Perfume to match songs?

[Effluvia]

I was listening to "Hollow Hills" this morning and was thinking how much I wanted an oil like that...a dark fairytale that felt like it was sort of rotting away with time...then it got me thinking, I want "In The Flat Field" and "Antonin Artaud", too! Then, naturally, my mind wandered to The Cure and Siouxsie...now I know I posted a Cure suggestion a while back, but are there oils that already exist that you think would suit these songs pretty well? I'd like to hear other suggestions, too...

 

Cure songs I want to smell (lol):

Last Dance

Disintegration

(alright, ALL of the songs on Disintegration!!)

The Kiss

Like Cockatoos

Faith (I know Cathedral is an easy choice for this one)

Strange Day

Pornography

100 Years

Open

Just One Kiss (Black Lotus?)

If Only Tonight We Could Sleep

To Wish Impossible Things

Secrets

In Your House

A Forest (Black Forest suits this PERFECTLY!!)

Also, I think Caterpillar smells like Caterpillar!

um...all of them...lol

 

Siouxsie songs:

I haven't experienced Spellbound yet (it's on its way, though!), does it smell similar to the song, you think?

Green Fingers

Dazzle (I REALLY want this one!!)

everything else off Hyaena

Voodoo Dolly (once again, bought Voodoo but haven't experienced it yet...)

 

and on and on and on...

[LadyWilde]

I hope there isn't a similar thread somewhere else. I did a search and couldn't find one, so, here goes:

 

I was driving along today listening to Kiss Me Kiss Me Kiss Me (The Cure. If you don't own it, you ought to.). The song "Icing Sugar" came on and what popped into my head was "Damn. I want to smell like this song sounds." Pounding percussion, thumping bass, wailing horns, and that voice. . .the whole nine. It's loud and overpoweringly sexy and yet somehow distant and cavernous and even cold. If you know the song, I think you get what I mean, even though I'm probably not describing it too well. Anyway, any recommendations as far as BPALs go?

 

Also, if anyone else has any kind of song/scent connections, satisfy my slightly off-balance and synesthetic side and tell us about it!

[HoneyHoneyNY]

 

I'd love to smell like "House of the Rising Sun" I imagine that it would be something smoky and jaded, like clove cigarettes, bourbon, leather, musky skin, but with something cool, and humid added. Like how the dawn feels in midsummer. I was also thinking about how the smell of Jasmine tea makes me think of New Orleans for some reason.

 

Wow! I didn't know that idea was floating around in my head. Your post inspired me!

[LadyWilde]

Whoa. . .good one. Sounds like stumbling out of a frat house at 6am on a Sunday with a gorgeous boy beside you and his jacket draped around your shoulders, with the sun just coming up over campus. I could totally walk around smelling like that.

[renaissancerouge]

Yeah, me too, me too! I actually think that Nocturne smells like King Crimson's Walking on Air sounds, but it's the only oil that's smelled like a song to me so far. I'd love to find one that smells like Minor Swing by Django Reinhardt or Ma Vie En Rose by Edith Piaf. My sister slathered the Bon Vivant before an awesome Sonic Youth concert, so I associate Sister rather strongly with that scent, but it doesn't encapsulate the song. Really, unless a scent is named after the song, it's going to be hard to recreate the synaesthesia needed to pull a Nocturne. It summoned up a poignant time in my life, and the soundtrack was Walking on Air.

[inbigtrouble]

I was driving along today listening to Kiss Me Kiss Me Kiss Me (The Cure.  If you don't own it, you ought to.).  The song "Icing Sugar" came on and what popped into my head was "Damn.  I want to smell like this song sounds."  Pounding percussion, thumping bass, wailing horns, and that voice. . .the whole nine.  It's loud and overpoweringly sexy and yet somehow distant and cavernous and even cold.  If you know the song, I think you get what I mean, even though I'm probably not describing it too well.  Anyway, any recommendations as far as BPALs go?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

I *would* like to know what this smells like; it's one of my favorite songs on that album! Snake Oil, maybe? Snake Oil is warm, but it has all of the other qualities present in that song: sex, sweetness, exotic spiciness.

 

I'll have to start paying more attention to what I want to listen to when I am wearing certain scents.

[sookster]

slightly off topic here but remember the movie

"Hedwig and the Angry Inch"???

 

Demeter made a perfume after it ...

simply called "Hedwig" ....the scent was described as smelling like an old hotel lobby, aqua net hairspray and ashtrays.... *gag*....I never smelled it personally so I can't vouch either way.....

 

anywho, whenever I hear that song "angry inch" from the soundtrack, it reminds me of this crazy scent ......

