monocainsheresy

2018 version I avoid scents with more than half a dozen notes as a rule, but LORD am I happy I went for this. This smells exactly like my childhood church. In the bottle and fresh on the skin, this smells like licorice + red wine from the combo of the star anise, palmarosa, the evergreen/citrus tones from the frankincense and elemi, and some elements of the kyphi. Red and fruity, but not un-incensy. After about ten minutes the fruity phase calms down a little and the cassia, sandalwood, and dusty white sage leaves come forward with the warm, powdery incenses of the resins. Very well-balanced and mystical; smells both antique and modern at the same time. The nostalgia of Sunday services and communion wine.

For the first 40ish minutes this smells almost exactly like the ambergris+lavender combo for The Air And The Ether, but once it dries down it's vaguely foody vanilla, the faintest hint of musky lavender, and brown herbs from the fougere. I was hoping for this to be some kind of Dorian + Villain dream, but that's not what I get at all. I already have something that smells almost exactly like it that's a lot better.

Sweet, squishy pumpkin musk and ever so soft oudh in the background. Neither goes funky or overpowering on me, which is fortunate because musk and especially oudh can get really bad really quickly. But this is perfect, soft incense notes from both sides. I love this and I should have gotten a full bottle while I had the chance

True apple. Fresh off the tree, unbitten, musty, dusty, late-autumn apple. This isn't apple + incense, this is like the scent of a room that's had a fresh apple pomander in it every month for years. Warm, sweet, mushy apple. Absolutely divine.

I get cedar and sandalwood only, maybe a bit herby in the background. Sadly, no frankincense. Warm and sweet and magical.

The kind of scent you'll find in an "Ocean Mist" or "Sea Spray" candle. A very gentle aquatic, which is GREAT because I usually despise aquatics, and a wee bit of ozone. I agree with Soupy Twist saying that's it's snowy and sweet. Smells like the taste of fresh ice water.

A bright woody scent - definitely pine and mint in there, and when it's wet i smell sassafras. Probably cedar too. A fresh, clean forest scent that dances on the edge of toothpaste-y, but not in a bad way.

Warm, smooth, clovey musk, with a mildly medicinal edge from the poppy, rounded off by glossy orris. A laid-back masculine scent.

In the bottle this totally smells like Elmer's glue, but as soon as it hits the skin it turns into dusty lavender-vanilla goodness, with a bit of plasticy, sugary bubblegum. The sugar puts this in the same family as Roof Goblins. Extremely reminiscent of Lush's Twilight. A fun, light-hearted, nostalgic scent

Hot, juicy, slightly-ozoney rose

I've been stewing over what this smells like in the bottle since it came out of the mail, and my verdict is freshly opened Satya nag champa incense - musky, a bit floral, weirdly sweet, with that almost-overpowering-dangerously-close-to-goaty oudh undertone. Alternatively, overly-febreezed-bathroom-where-someone-just-took-a-massive-dump. Yeah. It's rough. This one is not for the faint of heart. But if you can get past the nightmare phase, it powders and smooths. The clove, musk, oudh, benzoin, and tobacco team up for a big cloud of incense shop vibe, with an extremely sheer blanket of the lace note, edged by lily. It's still not great, but I actually like this quite a bit if I don't get too close. If there was no lily and the oudh was calmed down a little, this would be superb. The lily-oudh combo smells like goat. It's a problem. Not quite a scrubber, but boy does it come close. I'll be keeping this as an aging experiment.

Loam, moss, and a bouquet of dried flowers. Despite being cloying and sneeze-inducing, I really like this. Kind of like the intersection between Penny Dreadful, Ouija, and Burial.

Dusty green tea leaves, lemon (not cleaning supply lemon, god bless), and sweet floral.

Goes on gritty and smokey. Charred woods and spices, probably vetiver. But then it morphs wildly into an almost foody scorched nutty caramel scent. I like this a lot for the "interesting" factor, but it's a bit much to really love.

Goes on super candy grape, then almost immediately develops a musky woodiness. The grape recedes into a more gentle booze. Dusty and gentle, spooky and refined.

Green grasses and vaguely coffee-y vanilla. Smells an awful lot like freshly ground mullein, which I am VERY happy about. Spinning On Graves's less complex baby sibling.

After 3 years of BPAL hoarding, I FINALLY got a frimp of Snake Oil. Honey-y/musky vanilla - a little green - over sticky melted sugar. Foodier than I expected. Not blown away, and I've definitely smelled a lot of similar scents. These are my thoughts on it when it's less than a week old, so I'm definitely going to buy a bottle and stash it away to age, to see if it's really as glorious as people say.

This is GOOD. This is SO. GOOD. Very well balanced lavender and oceanic ambergris (smells like men's cologne, in a good way!) grounded by light, warm amber. Classy, neutral leaning towards feminine, and really, really chill. New favorite

Plum, a floral cloud, something herbal, and musk. Pretty much just what it says on the tin. Bright and catty.

Definitely honey and almond, and I'm going to guess vanilla and clementines. Once it gets out of the honey + almond phase it smells like peeling a clementine with a background of vanilla. Yummy yummy yummy!

Tingly grapefruit, citrus, and a hint of resins and wood. Smells like an old-fashioned candy shop.

Citrus, light booze, and warmth from the opoponax and vetiver (except you I can't actually smell either of those notes). Smells like champagne grapes taste - one of my all-time faves

Warm golden amber, sandalwood, and heliotrope, candied by the vanilla and peach. Like those big plastic buckets of multi-colored sherbet, warmed to the point of smelling almost boozy.

This one is such a disappointment. Lots of notes that are either very good or very very bad - and unfortunately in Mata Hari they all go bad. Stinky roses, stinky jasmine, dirty coffee, aquatic fig - with the vanilla, tonka, and mahogany trying very hard to smell lovely. Like Miskatonic University in a sewer.

Super sleek - metallic, floral-evergreen, a memory of tobacco, and the thought of musk. Too soapy and sneezy-cologny for me.