Vice

[Dani87]

Voluptuous and indulgent! A deep chocolate scent, with black cherry and orange blossom.

 

Imp: cherry syrup, not medicine, but very sweet syrup like a pie filling.
Wet: same as imp
Dry: chocolate covered cherries! Just like a box of chocolate covered cherries.
Over all I love this scent, it reminds me of my great grandmother who would sit me on her lap when I was a little girl, and we would eat chocolate covered cherries. A keeper for sure, have to get a big bottle.

[Vega]

Sniffed: Dark, juicy cherry with an orange zest. Where's the chocolate?

 

On skin: I've noticed that the Lab's dark chocolate note doesn't so much give off a chocolate scent per se, as add weight and darkness to the other notes. That's exactly what happens here in Vice: the dark chocolate note is grounding and deepening the fruity notes instead of contributing to the smell (if any). The rich, luscious cherry and bright, tangy orange are the stars of the show, but are much darker and rounded than they would be on their own. Cherry can be hit or miss on my skin, but here it is gorgeously juicy and not overly sweet. The sparkling, zesty bite of the orange contrasts well with the full-bodied, dark cherry. Vice is exactly its name: wickedly decadent chocolate, indulgent and debauched cherry, and the orange sting of the conscience. The scent fully embodies the word "succulent". Colour impression is the same dark red as black cherries, sparkling with orange.

 

Verdict: Vice is a luscious, sexy blend, and absolutely gorgeous! I would've liked to smell more chocolate, but this is a minor quibble. I love this!

[ShannonElisabethJones]

In the imp - exactly like cherry-filled chocolates. I don't like to eat them, but they sure smell nice.

First applied - More cherry than chocolate. Not bad. Verrrrrrrrry sweet. I don't get any orange blossom. Definitely more fruity than flowery.

 

After a while - it's not super strong, but it's super yummy! Don't think I'll spring for an entire bottle, but this one is just plain fun.

Edited March 24, 2012 by Sionann

[Innocuousmold]

I was wondering if Vice could rival my love for Bliss, but they're really two entirely different animals. In Vice, I get mostly sweet and thick cherries with a tiny bit of orange. I can't really pick put much of the dark chocolate but it's there, and in the end it's a subtle scent. Though I really love the Labs cherry note I'm going to pass on Vice because it's not interesting enough to me.

[Greenwoodtree]

Yet another disappointment...I wanted to try this because the notes reminded me of Blood Kiss, which works well for me....

 

However, the chocolate and orange blossom are fighting each other, and the cherry is leaving a decidedly artificial note on my skin...

after a short while it turns to a plastiky orange blossom cherry smell that reminds me shockingly of the plastic artificial flowers my grandma had in her bathroom when I was a little kid!

 

Oh BPAL, how fickle your scents are.

[lohengrin]

In the imp: Chocolate-covered cherries.

 

On skin, wet: Mostly cherry, hint of cough syrup.

 

On skin, dry: Cherry, a little smoothed out and warmed up by something, but not distinctly chocolatey.

 

After an hour: And this has turned into artificial cherry, like scratch n'sniff or scented plastic dolls. It's not actually unpleasant, but it's sure not anything I want to smell like on a regular basis. ^^;

[sunlitgarden]

Vice has been on my wishlist for a while, as I love chocolate scents, but I'm beginning to find that orange blossom may be a problem note for my skin (which is unfortunate because I love the actual smell of orange blossoms.) So I'm not sure how well it will work...

 

In the imp, this smells like some kind of gourmet chocolate. Yummm. The cherry comes out pretty strong on my skin, though, and is unfortunately kind of fake smelling, at least on me. It reminds me of those scented markers we had in elementary school. There's still some sweetness from the orange blossom, but I'm not getting much chocolate at all on my skin.

 

The fake cherry note fades out somewhat as it dries. The throw is mainly orange blossom, and it smells remarkably true to life and sweet. Fortunately, the orange blossom is not going sour! It must have been something else in those other blends. I'm sad that the chocolate disappeared as soon as it hit my skin, though.

[hexnut]

VICE

 

In Vitro Chocolate and sweet fruit, with orange stronger than cherry! I literally exclaimed aloud and put my free hand to my chest, as if I had the vapors.