[Electra]

BPAL Samhain smells like Poe's "Haunted." To me, anyway.

[starrykitten]

Totally agree on the Samhain/Haunted!

 

Snow White=Tori Amos' "Winter"

Nosferatu=Tori Amos' "Little Earthquakes"

Snake Oil=Portishead's "Glory Box"

[faylie]

Oooh, I love Glory Box, Got to get me some snake oil even more now. I'd love a scent to smell like Joga by Bjork, that some brings so many memories, very evocative song, so it deserves an evocative scent to go with it, something powerful and passionate but a very natural smell too.

[Miss Lynx]

Interesting that this idea should come up - I was just thinking of the same thing a few days ago! But the song I was thinking I'd want to smell like was "Introit 2" by Aesma Daeva.

 

I'm not sure what a scent based on that would be like - it would need to be really complex and intense, with strong highs and lows and a sense of depth to it. From the descriptions, maybe something like Nyx?

[Electra]

I have decided that I want to smell like "What If" by Emilie Autumn.

 

:::::swoon:::::

[walkingundine]

Lady Macbeth is an odd one- when it's still wet, it's 'Curse of Millhaven' by Nick Cave. It's wild, manic, unprincipled, gleeful- and oddly seductive.

 

Haunted reminds me of any number of Dead Can Dance songs, particularly 'Yulunga'.

[VelvetSky]

'Candy Perfume Girl' on Madonna's Ray of Light album always reminds me of BPAL in general.

 

Young velvet porcelain boy

Devour me when you're with me

Blue wish window seas

Speak delicious fires

 

I'm your candy perfume girl

Your candy perfume girl

[feline.by.design]

Ah.

 

From my review of Hollywood Babylon:

 

A bit of odd trivia: this scent inspired me to play "Lips Like Sugar" from Echo and the Bunnymen, inexplicably. It seemed appropriate.

 

I'm sure I could probably think up of some more if I put my brain cells at work on it, but Hollywood Babylon was the first to spontaneously attach itself to "Lips Like Sugar." I didn't even have to think about it, it's as if the two coexist to compliment each other perfectly. Oooh....

 

Now, sitting down to think-think-think....

 

"Golden Brown" by the Stranglers = Eos

"Psycho Killer" by the Talking Heads = Whitechapel, maybe?

"Picture of Dorian Grey" by the Television Personalities = Dorian (whew, took me awhile for that one)

"Soixante Neuf Annee Erotique" by Serge Gainsbourge = Swank, which I haven't tried, but seems apt

"Rhiannon" by Fleetwood Mac = Baobhan Sith and/or Aeval

"Pink Moon" by Nick Drake = Pink Moon (another toughie)

"Letting Go" by Nitin Sawhney = Szepasszony

"Don't Stop" by Brazilian Girls = Silk Road

"Pendulum" by Broadcast = Lucy's Kiss

"A Forest" by The Cure = Fenris Wolf

"Autumn Sweater" by Yo La Tengo = Libertine

 

Feel free to argue, add, adjust or agree. I'm sure it's different for everyone else. I can't help you on your song quest, though I'm tempted to recommend Dracul just for the hell of it. Good luck with your mission.

 

-doreen

[Empress Dark]

"Letting Go" by Nitin Sawhney = Szepasszony

 

I've had Szepasszony on my "potential imps for first order" list and have been debating back-and-forth with myself whether or not to get it. This just convinced me.

 

If I could smell like a song, it would hands down be "Aqua" by Yoko Kanno, from the Arjuna soundtrack (the show's not that great, but the music is damned gorgeous). It's huge and wet and atmospheric, echoing with voices that speak a completely unintelligible tongue (it's actually pure nonsense) but ring true with lust and longing and heartbreak.

 

It makes me think of two desperate lovers going at it on the floor of a house perched over the ocean, with the French doors flung wide open and the sounds of the thrashing sea floating in on a monsoon wind. At midnight.

 

Then again, I'm a BPAL n00b, so maybe there is a scent sort of like that?

[lovelyza]

I love the whole sensory mishmash that occasionally happens when a scent reminds you of a song or a song reminds you of a scent. I remember a thread that delved into this a long time ago but I couldn't find it for the life of me (it may be in the graveyard by now), so I figured I would start a new one and hope for the best. Here are a few song/BPAL corrospondances that have stuck in my mind...please share any that you might have!

 

Sea of Glass reminds me of Bjork's "All is Full of Love"

 

Blood reminds me of Bjork's "Hunter"

 

Samhain reminds me of Nico's "Fairest of the Seasons"

 

Neo-Tokyo reminds me of The Jesus and Mary Chain's "Just like Honey" (probably because of the association with the movie Lost in Translation). O also makes me think of this song, because of the honey note.

