Velvet Dogs Playing Poker

[megank4]

Smooth wood, sweet pipe smoke, tonka, and Irish coffee.

wow. This smells like dog fur. Warm, clean, but dog.

[Twitch]

Just got my velvet decants in and this is the first I've tried. It's really great, probably bottleworthy. It's coffee, but there is also a lot of wood in there, like a very natural coffee, freshly picked from the forest. Very interesting and comfortable. Not a great deal of throw, but not terrible in that respect.

[maproot]

in the bottle smoke and wood and deep smells..on me it drifts away and smells slightly rubbery on my wrist-not bad, just difficult to sniff out the coffee that I want to be there. Have kept reapplying since it arrived today, but my skin must be eating this up; the moment I apply I get a whiff of coffee with a pinch of cream,and then poof its gone and its all wood and smoke on me>Will give it more time, so far bottle worthy, but with my slathering I may get through half the bottle before the coffee stays on my wrist!

 

ADDED April 24:

 

Ok, today is a whole new day, and now am liking my bottle of the Velvet Dogs playing poker more than I did yesterday. Have slathered pretty freely on the wrists, and instead of coffee I am getting silken smokiness, and it brings up an image of heavy brocade vests that have been worn for a night out and gotten a bit of the smoke into the fabric; but it's not musty or anything.A little while later a smidgen of coffee comes out, and this reminds me of a warm mens cologne but without the ugliness of the alcohol of typical mens cologne.

Since I am a scent slut for smoky scents, this is definitely growing on me and my wrists; very sultry smokiness

[Pottersville]

This is lovely stuff, very comforting indeed. The tonka adds just the right amount of sweetness, and the wood is very smooth. The coffee isn't overwhelming, which is nice since I'm not much for wearing foodie scents. I don't get any smoke, rather I smell unlit pipe tobacco and it's quite wonderful. I have only passing acquaintance with Pinched with Four Aces (thanks to an imp from a generous forumite) and I don't smell much similarity here, which is ok, since Pinched was quite a bit more cherry on me and didn't last very long at all. VDPP reminds me a lot of Tiresias and Ventriloquist Dummy, but is definitely a kinder, gentler version. Might be worth a bottle since I love those two!

[crebbsgirl]

Huh, I guess I don't like coffee. I mean don't get me wrong, I LOVE drinking the stuff, but smelling like it just isn't my thing. This blend on me is predominantly coffee and smoke, with the tonka and wood lending a sweet smoothness. But there's something almost bitter here - and I think it's the coffee. I get an overtly masculine vibe, and this is just uncomfortable for me to wear. That's so weird, I've never had a reaction like this before. It's not that I hate the smell, it's that I'm actually uncomfortable in my own skin while wearing this.

[steffanina]

Velvet Dogs Playing Poker-

 

In Bottle: Creaminess with a hint of the tobacco.

 

Wet: Ah, here comes the dry spicy hint of the tonka. Tonka's one of those scents I shouldn't like but it gets in my blood and I do. I thought Parfums de Nicolai's Vanille Tonka was a nose-wrinkling bitter perfumey thing...until I started liking it lots.

 

Dry: As this reaches its final dry down, I do get a nice mellowing of the tonka, though it takes time to get there. This is primarily creamy tonka once it's out of the bottle and on me, with all that that implies.

 

Overall: Not quite enough foodiness for me to want to wear it, though I'll keep my imp around to sniff.

 

 

[catattack]

Imp: Creamy coffee

Wet: Sweet cream and wood

Drydown: The coffee scent is very faint. Not as strong as I'd hoped for. The scent is very faint. I'm getting light woods.

Overall: I was looking forward to this one the most of the Velvets, but it let me down. The coffee just wasn't strong enough, and I never got the tobacco. Bummer.

[Iceblink]

This is a wonderfully sweet creamy tobacco when wet but as it dries it becomes smokier and kind of...bland. The final result seems to be a sweet smoky woodsiness that's inoffensive but just kind of...there. Faint, not much throw. Doesn't remind me of Pinched at all.

[zankoku_zen]

I agree with the comment of this smelling like dog fur. I get alot of the wood and smoke, and definitely smells like wet dog fur.

 

Pass.

[jewelbug]

Bottle: Very caramelly. Actually, this reminds me of Ventriloquists Dummy, which was a diasater on my skin. Here goes!

 

Wet: Honestly, it kinda smells like stale coffee grounds and burnt sugar. With a little bit of dirtiness (and not dirt in that bpal-does-awesome-dirt kind of way). Dirtiness like the weird note I got from V. Dummy.

 

Drying: I get a doughty burnt sugar smell. Over coffee and wood polish, with a hint of pipe smoke that might be enjoyable without everything else going on. Alas, this just is not working on me at all. It really does remind me of V.Dummy!

 

Dry: After about an hour, its less offensive one me--the caramel burning-ness subsided for the most part, and this reads as doughnuts, slightly stale coffee and whiffs of pipe smoke. Not sure where that doughiness is coming from, but its still there. Evocative, but not what I want in a perfume.