 

Wet This began as heavenly fruity chocolate with cherry and orange blossom at equal strength. The chocolate diminished a bit but the overall scent remained rich. The fruitiness dominated unless I put my nose right on my wrist, where I got more chocolate.

 

Drying The chocolate wasn't readily identifiable as such but it provided a base. The orange blossom and cherry blended to a floral-fruity sweetness that was neither cloying nor vegetative. It was almost intoxicating.

 

Half an hour after application and I couldn't believe it - it got better! All three notes melded to a rich, almost spicy blend, like a gourmet milk chocolate bar flavored with fruit and and a hint of chai spices. And that's where it remained, fading slowly but still amazing, for at least three hours. At the very end it was more cherry than anything, but no complaints.

 

 

It's a good thing that I sample BPAL in private, because this oil induced me to behave in embarrassing ways. I couldn't stop smelling my wrist and making rapturous faces. And to think, this could have gone so wrong on me; the cherry could have turned to evil cough syrup but it was real fruit instead. The day I tested Vice I wanted to run around shouting, "I can wear the Lab's chocolate!"

 

ETA: Whoops, got excited and posted prematurely. I meant to add that this goes to the top of the bottle list.

 

 

14

Edited May 18, 2012 by hexnut

[Cthonne]

In Imp: Ohhhhh my god this is straight up, pure essence of chilli. Chilli! DX

 

Wet: Nothing but chilli, chilli, chilli. This is like the hit of chilli in a mexican hot chocolate drink from San Churros, but by far more powerful. This is a chilli that punches you in the nose. This is what I imagine the hottest chilli in the world to smell like.

Jalapenos, Habaneros, piri piri and bird's eye chillies stand aside. I can barely detect the cocoa and cherrie notes once it starts to warm up on the skin. Cannot tell what is giving me that strong chilli note. Is it the orange blossom?

 

Dry: Finally! Cherry and orange fruitiness. My, it's delicious now.

 

On me, Vice also has deliriously long wear-time - about 12 hours or overnight - but it seems to need that time to really come into its own, to get that deliciously sinful cherry-orange fruitiness underscored by good, dark, bitter cocoa powder. That crazy beginning, though... Off you go into the 'age-like-whoa-and-hope-for-improvement' pile.

[Bookgroper]

Smells divine in the vial - I got the imp as a freebie with a purchase, popped the top and nearly swooned - but it literally disappeared from my skin in under an hour. The chocolate part lasted maybe a minute - then faded to the fruit which I did also enjoy - but then my skin just drank all of it and nothing was left. SADFACE. Still want to keep the imp, if for no other reason than to open it and take a deep sniff when I'm PMSing or something

[Deliciousness]

Imp: smells like a tootsie roll and orange, with a bit of cherry ... yummy!
Wet on skin: Wow, this smells pretty muck like in the imp, sweet and delicious!
Dry on skin: This smells like a chocolate tootsie roll with a little bit of orange, which fades and is replaced by a hint of cherry.

I do really this scent - especially in it's infancy, when it's all chocolate gorgeousness with a smidgen of fruit. Alas, this stage is very short and, this scent just doen't last on me

[claudia6913]

I've shied away from chocolate scents for ... forever. This is the first one that's touched my skin since I was a child.

 

And amazingly enough, I get little to no chocolate scent. It's actually very candy-like. I get more of a visual of the gooey part of a chocolate covered cherry, than I do the actual cherry or chocolate.

 

Definitely not my cuppa, but not at all what I was expecting either.

[boomtownrat]

When I got Vice I gave it a small dab, but today I decided to put it on all my usual application spots (front and back of each wrist, behind each ear, on the hollow of my throat) for a long-term skin test. It's an imp that I bought off the forum because I had been eyeing it for a while, unsure of how the orange blossom would play with the other notes on my skin. I don't love the way I tend to amp orange blossom, but I like chocolate and cherry so I was willing to test Vice.

 

For about five minutes the cherry and orange blossom together give off that artificial pink smell you come across in certain public restrooms. Fortunately, the chocolate starts to mellow out the scent as it dries so that it no longer makes me feel as though I'm hanging out in a rest stop on I-85. It has minimal throw once it dries and starts smelling more like one of the chocolates that I got in a box as a gift last Christmas, but occasionally the ghost of the bathroom wafts up to my nose. The blend is probably one of the simplest I've tried from BPAL so far, which isn't a bad thing, but in this case I think I would've liked something else in place of the orange blossom. I'm pretty sure that's the note that gives it that rest stop bathroom effect.

