flumphlord

In the vial: Remember those chalky old-school banana-shaped banana candies? It's like one of those, but with a savory edge. Wet on skin: After a very brief initial blast of banana, which on skin is a somewhat more realistic banana than the candy I got in the vial, this settles into an umami and fig scent with the slightest hint of creamy banana in the background. I get how someone might interpret this as reminiscent of a way overripe, fermenting banana, but for me it's more along the lines of some kind of sweet and savory fruit salad. Actually pretty appetizing. Dry: During the dry down there's a period of an hour or so where I get the raw silk comparison in the description. Everything coalesces into an experience that's eerily like the dusty, overcrowded back room of a fabric store. Eventually, though, the umami mushroom note takes over everything. Post-workout: Brings out the banana again, weirdly. This isn't really me, but it's pleasant, and a fascinating olfactory experience. I wouldn't say it's a safe blind buy, but the right person absolutely could pull this off in public.

I purchased a decant based on the listed blue spruce note, hoping for a conifer-based aquatic along the lines of, e.g., Jolly Roger. But alas, there is a prominent unlisted citrus. (I agree with roseus that it seems to be bergamot.) In the vial: Soapy, with a lingering hint of citrus once the initial wave of ambergris and musk passes. Wet on skin: Soft citrus (bergamot, I think?) lounging on a cloud of floral soap suds. A more mellow cousin of Cthulhu, less aggressive on both the floral and the soap. I don't get any of the listed spruce, or any saltiness. Unfortunately, as with Cthulhu, to me the citrus feels a little discordant with everything else in the blend, a little too bright and sharp. Dry: Dries down to a powdery, mentholic musk. There's a floral overtone from the eucalyptus blossom that shows up in the sillage, but not so much up close to the skin. Post-workout: Sweat does this a favor, taming the citrus and bringing everything together into a more unified scent, but it also leaves things a little sour. Ultimately, too floral and traditionally perfumey for my taste. I can definitely see the appeal for someone more drawn to clean floral scents, though.

I'm normally very much not a floral person, but orange blossom and tobacco flower are exceptions I can genuinely enjoy sometimes. I've actually been going through an orange blossom phase lately, so I thought I'd give this one a shot. In the vial: Mostly tobacco flower, though the orange blossom is present as well. Wet on skin: Tobacco flower, orange blossom, and a very gentle patchouli, in that order of prominence, pervaded by a sugary sweetness. I don't really get any caramel note--this is unadulturated table sugar, to to point that it borders on gourmand when it first goes on. This quickly fades into a more purely floral experience, though. Warm, soft, and clean. Dry: This scent is very linear, which isn't a bad thing in my book. I'm a fan of all these notes, and I like that they stay well-balanced throughout. Post-workout: Maybe the patchouli is a little too gentle. This doesn't hold up to my natural odor as well as I'd hoped, though it's not terrible by any means. The main thing holding me back from making a full size purchase is that I already own a fair number of clean, citrusy fragrances. I don't know how often I would realistically reach for this over my existing options. If this were general catalog, I'd let this decant age awhile and revisit it down the line to see if it goes somewhere interesting. But since it's not GC, I'm content letting this one go.

2025 Version In the vial: Conifers, musk, and just a hint of honey. Wet on skin: Bold, dirty, and wild, as is befitting of Lupercalia. On my skin, it's mostly patchouli and conifers, tempered with beeswax and underscored by something vaguely herbal. Dry: Gets sweeter and smoother as it dries down. After while the patchouli backs off a bit and I can detect the ambrette and honey. The vaguely herbal note I can't place grows also stronger. Possibly the Sampson root? Eventually, all that's left is an incensy musk that lasted overnight for me. Good sillage for an oil. Unisex leaning masculine. Post-workout: Brings out the musk and animalic aspects of the honey. This is the kind of thing most people would wear intending to get a little sweaty, and it passes that test with flying colors. I enjoy this, especially the patchouli and honey combo, but it feels too mature for me. I'd be really into it on an older guy, though.

