Halloween: Los Angeles

[Suu4LC]

The sky on fire: a strange incense of burning brush, junegrass, tumbleweeds, chaparral, and wild sage.

Like Beth, I grew up in Los Angeles. The San Fernando valley to be exact, where we had more than our fair share of fires. I can remember school being evacuated on more than one occasion because of them in fact. While fire/burning scents are not something I really want to wear as perfume, they can conjure up scent memories for me.

In the imp, this is an incensey/sagey scent. Not quite as smokey or gritty as the fires I remember.

Ok, on my skin I get a bit more of that black smoke/grit scent that I associate with the fires around here. The sage note is very strong. There is definitely a 'burnt' feel to this blend. A tad sour.

On drydown this is sort of a burnt wood/sage incense type smell. Still not quite the fires I remember, but a lot more pleasant!

[nineveh]

I live on the edge of San Diego, right where things start to get rural and where wildfires have an impact. Objectively, I like the smell of burning brush, but in context of the huge fires a few years ago, it now holds only negative associations.

 

Thankfully, the little smokiness that existed in the bottle never manifested on my skin. Instead I get a vibrant green scent with the slightly spicy bite of sage. It's warm and sweet, maybe with a touch of rain in the background.

 

To me, this is the scent of life on the hillsides after the fires. My skin might be doing something weird with it, but I'm glad I risked a bottle because it's such a wonderful, natural scent.

[surf-tormented]

Strangely enough, I also live in San Diego. Look at last post! Yeah, you look outside one day in October 2003 and you think there is snow on the ground. But it isn't snow, it is ash and the sky is a crazy orange black color in a mess of dirty clouds. It looks like the world is ending. Amusing that this blend was released on a year that San Diego and Southern Cali have had cooler temps and a lot of rain, so not many fires. Which is fine by me!

 

This blend doesn't bring up those feelings of scary fires to me. It reminds me of happy scents I love that are like it: Wildfire, Brimstone, Djinn, Troll, Parliament of Monsters. I truly am a burning smoke sort of girl.

 

The perfume it reminds me most of is Violette Market's Hesta, which smells like it is on fire. Halloween: Los Angeles is a bit more woodsy than Hestia, but I get the same vibe from it. It's reminds me of a bonfire in the desert. Smoke, sage and a whole lot of desert land. Perhaps even a slight windy coolness from the desert night. I love this blend because it is the outside version of Hestia.

Edited December 18, 2010 by Madame Nyx

[rayvn1]

Incense and woodsmoke! Goes on as pure smoke but the spiciness of the incense shows up pretty quick. Dark and comforting. Light throw, but a keeper, for sure

[filigree_shadow]

This definitely smells like something's burning, but not bad things burning -- plants. It smells smoky and dark and herby. Personally I'm not a fan of burning scents, but I can definitely say I like this one more than most.

[Mountaingrrl00]

I got this when it came out about nine months ago, but never wore it beyond the initial skin-test. In the long, cold autumn and winter the ozone and burnt smells just didn't work. I'm glad I hung onto it now, though, because it's glorious in the heat. It blooms on my skin and evokes the dry air and western herbs and grasses I grew up with, and the burning smell is really subdued now, like incense without the smoke. It's herbal-resiny, slightly sweet, natural-smelling, unisex. It's going to be very wearable for summer.

[griffonner]

In the imp- Burning sage and brush in the best of ways.

Wet- Sage moves back, and burning hillside with a faint medicinal background.

Dry- Dampens down a bit. Medicinal note starts to morph into sage.

5 minutes- Same as dry.

 

Not good on me to wear, but I love it in the bottle.

[stellans]

Last year, I loved this blend. This year, it has changed drastically on me and I'm not sure why. Too many of my former Halloweenie favorites don't seem to be doing well for me this year, and the one thing they all have in common (besides that they are all Halloweenies) is that they have a sweet component. Unfortunately for me, for some reason my body chemistry is amping whatever sweet note (whether syrup, candy, or fruit) to an unbearable pitch which for me is headache and nausea-inducing, as though I had overstuffed myself on Halloween goodies. Not a good feeling, at all, and one I will not willingly seek out, trust me. I'm going to hang on to those blends --including Halloween: Los Angeles-- for another year to see if perhaps this body chemistry shift (for which I have no explanation this time: no change in meds, health, etc.) will swing back or again to a point where I can enjoy them again. Till then, I'm just a sad panda.

[The Poison Queen]

In the bottle: Green, almost a eucalyptus scent. Very sterile and almost cold.

 

On my skin: Holy WOW the smoke! What a BEAUTIFUL scent, definitely smoke and sage.

 

15 minutes later: Still smoke, but more incense to it now. I am SO happy I got a bottle of this!

[fufu_berry]

Like some of the other reviewers, I'm from San Diego, and since 2003 have always associated Halloween with fires - the whole county was on fire for several days, and Halloween was the first day we were allowed to go outside due to the air quality.

 

Wet: This smells *just* like Mad Meg from the Salons. Lots of sage and burnt grasses, and a little bit of something sweet (in MM it's the mandarin, not sure what it is here).

 

Drydown: As usual, my skin mostly eats the smokiness, but the herbal quality is nice still.

 

Dry: Lots of delicious herbally sage smell - I think I probably prefer Mad Meg just a little since it has the vetiver (which helps the smoky scent last longer on me), but this is nice too. I have a bottle of MM so I don't think I need to track more of Halloween: LA down, but it's lovely.

[ObliqueRed]

It's definitely got the smoke and burning grass here, but on me it does a really strange morph and ends up smelling smoky-medicine, which reminds me of getting a filling at the dentist. Yikes! Swap pile for you, LA.

[porcelina]

FIRE. wow. *this* is the smokey sort of scent i have been wanting for a while. fall smells like burning leaves to me and this is fall in a bottle. it's smokey, gorgeous grasses that reminds me of a favorite sweetgrass incense i have. it's beautiful on its own but could also layer amazingly with incense blends.

[Lucchesa]

I just got an obviously well-aged bottle of Halloween: Los Angeles, and it is truly lovely, though somewhat melancholy due to the current fire situation in my beloved home state.  At first it was all fresh and outdoorsy, sage and chaparral and other warm southern-CA-type scents.  In fact it reminded me of the She-Goat from the newest crop of Liliths.  It took about half an hour for the smoke to emerge on my skin, and then it was exactly what I was hoping for.  It's not a vetiver-heavy smoke, but something more like a smudge.  In fact, there is more sweetness and lightness to this scent than I expected, which makes it feel more late summer/early autumn than late autumn/winter to me.  Beautiful. 

[doomsday_disco]

Halloween: Los Angeles starts off with a lovely sage note and some other greenery, but over time, it gets a little smoky, and very dusty -- so it morphs into a desert with plant life into a desert that's scorched and dry.

 

Although I enjoyed the wet phase, it was too dusty for me by the end of the day. It's absolutely evocative of its inspiration, though.