nathanielhebert

Planting Moon 2009 Frederic 2008

Sacrifice (Vampire-Cowboy)

The Norns' Farmhouse Mr. Vandemar

Cheers! I've been collecting little tea cup sets and doll house furniture for my rescued house sparrows, who've more or less taken over my room. Erik (Great Duets in Horror 2009)

The Grand Inquisitor's Heretic's Fork Corrupt Chancellor

THE NIGHT-RAVEN—Indigo musk, wild plum, rose geranium, benzoin, night-blooming jasmine, and patchouli. For White Moon, off the top of my head, perhaps The Night-Raven might work. It's a sharp floral with a purple feel about it, and when mixed with the dry woody note of the patchouli, it remains rather astringent on my skin.

I haven't tried The Gentleman, but two scents come to mind that might fulfill the "dapper cologne with a hint of citrus" profile. Bram Stoker is nice and refined, and I could have sworn there was something akin to lemon peel in here, but the bergamot seems to come across on the citrusy side of things. The lab notes include bourbon vetiver with opoponax, Italian bergamot, and hay absolute. Incantation reminds me of Bram Stoker, and despite the listed notes—vetiver, dark woods, crumbling and burnt black sandalwood with a drop of lemon rind—this is a really light and crisp blend which I'll be saving for the sweltering dog days of summer!

Sticks and stones may break my bones, but Krampus will likely kidnap me and toss me into a river! It's exciting to have two Krampuses together to compare and contrast! Krampus (2006) Now this is a pleasant surprise! I had received the 2012 version first, which left me feeling a little nonplussed about Krampus in general. However, the 2006 version delivers on the notes it promises. In the bottle, it's slightly sour and sharp, and unfolds beautifully on my skin upon application. All the notes seem to be well balanced. There’s the dusty rags up front, and the switches in play are green and vegetal. These aren’t dry twigs, but live branches that Krampus has gleefully hacked off a tree—a scent that reminds me of the autumnal blend, October. The red musk is present, but kept in check by the depth of the worn black leather. Overall, it’s a dry, somewhat masculine scent that I can imagine I’ll be reaching for throughout the year. Krampus (2012) In the bottle, it’s very sweet. Like VERY sweet. It’s mainly juicy red musk, that eclipses all the other notes. I had splashed a dab onto myself, and unsolicited, my wife remarked, “You smell like a fruit cake!”. I’m sure she was referring to the sticky Yule log that people like to gift. ( and re-gift ) Certainly smells like spiced, candied fruit. It’s almost like the Sugar Plum Fairy was paying Krampus a visit, and he subsequently tossed her into the batter of his gâteau aux fruits, which he later served up to guests with a disturbing twinkle in his eyes. If this were a deathmatch, Krampus 2006, definitely takes the cake—and much like the reviled holiday fruitcakes, I will likely recycle the 2012 version onwards.

Krampus (2006) and Krampus (2012)

Cheers! For some reason, I've been deriving more pleasure that I thought I would providing a little context for the various scents!

Streets of Detroit is predominantly a resinous myrrh, with a slap of sweet black musk, and a dribble of motor oil for some character. In fact, the myrrh is more forward than in Sloth, and that's just a two note blend! The gritty motor oil is the first to dissipate while drying down, but on a whole, I felt the mix to be too sweet for my liking. After a botched first attempt to wear this, I gave Streets of Detroit another whirl, slathering it on before going to bed, but the sweetness crept up on me, becoming almost cloyingly unbearable. I awoke at 5AM, feeling super queasy, with the Streets still going strong, so I had to hop into the shower to wash it off and couldn’t get back to sleep afterwards. I usually pride myself on having an iron constitution, but I don’t think I’ll be able to stomach this one, even though I really want to like it. Honestly, the culprit seems to be the black musk—a scent I had always assumed smells unobtrusive and sensual. It's the backbone for some of my favourite blends like Leopold Freiherr, German Expressionist Horror, and Mr. Croup. I bought two, lab-fresh bottles from BPAL recently, Iago and Streets of Detroit, both of which are simple, so the notes have nowhere to hide. Iago had the same effect on me, eliciting a knee-jerk gag reflex (even though I loved the imp!), and sniffing them back to back, the black musk note is the one that’s turning my stomach. I know there’s seasonal variations in the blends, but this black musk reminds me of the syrupy red musk scents that haven’t worked for me in the past. I'll let the Streets of Detroit sit and plan on revisiting it in the future, but that negative scent association might be a hard bike to re-mount even if my chemistry sorts itself out.

This one was a bit of a head scratcher for me, because on paper, it's like a checklist of all my favourite notes. Scorched wood, myrrh, black musk, vetiver? Yes, please! Even the reviews in this thread made Peninsula Fulminum sound quite enticing, with the promises of smouldering campfires and scorched earth. Unfortunately, I didn’t really experience any of that because right in the bottle and on my skin, cognac comes SCREAMING to the fore. This is by far the booziest blend I’ve yet to experience from BPAL. And it’s really not a pleasant one—it’s like someone spilled a bottle all over their liquor cabinet, and after it evaporated, the sticky sweet leftovers were scraped up and added to the mix. Maybe it’s a case of something not aging well in the bottle, but this is far too cloyingly sweet for me, smelling more like a fortified dessert aperitif than a dry brandy. I had to wash it off the first time, and thought the scent deserved a fair chance, but I couldn’t sit through the second application to get through most of the dry down. I can tell there’s something complex and possibly awesome happening underneath the cognac, but it’s just too much in the foreground to really tell. I’m thinking maybe the myrrh and benzoin are sitting under the alcohol, lending the impression of a dessert wine gone bad, but the intense booziness of this made me too queasy to see if the other notes would emerge from the shadows of the cognac.