As a disclaimer, I have never had fresh red currants, only dried ones. You can't really find fresh ones where I live. Therefore, I have no way of evaluating how realistic the note is. In the vial: Cold, resembling a red snow cone. Wet on skin: Fresher than I was expecting. The currants are juicy and somewhat but not overly tart. The vanilla is sweet and creamy, tempering the sharpness of the bourbon. The orris at this stage is just a faint softness, not prominent enough that I’d say there’s a floral element. There’s an underlying coolness that makes it seem like everything is sitting in a bowl of shaved ice. Dry: The bourbon fades, and the blend becomes more perfumey, the product of the orris coming into its own. The currants dry down to something candied rather than fresh. Post-workout: Sweat pairs okay with this, just as a pinch of salt can work on fruit. BO doesn’t do it any favors, but it actually hold up fairly well for a gourmand due to the tartness. Still probably a scent best saved for cool weather. I’m really torn on this one. I enjoy it, but I don’t know whether it’s unisex enough for me to pull off in public in this political climate, at least combined with my innate penalties to passing as cishet. A couple years ago I probably would have full sized without much hesitation.

I'm a big fan of kelp scents, so I couldn't resist trying this. In the vial: Spicy grapefruit. Wet on skin: If you’re familiar with R’lyeh (the scent, not Cthulhu’s place), this is basically R’lyeh with wasabi. So yeah, spicy grapefruit. (Actually, for all I know Cthulhu’s place smells like this too.) Dry: The grapefruit dies down, as citrus is wont to do, and reveals the briny vegetal reinforcements lying in wait. The kelp is the same as the kelp note as in R’lyeh, very approachable without any funkiness. The wasabi remains in the mix, though it’s less sharp than before. I think I might get something radishy, though that could be the wasabi leading me astray. If the other vegetables are in there, they are subsumed by the other notes. All in all, it's not actually significantly more green than R'lyeh in its dry stage, though it maintains more of a kick. Post-workout: Sweat brings out the brininess already present. I’d recommend this to someone who likes the opening of R’lyeh and wishes it hung onto its brightness and spiciness for longer, since the wasabi keeps going for quite awhile after the grapefruit fades.

I picked a decant of this up because I'm a patchouli fan and wanted to experience how BPAL does oud. In the vial: Intensely animalic at first whiff, but when I come back for a second pass I get a little bit of lemon dancing on top. Wet on skin: Surprisingly bright and lemony. Tart, with the bite of the juniper and clove backing it up, but not cleanery. I’m sure I’ll get more wolf in the dry down, but for now it’s mostly moonlight. Dry: As expected, the lemon gradually fades and allows the darker notes to come through. It all coalesces into a dirty, animalic musk where it’s difficult for me to pick out the individual notes. The hay and oud in the description made me think it might go in a barnyard direction, but it leans much more incensey on me. I’m actually a little disappointed in that I was hoping for more earthiness and hay, but admittedly it’s probably more wearable for more people as is. Post-workout: It’s already intensely musky. My natural odor doesn’t really make a dent. I think this scent executes the concept it’s going for really well, but it’s not particularly me.

I purchased this in a sample size from a decanter. In the vial: I get the balsam, woods, and an earthy scent that must be the angelica root. There’s a bit of an underlying alcoholic burn, presumably from the bourbon vanilla, but I don’t really get the note itself in the vial. Wet on skin: Once I put it on, it’s mostly balsam, orris, and a slightly but not overly boozey vanilla. It’s more of a sweet, smooth balsam than a sharp one. The woodiness and earthiness of the other notes is still there in the background, but the balsam kind of overwhelms them at this stage. Dry: During the dry down, a dark, fruity aspect comes out—probably the combination of the fig wood, agarwood, and the remnants of the balsam. The root note is also more prominent at this stage. It’s pretty dry and a little powdery. Unisex, maybe leaning a slightly masculine. This scent strikes me as being good for gray days in early spring when you need something that can hold up to cold but it’s past the point where you’re feeling something traditionally wintery. Post-workout: Orris sometimes turns into baby wipes on me when I sweat, and it initially veers in that direction with this scent. It stops before going full baby wipes, though, and ends up more in teenage boy body spray territory. It could be better, but it’s not terrible. I think the balsam does a lot to balance things out and prevent a full on disaster. Overall, I find this really pleasant, especially after it's dried, but I don’t know if I like it enough to full size after it reacted the way it did to sweat. I’ll enjoy using up the decant, though, and I could see it growing on me in the process.

