings on me. It seems to work nicely in this blend, and I may have to wrangle up some Antique Lace to see about layering the two. It smells like spiced cream soda. It lacks a bit of the creamy quality of LP, and some of the richness, but quite a good comparison- and really, an excellent scent. I would love to find more scents in this family!

I really do not love lavender as a note. In fact, in BPAL blends, it is commonly known to make me sneeze when it's at the forefront of a blend. I am well aware, however, that when it comes to BPAL and my chemistry, the only hard rule is no red musk... and I am awaiting the day even that will be misproven. All that said, I love the scent Villain, which features lavender quite prominently, and as I was mulling over if I wanted to swap for Wulric or not, I came across a review that said Wulric was a richer, more complex Villain. I was sold. When I opened the bottle, all I could smell was that sharp, bracing lavender that I don't like, with a hint of sweetness underneath. I rolled the bottle, having been warned that this was one of the blends that will separate, then took another sniff. Chocolate-y lavender. Hmm. Once on my skin, the lavender takes charge immediately, and then is told to sit down and shut up, because the other notes are tired of being bullied, and they're not gonna take it anymore! So it sits down and makes nice with everybody, and voila! A cohesive team. It is gourmand, not foody, on me. I love it. It's like Villain wrestled a Death Adder, then took a bath in Boomslang. But there's something even more- it's just very complex and deep. Seems like it could be worn most any time of year, really. EDIT: A lot of people seem to be confusing CISTUS with CITRUS. Cistus is the actual ingredient; there's no citrus in it. Similar scents: Villain, Bliss, Boomslang, Death Adder, Lump of Coal

51, Mag Mell (give it some time to dry), Regan (as previously mentioned), Bewitched, Katharina and Mouse's Long and Sad Tale all come to mind.

Mag Mell does not smell good to me in the imp. It's sharp and perfume-y... almost cologne-y, really. Astringent. Piercingly so. And it smells like that on my skin for about 3 minutes, maybe less. Then... I can actually smell the rainy scent. Rain on grass- it's like being a kid on a cool spring day, laying out in the grass in bare feet and it's not incredibly warm, but it's warm enough that it signals the coming summer months, which were always the best ones... And then it's a warm bit of rain that comes down for a few minutes; long enough to leave a rainbow and the scent behind. It dries down into this lovely, warm, inviting scent. It's quite pretty. I'm going to see how much I use my imp before I decide if I need to put it on my bottle waiting-list or not. I'd list scents that have a similar feel, but the only thing I can even begin to come up with is 51... maybe Bewitched.

Port Royal smells AMAZINGLY close to what I remember Hamadryad smelling like when it was cinnamon-y.