Peninsula Fulminum The Bloody Banister

Silas Ruthyn Oh, Uncle Silas, don't you know smoking will be the death of you?

October, smells like a forest on the autumnal end of things!

Traipsing Through the Crop Circles

This is a tough review to submit to, because based on the strength of the imp alone, Iago had catapulted into my proverbial Top Ten. Sadly, the bottle purchase is not the same beast that I had grown to treasure. This is the first time I'd been genuinely disappointed by a BPAL purchase. (oh, the folly of expectations!) In the vial, Iago was dark, viscous, very sharp, and uncompromisingly dry. Crude, rude, vulgar—yes Iago was all that, but the fascination with the grotesque kept luring me back. The black leather and vetiver felt like a slap to the face, and the musk lewdly conjured up images of mares in heat. Even the tiniest dabs would waft up like a sinuous curl hours after application. While hiking through the woods in winter, I was genuinely afraid I’d have to lock heads with the bucks who’d been seen roaming through the forest. Fast-forward, and the bottle is like a musty, muted version of my treasured scent. I skeptically slathered some on before a bike ride, only to be accosted by a blast of something sacchrine that I kept picking up on. Oh no, Iago was now cloyingly sweet to the point it began to turn my stomach! This was a Iago who really let himself go. He’d traded in his leather pants for something a little more comfortable with an elastic waistband. His stomach for woman had been usurped by a love of cake, and he was now flirting dangerously with Type 2 diabetes. The black musk which seemed rather unobtrusive and sensual before, now reeked like sweet-smelling urine. This was no pleasant slice of gateau, instead it came across as cake that had been vomited up—equal parts sugary and repulsive. It says something about its lasting power, as it took several showers to wipe away the scent until it was nothing but an unpleasant memory. I’ll let it settle, and revisit Iago at a future date, but until then I’ll cherish every last drop that is left in my imp.

I seem to have a penchant for the oddities in the BPAL collection and Tattie Bogle is no exception. Autumn is my favourite time of year, so it's always nice to find a scent that evokes the season without crutching on pumpkins and spices. In the bottle, the scent of gunpowder is strongest, which might be off-putting to some, but I find it strangely comforting—sort of like the wafts of gasoline one might inhale when filling up at a station. It dials down upon application, but lingers, mingling with the scent of hay and dry woods. Unlike other blends with similar notes, such as Agnes Nutter, this is gunpowder that hasn't been ignited. Instead, it's been safely stored in wooden barrels and tucked away into a shed alongside bales of hay and other rustic sundries. The whole scene plays out like a day spent in an old barn, sifting through straw, while old farm machinery idles quietly in the distance. It maintains its presence over time, and is also wonderfully dry, without any sweetness creeping up into the blend. Overall, Tattie Bogle's found a place in my proverbial top ten, and has left me pining for autumn, even though we're just beginning to emerge from the icy bite of winter!

German Expressionist Horror

"I got an imp of Serpent's Kiss in a swap and fell absolutely in love only to discover that it had been discontinued a few months previously." Now I haven't sampled Serpent's Kiss before, but one of my favourite blends that balances vetiver and dragon's blood resin to perfection is, skekUng the Garthim-Master, which according to the Lab notes contains, "vetiver, smoke, steel, and dragon's blood resin." It's a surprisingly light blend, the vetiver is green and crisp here, and there's a modicum of restraint with the dragon's blood in the mix, adding just enough sweetness to temper the vetiver. It's a scent that's in my proverbial top 10, and you can't go wrong with telling people you're wearing a Skeksis perfume when asked! http://www.bpal.org/topic/81653-skekung-the-garthim-master/

October (2014) Bonfire (single note) Samhain (2014) Mr Croup (do NOT invite this guy to a tea party)

More label art! Le Père Fouettard Leopold Freiherr Von Tsemekwes, The Poet Rapscallion

Some label art photos of recent acquisitions! Tattie Bogle: Hans Trapp

I'm happy to have received this, as I was pining to give the evil-Yules an olfactory whirl! Off the bat, in the bottle, Hans Trapp reminds me of peppermint toothpicks. (little sharpened sticks!) As it unpacks itself on the skin, it settles into a very worn leather scent, dusty from years of use, with the Alpines still clinging to its surface. It's sooty, and dry, with just a whisper of twiggy birch woods—like stumbling into an abandoned wooden cabin in a mountain retreat. It's a keeper!

This was a purchased imp, and upon popping the top, I was pleasantly surprised. I may have even uttered a "Wow!" as I took in a breath. This is moreso the fighter who scraps it out in the pits—a Spartacus, decked out in new leathers, baking in the heat of the sun as he duels other gladiators while representing house Batiatus. My initial scent memories that were triggered, brought me back to highschool gym class, sweating in our uniforms, tossing medicine balls, and trying unsuccessfully to do anything cool on the suede covered pommel horse. The combination of the musk, blood and steel really recalls to mind the sort of skin musk that lingers after spending all day in the sun at the community swim pool, or the odour that's still present post-shower after you've just completed a grueling workout. It's funky, but also somewhat pleasant and feral at the same time. A few dabs on my inner arms, and I could smell the musk wafting up all day, even while weighed down in my winter coat. This is like Iago, but without the rude slap of vetiver—I can safely layer this over other blends that benefit from a little rough musk, breathing humanity into gleaming metals and other non-organic scents. Big bottle worthy for sure!