I got this sample from the lab as part of the men’s imp pack. Wet on skin: Initially I get a lot of the rosemary and florals, but that fades extremely quickly into mossy and musky ambergris. The ambergris kind of subsumes and heavily blurs everything else without totally erasing it. Despite “three mints” being listed there’s not any mint in sight for me. As a traditional cologne fan I enjoy the scent at this stage. Dry: As it dries it veers almost into baby wipes territory. BPAL’s ambergris has been hit or miss for me, and I think this is one of those cases where it’s a miss. Its longevity was also kind of disappointing. I wasn’t expecting the orange blossom to stick around long, but even the last vestiges of the musk only hang on for about three hours. If I was testing this fresh out of the mail, I would assume my sample might need more time to rest or macerate, but it's been several months at this point. Granted, this is more of a date scent than an office scent, so longevity isn’t as big of a dealbreaker as it might otherwise be. Post-workout: Like any decent gentlemen’s cologne, natural musk makes it sexier. Not quite enough to salvage the ambergris situation for me, but seriously, I would be all over another guy wearing this whose skin chemistry played with it a little better. It's worth trying out if you vibe with traditional colognes.

Received as a frimp with an order. In the vial: Patchouli. Perhaps the patchouliest. Wet on skin: The best descriptor I can come up for this is “green.” Patchouli, wood, vetiver, and some herbal notes I can’t identify. On my skin, I don’t really get any of the incense that others report unless I put my hand right up to my wrist and concentrate very hard on picking out the individual notes. Nor is it overly dry. It’s all in-your-face greenery on me. Dry: It doesn’t morph on me. Lasts about six hours. I can see this being a nice, invigorating everyday scent for someone who likes patchouli. (And the worst nightmare of someone who doesn’t.) Post-workout: This gets a little soapy with sweat and a little sour with BO. Nothing too offensive, but unpleasant enough that I’d be disinterested in purchasing it for myself. Especially since this is the kind of thing I’d reach for on an active day.

I got this sample from the lab as part of the men’s imp pack. In the vial: I can pick out all the individual listed notes: oppoponax, leather, tobacco, and amber, in that order of prominence. Wet on skin: I rarely find a leather note that lasts long on me. Here it peaces out within a few minutes. I do like the other remaining notes, but without the leather, the scent definitely feels like it’s missing something. Dry: The oppoponax dies down. The amber amps up, to the point where the amber becomes the dominant scent. At this point, I would go so far as to say that this reads as feminine on me. Aside from the aforementioned leather, it lasts about four hours. Post-workout: All of the remaining scents hold their own against sweat. Unfortunately, this one clashes with my natural scent. Not for me. I would like this on another person, though. Despite being in the men's sample pack, I honestly think even very femme-presenting people have a good chance of being able to pull it off thanks to the heavy amber.

I initially sought out BPAL on a quest to find a realistic ocean scent, particularly one that evokes the North Atlantic. A lot of the options out there, including some in BPAL’s catalog, lean heavily on citrus to enhance the ozone effect, which doesn’t particularly resemble the actual ocean and adds a southern, summery vibe I’m not really going for. Jolly Roger is in the category that leans on pine for this purpose instead, which isn’t any more successful in replicating an authentic ocean scent but does have the benefit of not feeling out of place on a New England wharf in January. In the vial: Pine, with a hint of ozone. Wet on skin: This does not smell like the ocean on its own, but it is a very close approximation to a hike in the woods on the Maine coast where you’re getting whiffs of the sea here and there. The pine and wood are at the forefront, but the salt and ozone are definitely present. It’s very comforting yet energizing. Dry: After two or three hours of unadulterated coastal pine forest, the bay rum starts to gradually come out. Combined with the pine and salt and wood, the overall effect isn’t really boozy or classically aftershavey so much as a pleasant sweetness that balances out those other more astringent notes for an effect that is surprisingly clean. It lasts the full work day for me. Now that I look at the lab description, leather is actually among the listed notes, though I've never gotten a single hint of it. My skin tends to absorb most leather notes very quickly, so I’m guessing that by the time the pine dies down enough to let anything else come through, the leather is long gone. Post-workout: It’s salty out of the vial, so sweat is just more of the same. It goes well with my natural body odor, with the pine having the tempering effect pine usually does in men's hygiene products. While it's not the most realist fragrance I've tried in terms of resembling the actual ocean, this is a very nice, wearable everyday fragrance that works in all seasons and a broad range of occasions. It does come off as more heavy on the pine and less heavy on the bay rum in the winter, but it holds up. I initially tried this as an imp, and it became my first full size bottle purchase from BPAL precisely because it is the kind of thing I can reach for so often.