Overall: Like many others, I was really hopeing for a Pinched w/ 4 Aces part 2, but this just doesn’t work on my skin chemistry at all. Wood, pipe smoke, tonka, coffee—all things I like. But there is something hidden in the combo that just doesn’t work on my skin at all. I think it’s the “irish” I swear there’s caramel in here doing horrible things to me, and think this one is closely related to Monsterbait: V Dummy.

 

[forspecial_plate]

I like this....it smells mostly like smokey toffee at first, and reminds me of scratch 'n sniff stickers from when I was little. Later, the woodsy parts come out, and I find myself thinking of Riding The Goat, but with some sultry toffee layered on top. I never tried Ventriloquist Dummy so I can't say how that compares.

 

I don't get a lot of coffee, it's mostly smokey toffee and woods. It had a teasing quality to my nose, it keeps wafting up and around me, reminding me that it's there (duh, I guess most scents do that). But it does smell a little different if I sniff up close, compared to the throw. It's a good scent!

 

Edit....I agree with the reviewer after me who was reminded of El Dia de Reyes. I thought of it right away when I put on Velvet Dogs Playing Poker, but just forgot to mention it in my review. It must be the sweet coffee!

Edited May 5, 2009 by Forspecial Plate

[Scylla]

I have not smelled any of the original Dogs Playing Poker scents, so I can't compare the Velvet version.

 

To me, Velvet Dogs Playing Poker smells strongly of stale coffee, burnt sugar, cigarette smoke and wood, but for some reason it strikes me as masculine. It's really not something I'd want to smell like, but it's oddly comforting! It's what I imagine a Men's Only AA meeting would smell like.

 

 

[edenssixthday]

Velvet Dogs Playing Poker - On me, this is just ghastly to the point where I can't even imagine how some people could like it so much. It's got really heavy caramel and dry, bitter wood notes, reminding me way too much of Monster Bait: Ventriloquist's Dummy. I don't smell coffee at all. The pipe smoke scent comes out after it's been on my skin a bit, but it doesn't smell warm and inviting; it smells more like an ashtray. I'm guessing it's a skin chemistry thing, but this is just really, really awful on me.

[sunshinedaisybliss]

Mmmmmm. MMMMMMMMMMM. Yum!

 

The coffee here is lovely - this reminds me a little of El Dia de Reyes but without the brown sugar. If there really was a group of dogs playing poker, smoking pipes and drinking Irish coffee - this is how the room would smell after they'd left, having spilled the Irish coffee all over the wood and tapped their burnt pipe tobacco out on to the floor.

 

I found that it goes on strong, with a very rich blast of the rich sugary Irish coffee, but within about 10 minutes the wood and the tonka come out and the coffee blends in more evenly. At the half-hour stage, the smoke is now there. At the two-hour stage it's all just blended together beautifully but quite faint on my skin - mostly it's the coffee (still) and smokey wood that I can smell.

 

 

 

 

[iiinterstate]

Confession: I have never tried a coffee blend before, simply because caramel will turn into coffee breath on my skin and it is horrible.

 

In the bottle: sweeeeeet tobacco. Almost caramelly. Uh oh.

 

On me: Tobacco and polished wood. Ohh it is the delicious. And before long, the tonka is right there too, vanilla-ing everything up. It's a smoother version of the Antikythera Mechanism on me (which sounds weird, as I think TAM is a smooth scent on most people. For me the woods are a little sharp.)

 

Overall, this blend is rich and almost foody smelling, but does not actually cross over into the land of foods. It doesn't strike me as a hot weather blend, but that's just fine. I want more.

[Little Bird]

In the bottle: Smoky, burnt caramel?

 

On my skin: AH! It's Monster Bait: Ventriloquist Dummy, but somehow even worse. Bitter, painfully dry woods, sickly sweetness, and the addition of stale cigarette smoke & a hint of burnt, stale coffee. It's bad and unbearably dry smelling on my skin.

 

I had to scrub this one off. I was hoping for smooth tonka, manly woods, and sweet tobacco... but this is burnt coffee left in the pot all night, cigarettes left in an ash tray, bone-dry woods, and burnt caramel. Not good on me. At all.

[Eros]

I get little to no caramel in this, yay! That's what killed the original Dogs Playing Poker for me.

 

Very well blended, hard to pick out individual notes. To me, this is like a smoother, creamier, non-patchouli Schwarzer Mond. With a *very* subtle, barely-there-touch of spearmint-kissed wood. More of an impression of it, really.

 

Quite nice

 

 

[unlaced]

In the bottle: smells almost exactly like Miskatonic University! Yum!

 

Wet on my skin: immediately the smokyness starts to come out and it's sweet Irish coffee with smoky overtones. Quite nice.

