Sunny the Wizard

When it's wet, this scent has the most spectacular rotting apple smell. It's precisely that sulfuric-y scent of an apple you've left out too long, to the point it genuinely startled me. As the scent wears, however, those earthy oakmoss-y notes come out, sweetened by the rose petals. Maybe weird to say but I appreciate how the lab isn't scared to really confront you with 'unpleasant' notes at first lol. Not a scent I think I'll be wearing regularly because of those initial notes, but I certainly don't regret having it.

This one is just absolutely lovely; I get less of a rice milk sort of smell to it than I do the creamy sweetness of like an almond milk? It's bright and sweet and a little bit spicy. It's funny, I didn't get a lemony note until I read other people saying it smelled lemony to them, and now it does smell a bit like a lemon cream biscuit, but then it sort of fades into a more spicy note again the more I smell it. I'm sitting here literally just inhaling my wrist lol. I put it on maybe half an hour ago and it's already fading a little, but that's likely due to the amount I put on and not the scent itself.

I will first admit to being incredibly biased when it comes to the concept behind this scent. I'm a big fan of Effy's work both in the squared circle and in making wrestling a safer space for queer performers, my most recent order was about 80% just to get my hands on this bottle. But, thankfully, I was not disappointed by the scent itself. Hay, incense, and bay rum are the big major notes I get in the bottle, wet, and dry. I'm not sure about any sort of kaleidoscopic or shifting effect, the smell stayed pretty consistent on me, and I didn't get any green or 'old lady' notes. But hey, that's the magic of perfume, and I'm just glad that it works for me. "A roll in the hay with a demonic daddy" indeed, it's delicately masculine on me with a seductive quality that I'm a big fan of. I'm not sure if it makes me the daddy, if it draws daddies, or if it is a gesture towards the great archetypal daddy, but I feel daddy in this 5ml tonight and it's definitely going into my regular rotation.

Deliciously rich and leathery, on wet the tobacco notes are really strong and it smells delightfully masculine on me. As it wears it gets waxy and sweeter, and as people have said, there's some incense notes on here I find very compelling. I know this is meant to be based on Baba Yaga's black rider, but I can't help but think of an infernal midnight cowboy when I smell it, riding on a horse with brimstone hoofbeats and an appropriately wide-brimmed black hat. It's very masculine, decently aggressive in how the notes come together, and is something that I'll be sure to only wear paired with a leather jacket.

On wet I got a lot of those leather and wood notes, although I'm not sure my nose is good enough to separate the woods out. It does smell very 'mens cologne'-y, but there's a depth to it that I really enjoy. It's soft and inviting, in the same sort of wheelhouse as Miskatonic University in that it smells like an academic sort of masculinity. I'm not sure my skin really picks up parchment at all, considering both this and Miskatonic lacked any parchment notes for me, but the incense notes have emerged out after a day's wear really wonderfully, which compliments what remains of the leather. It's definitely a keeper for me.

I got this one from the incense sample pack, and I've been waiting to test it out of nervousness that I wasn't going to like it. Turns out I needn't have bothered; it's wonderful. The notes I get from it are sweet and clean, I think I smell myrrh and I definitely get lemony incense notes. When wet the smell strongly reminded me of wax melts from a candle company over here, there's some beeswaxy quality to it that I think is the honey scent note. It's gotten a bit less sweet and more incensey as it's dried, I think I might be getting some wine-grape or raisin notes from it. All in all, it's lovely, it makes me think of the warmth of the sun on my face.

Echoing what a number of other people in here have said; I find it difficult to pick out individual notes beyond an overall sense of dragon's blood and something sweet and spicy. That said, it's absolutely delicious, and I did notice it settling my frayed nerves when I tried it on. Placebo, aromatherapeutic, magic, I don't know and I don't mind, this scent is like a warm hug from someone strong.

I liked the smell in the imp, and I was excited for another nice clean scent, but when wet it took on a really strong cleaning chemicals smell that legitimately faded in minutes, leaving... a whole lot of nothing? No tea, no white musk, no aloe, just the faintest smell of lemon cleaning spray. I put on the same amount of embalming fluid as I do every other perfume of theirs, so I was legitimately baffled at how quickly the scent faded. I might try layering it with something to see if there's any improvement, but otherwise it's going into the swap pile.

Wet, I got a lot of milk and honey notes, the bergamot really came through as a strong middle note, and the rose was happy to take a back seat. As it dried, however, that milk and honey scent gradually faded, and unfortunately now it's full 'grandma perfume'. Powdery with strong rose notes and very little else; it actually reminds me of the soap and potpourri that used to be at my grandparents house. It's a little disappointing- I don't think I was going to keep it anyway, but it's definitely going onto the swap pile now.

When wet, I was legitimately stunned at how much this smelled like real roses. Not rose perfume, real roses. We have a rose bush out the back of our place and it smells just like the crushed petals of them. As it dried, I got some of the carnation notes, and the tea eventually poked its head out, but the rose is really the hero of this scent. The rose note goes from fresh real roses to what I can only describe as turkish delight, all sweet rose-water deliciousness. I like the smell of it it, it's just not my kind of thing to wear, so it's being passed on graciously.