As a disclaimer, I am unfairly biased here. I spend a lot of time in an old New England library that H. P. Lovecraft is documented as having visited in his lifetime. This means that I’m inevitably going to be comparing this to a concrete, familiar sensory experience rather than an abstract vibe. In the vial: Artificial popcorn butter. Wet on skin: I am in a modern library, furtively sipping an Irish coffee with a splash of Bailey's and butterscotch schnapps. My smuggled cocktail is definitely the star here. There is a papery smell in the background, but these are stacks of newly printed bestsellers, not the complex funk of slowly decaying 19th century books, or even the mustiness of decades old acid free paper. In fairness, while I'm personally fond of those notes and a lot of other sorts of decaying organic matter, I feel like most people would not want to smell like actual 19th century books. I don't get the wood notes listed in the description at this stage. Not a lot of throw, but for something this boozy that's probably for the best. Dry: The booze diminishes over time, but never completely fades. As that happens, the oak finally begins to emerge, though it's never more than a background note. This is still a newly renovated modern library, albeit a well-funded one with lots of real wood. It lasts a full work day. Toward the end, the sweetness goes from deliciously boozy to borderline cloying, but never to the point where I feel the need to wash it off. Unfortunately, that last stage becomes a bit too feminine for me to feel like I can safely get away with it in public in my area in this political climate. Post-workout: Okay, that's utterly delightful. Sweat totally overwhelms the creamy tones, but in exchange it salts the butterscotch. And my natural odor to brings the other notes to life and makes everything pop. I'd go so far as to say that I wish there was just a smidge of musk straight up included in the blend, so I could actually wear it on a slow, crisp fall day where I'm not sweating at all--i.e., the vibe the blend purports to capture to begin with. Maybe I could figure out something to layer it with to help it keep its more unisex edge? I wouldn't normally bother with something I can't wear on its own, but it's so painfully close to greatness. I'll use up the rest of the sample to see what I can do.

Received as a frimp with an order. In the vial: My initial impression is that of cherry cough syrup. If I stop and concentrate I can pick out the clove and resin, but the medicinal association is hard to shake even after identifying those other notes. Wet on skin: The dragon’s blood and clove are at the forefront. The cherry is still there though, with the myrrh just barely perceptible in the background adding depth. Unfortunately, dragon’s blood has never been my thing, and this is not helping to change my mind. The way it combines with the cherry and clove here really does result in something that resembles cough syrup to my nose, and that in turn does not evoke pleasant memories. I ended up having to scrub this one off after about an hour. For what it's worth, the cherry didn't fade on me during that time like it did for some other reviewers.

The cocoa and patchouli blend in Tezcatlipoca does wondrous things on my skin, so I gambled and went for a bottle here. In the bottle: Cocoa predominates for me. There are actually what appears to be little globs of cocoa floating in the oil. The patchouli and a faint woody scent that must be the chestnut are present though. I don’t really get the champaca here. Wet on skin: On skin, this transforms into a realistic approximation of chestnuts roasting on an open fire. As the lab description implies but does not directly state, there is smoke here. Not an overpowering amount to my nose, but enough that anyone who dislikes that note will probably want to steer clear. The patchouli and cocoa are still there in the background, but they serve mostly to give body to the chestnut. Dry: The champaca finally shows itself. I’m torn on whether I like it here. It gives more of a holiday vibe, but in doing so it significantly narrows down the seasonal window in which I’d want to wear this scent. It’s pleasant, though. I’ll be wearing this for cozy December nights in. If I was more inclined to wear perfume to bed I’d be using it as a sleep scent. It’s very unisex, with average sillage. Post-workout: This isn’t something I’d normally be wearing during physical activity, aside from perhaps some less metaphorical lashes or other activities that would land me on the naughty list, but I tried it for the sake of completeness. I'm pleased to report that it has that same wonderful alchemy as Tezcatlipoca. They’re different enough that I wouldn’t say liking one means you’ll be into the other, but they are both in the same vaguely earthy, vaguely gourmand ballpark. It’s definitely a niche vibe, but I like it enough that I’m glad I got a bottle. Given the straightforwardness of the concept and BPAL's massive catalog there's probably been a nigh-identical release sometime during past years, but I'm not familiar enough with BPAL to know for sure or make comparisons.