 

Drying/dry: More of the same. Irish coffee similar to Misk. U. with sweet smoke added in. There's another note in there that I can't quite identify that's just a bit bitter... I don't really know what's up with that. Maybe I need to age my bottle a bit. hmmm.....

[Champagne]

I love Miskatonic, and I had high hopes for Dogs, but alas, the tobacco note is so strong it gives me nausea and there is just a little drop od coffee at the end of tobacco tunnel. Dry like a dirty pipe. Ah, skin chemistry

[GhillieDhu]

Skin chemistry for the fail, yet again. :/ In the bottle, I smell mostly tobacco leaves and sweet caramelly whiskey. On skin, it smells like... well... "old people" was my first thought. Like a dark closed-up house, ancient tobacco, and that sweetish nursing home/hospital smell. I'm sad... I really wanted to like this.

[devilot]

In the vial: Smell the wood, the pipe smoke, and the coffee. But I'm also smelling something that comes across sharp-- almost like patchouli (I think it's the wood note since patch isn't listed). I've never smelled tonka on its own, so am unsure whether or not I detect it.

 

Wet: Such delicious pipe smoke + coffee. It literally makes my mouth water to smell this on my skin. Wet, the wood isn't nearly so noticeable (at least w/ my skin chemistry).

 

Drydown: Nooooo! Pipe smoke, where are you going? Come back! The pipe smoke starts to drift away while the wood note moves forward. The sweet coffee is also starting to disappear. My favorite notes aren't staying put!

 

Verdict: I wish the wood note weren't so noticeable because otherwise? I'd be scrounging up the cash to get two bottles of this. Hehe. (Especially since the wood note reads as patchouli to my nose sometimes.) As it stands, I'm definitely gonna want at least a partial bottle. Not an everyday scent for me, but something that I really really dig. I bet this would be so damned sexy on a man. Sigh.

[Jenesis]

This smells exactly like Miskatonic University to me. The Irish Coffee note stands out too much on my skin.

[PurringPulsar]

Velvet Dogs Playing Poker

 

In the imp: sweet caramel latte!

Wet on skin: now I smell the woods and the tobacco mixing with the coffee.

Dry: this now smells quite sophisticated, as something slightly perfumey steps in-maybe from the wood or tobacco, maybe the tonka? I’m not sure but I like it. It is similar but not identical to Pinched. The coffee for one thing is sweeter, it’s less of a smooth creamy coffee and more of a caramel latte with brown sugar. It actually reminds me more of El Dia de Reyes than Pinched, it has that dry biscuit/macaroon quality. I also smell the woods (I’m guessing mahogany or ebony, maybe teak) and tobacco, and the pipe smoke is very nice-not the cloying and overpowering Hearth one, but a subtler one, and definitely smoky, more like bonfire smoke at times.

After a while: at times I worry that the woods/tobacco may go all burnt on me, but thankfully that never happens. This then turns into a really lovely, very sweet, coffee cake scent. The deep dark intense sweetness of the tonka amplifies the caramel of the Irish coffee (I now smell a bit of whisky here) and this becomes very gourmand. I think of a very sweet coffee served with macaroons, or a coffee flavoured cake sprinkled with brown sugar. It still reminds me of El Dia de Reyes, but with smoke and woods added. I think I prefer El Dia though.

Verdict: well, it’s not Pinched, but it’s not bad either! I wouldn’t say it’s a poor impostor to Pinched either because it seems like it’s a scent of it’s own as well as a tribute to the DPP range. There’s the sweet coffee-tobacco thing, as well as a darker tobacco and a pipe note and some more woods that hint at other DPPs. The coffee is more caramelised to me, also a bit drier at times, with a biscuit-like dry crumbly background. The woods are deeper and the tobacco is definitely pipe, not cigar, and a little too pipe-like for me (I sometimes find pipe tobacco notes too cloying). This doesn’t have the gentle cinnamon (though it seems a little spicy at times) or the smooth creamy vanilla base of Pinched. It’s lovely but I’d rather the tobacco was more of a dry cigar type, and the coffee a little less caramel-scented, then it’d be a keeper.

Emoticon rating:

Is it a keeper? Not really but it’s a very agreeable coffee scent.

If you like this, try: Pinched, Riding the Goat, Antikythera Mechanism, A Bold Bluff, Miskatonic University, El Dia de Reyes, Ventriloquist’s Dummy

[sirensea]

In the bottle: Tonka and coffee.

 

On my skin: It reminds me strongly of Miskatonic University without the sweetness. It's a dry, masculine scent, warm and familiar.

[Lamia]

I had high hopes for this one.

 

I say this started out smelling of coffee and a fresh, unburned fag.

 

Husband says I smell like old ladies again, like baby powder.

 

"But ... but .... CIGARETTES! TOBACCO!" I squawked at him.

 

"OK, then old ladies drinking coffee and smoking cigarettes!" LOL

 

It really smells like coffee-scented baby powder, he's absolutely right. That tonka, boy, it sure softens everything up. Ah well.

Edited November 11, 2009 by Shollin