I got this one in the incense scents imp pack, although I was a little disappointed, I don't really get any incense smell from it. When wet I got a lot of that lemony note, it reminds me of something like lemon myrtle or lemon verbena. Then as it dried, it turned... vaguely sweet and indistinct. It's not an unpleasant smell by any means, I wouldn't mind this as a scented candle or if someone else was wearing it, it's just a bit one-note for me; I'd probably look to something like Whitechapel for a similar lemony, clean, and masculine scent, with just a bit more complexity.

A darling of mine strongly recommended this to me after I expressed my adoration for Hellfire, and to be frank, it's one of the best things they've done for me. For me, Miskatonic takes a very clear path in development. It starts off with chocolate, then drifts to coffee, then embitters further into wood, before finally easing into a smoky rich tobacco type smell. On an instance when I tried to slather myself in it, I noticed the bitter notes were a lot more upfront, which was a good lesson in moderation. I don't think I've had a scent that gets less sweet as it wears on me before, but it's absolutely delicious, it makes me feel sexy in a 'hot professor' type of way. I don't even really have that much more to add, it's going to be something I intend on ordering again, and even beyond it smelling incredible, it'll always make me smile and think of the person who suggested it to me.

I picked up the white florals pack for mum, as a lot of the notes listed were things she really likes, but we ended up getting a duplicate frimp of Juliet along with the one in the pack. My sister's mentioned some interest in BPAL while we've been on the phone with her, so I figured I'd try this one out, see if it's something she'd like, and then send it to her if it's suitable. Wet and in the bottle, you really get the pear notes. It adds a really subtle sourness that I really like, that transforms it from 'boring white floral' to something with a bit more interest. It fades a bit pretty quickly though, leaving a sweet floral bouquet. You definitely get the honeysuckle, maybe a touch of the lilies. As of writing this the smell has deepened a little bit, is a bit more rounded instead of just high notes of florals, I hesitate to say it reminds me of pears cooked in cinnamon and vanilla. It's very clean and very graceful, maybe a little bit soapy as some people have said, but not in a bad way at all. Not a scent I'd choose for me, and too 'girly' for mum, but I'm definitely passing it on to my sister, I'm sure she's going to adore it. Now, I think we had some pears in the fridge...

I got this one as a frimp, it's not a scent I would've gotten for myself as I don't think I'm that interested in fruit scents, but I was willing to give it a red hot go. In the bottle I got a lot of the scent notes that were on the description; apple, banana, chili, sugar cane Unfortunately, my skin exacerbated the sweet qualities of this scent to a degree that was legitimately unpleasant. The banana smell took over very quickly, leading to what I could only describe as 'being pummeled to death by a very angry sentient stick of bubblegum'. As it dried, it got worse and more intense, until eventually I was forced to wash it off. I roped mum into testing it alongside me, just out of sheer curiosity to see if this was just a me problem, but she got a lot of the same notes as I did, except right in the middle there was a big hit of acrid smoke, like someone had lit a pineapple on fire. Definitely going to swap this one, I don't doubt that others got a good experience out of it, but I'm going to try to avoid any more scents with banana in it just to be safe.

Out of the bottle and wet, this one just screams medicinal herbs. Slightly bitter, and my nose isn't sharp enough to pick out individual notes, but the woody scent comes through very strongly. I don't get so much of the florals here, but that's not a bad thing, I like the stronger woody notes. As it's been wearing, an ash-y incense-y note has been peeking out, along with a very mellow deep note I'm not sure I can identify beyond 'delicious'. I think I got some of that chervil note too as it dried, but nothing that made me feel like I was a garden salad. Definitely glad this one is a 5ml bottle.

This one here was my first full-sized bottle and the first scent I wore from BPAL. The perfume gods must've been smiling on me, because it's the scent I default to most often, probably the closest I'll get to a signature scent considering how much I need novelty. In the bottle: Strong initial scent of leather. It's a scent that just puts 'black' in your mind; black mud, black leather, black billowing clouds, black musk. On me: The leather note sticks around at first, although I don't really get any moss or stone from it. Instead, my skin massively picks up that incense scent and runs with it. We have a little occult store in my city that always smells like every type of incense at once, and that's just what I end up smelling like as it wears. Full hippy store, but not irritatingly so, it still keeps a lot of its depth with subtle musky notes that round it out. It's a scent that makes me feel dark and dangerous, bold bloody and resolute.

It's been raining the last couple of days over here, and so I figured the atmosphere was right for me to test this one out. In the bottle: Pine scented bathroom air freshener. The pine notes really smack you in the face, to the extent where I couldn't really smell anything else. On me: So much more amazingly complex than I expected, the moss notes and jasmine really hold their own once it's actually on your skin. 'Green' is just a good way to put it, it's just lovely. As it's worn over the last couple of hours and after a nap, the pine note has stripped away considerably, leaving a lot more of those sweeter notes of jasmine and mint lingering (although I tend to throw sweet, so that part may just be me). I'm looking forward to seeing how it compares to A Tudor House In Moonlight, and I'm tempted to see how it plays with some of my other mossier scents like Oberon or Robin Goodfellow, maybe even Druid once I get around to trying it.