 

Snow White reminds me of The Cocteau Twins' "Alice" (probably because that song makes me think of falling snow).

 

Massive Attack's "Teardrop" makes me think of light aquatics, like Sea of Glass and aquatic florals like Ophelia

[Electra]

Found it . I knew I'd posted in that thread before.

 

http://www.bpal.org/index.php?showtopic=31...mp;#entry275066

 

And I'm a broken record from two years ago, apparently, but Samhain still smells like Poe's "Haunted" sounds to me.

[noumenon]

My friend Dawna just sent me an imp of Obatala, and all I can think of is Rupert Holmes' Escape (The Pina Colada Song).

 

If you like pina coladas

And getting caught in the rain

If you're not into yoga

If you have half a brain

Then get an imp of Obatala!

And take a long, loving sniff

Because it smells like coconut milk

And you'll fall in love at first whiff.

 

Man, I suck at this. Indicolite makes it look so easy.

 

ETA: I'm really hoping Samhain 06 smells like "Black No. 1" by Type O Negative.

Edited August 31, 2006 by Noumenon

[Vampire Sass]

There are three bands I'd love to match scents to songs, Dead Can Dance, Morphine and VAST. There are so many cool possibilities there, and they all tend to have a bit of a dark and melancholy atmosphere. There's a couple song in particular.

 

"I am Stretched on Your Grave" or "The Ubiquitous Mr. Lovegrove" by Dead Can Dance

"The Saddest Song" by Morphine

"Pretty When you Cry" by VAST

 

Anyone who knows the songs have any ideas?

[filigree_shadow]

"The Ubiquitous Mr. Lovegrove" by Dead Can Dance

 

I think Snake Charmer, Morocco, or Scherezade. For most Dead Can Dance songs, really, not just that one. I think you'd need a smooth BPAL perfume that's deeply sexy and kind of earthy at the same time for Dead Can Dance.

 

Sanvean: I am Your Shadow, by Lisa Gerrard, seems like a BPAL Black Orchid song to me.

[euterpe414]

There are three bands I'd love to match scents to songs, Dead Can Dance, Morphine and VAST. There are so many cool possibilities there, and they all tend to have a bit of a dark and melancholy atmosphere. There's a couple song in particular.

 

"I am Stretched on Your Grave" or "The Ubiquitous Mr. Lovegrove" by Dead Can Dance

"The Saddest Song" by Morphine

"Pretty When you Cry" by VAST

 

Anyone who knows the songs have any ideas?

 

for that VAST song, I'm thinking Wanda or Perversion

[anomie]

I know I'd love a scent for "Lilac Wine," the Jeff Buckley cover of a Nina Simone song.

 

I'm so glad to see there are other Emilie Autumn fans here! I might see if I can send her some imps. Given her new Victoriandustrial theme some Mad Tea Party scents might not go amiss...

[theseagrows]

like the original poster, i'd go crazy for some cure/siouxsie scents. i'd like to add "dressing up" from the top. i love that song, and think it'd make a lovely scent inspiration. also "at night" from seventeen seconds.

 

i also want some nick drake scents and some echo and the bunnymen.

[whitemyrrh]

There's a strong thread of fantasy fragrances based on music going on in the "Suggestions" thread, and it got me to thinking that I tend to want the same general atmosphere from a song as I do from my perfume on any given day. BPAL has such an extensive collection, I think it would be fun to do some recommendations based on someone's favorite band or song. There are even a few flat out same or similar names--for instance--

 

"The Catepillar," (The Cure)

"Blood Rose" (Tori Amos)

"Lucretia" (The Sisters of Mercy)

"The Highway Man" (Loreena McKennit)

"Magdalene" (A Perfect Circle)

 

Sometimes the connection isn't there for me from song to scent, but other times it almost seems like the inspiration for both was drawn from the same place ("Blood Rose" really connects with Tori's "Blood Roses" for me, at least on those people I've smelled it on who didn't amp out the wine note as grape soda, like I did.) There are also more conceptual or atmospheric connections...

 

"Jailbait" speaks of the Dresden Doll's "Missed Me"

"Delirium" of Tori Amos in general (Neil Gaiman modeled his character "Delirium" after her in the Sandman comics and wow, good fit all around)

"Black Rose" gives me general impressions of mid-to-late eighties era Sisters material (I'm a big fan of the Sisters of Mercy, surprise!)

 

I'm betting that we're drawn to scents and sounds for similar reasons, so I'd love to see whatever thoughts others might have on this.