 

Vice probably isn't for me, but I have a growing number of scents that I love and want to wear almost exclusively. Eventually I'll give it one more test, but if it doesn't work after that I might just give it to a friend who now has several sweet, fruity imps that I thought she would appreciate more than I did.

 

Contrary to the name Vice, I think of this scent as being innocent and youthful... or at least it could be on somebody who doesn't amp orange blossom into bathroom cleaner territory. It's something I could see being popular with pre-teens who are just starting to wear perfume, and there's always room for scents like that in the wide world of olfactory delights.

[ObliqueRed]

This one was cherry, cherry, cherry, cherry on me, a sort of artificial-smelling cherry... until about an hour and a half after I put it on, when it suddenly did an about-face and turned into chocolate. The chocolate stage is nice but I think there are better fruit scents for me than the Cherry! stage.

[Quillifer]

I love the chocolate and cherry in this, and I'm happy to keep my imp, but for me the organge blossom just clashes with the other notes. Its floweriness is a different register from the gourmand and the two just don't meld for me.

[MadameGorgon]

While the Lab's chocolate notes are to die for, Cherry is a bit problematic for me and Orange Blossom can either be lovely and fresh or a little screech-y. But lately, I've had a run of good luck with scents including cherry so I wanted to give this a try.

 

Big fat cherries, restroom air freshener and burnt hair. wtf.

 

I have never had the lab's chocolate note go so very very wrong. And it seems that berries and I don't often play well together. I amp them like whoa and they tend to smell very artificial and waxy like very bad scented candles. Boo.

 

I'm in a terribly pissy mood right now and I thought this might soothe my ragged edges, but apparently not.

 

I'm willing to give this another shot since I've never had the experience of a BPAL going so horribly wrong on my skin, but my hopes aren't high, what with the cherry ampage.

[Atrous]

The main player; Big, dark, juicy cherries dipped in liquid chocolate. Delicious!

 

I am getting the Orange Blossom in the background. It's like there is a bit of Orange zest floating around in the chocolate. Blossoms make this scent more complex by adding a light floral touch.

 

The Chocolate note is absolutely divine and so sweet. Also, I could swear I smell buttercream even though its not listed in the notes.

 

The bottle I'm testing has been aging for a little over a year and it's so much better than when I tested it fresh. Fresh, Vice didn't quite have the complexity it has now.

[mymymai]

• ITI: The cherry here is a gorgeously dark cherry, like maraschino cherry, only with the Rainier variety. There is something that reminds me of amaretto as well, and the chocolate note is more of a chocolate liquor rather than the overtly sugar chocolate note I've smelled before from the lab. So far, this is very nice.

Wet: Ah, now I know what it reminds me of: cherry cordials. It makes my mouth water! The orange blossom keeps the scent from being completely foody, adding some light and innocent floral to something that would otherwise be very hedonistic. Woo, this is awesome!

Dry: It's less foody and just wonderfully charged due to the distinct cherry and chocolate liquor notes, although the orange blossom here is essential in making this a very pleasant and alluring scent that is both indulgent and inviting, even to a non-foody like me. I think I might even consider getting more of this!

[inhumation]

I got a testable sniffy of this and I don't know what happened but this smells like cheese on me. like, the umami of parmaggiano reggiano was wafting from my skin. :/

[Veronica]

Starts off cherry syrup with a hint of cocoa, but morphs into some kind of lemonade--sweet, sugary lemon--which is actually far more wearable for me, but still totally bizarre.

[LizziesLuck]

Wet: The orange blossom is the strongest note, but I get hints of cocoa. Cherry is non-existent.

 

 

 

Dry: This is not good on me. There's something really off-putting about it. I'm starting to think I either don't like orange blossom, or it doesn't agree with my skin chemistry. This is the third orange blossom blend I've tried and they've all smelled really off.

[freyasfae]

I got this an imp swap. I was hoping the chocolate and orange blossom would outweight my dislike of cherry. Nope, but hey, if you like cherry, this is definitely for you.

[lucycat]

This was a frimp from the Lab.

 

In the imp the cherry is most prominent; I thought it was almond at first.

 

While super-foody scents are not usually my favorite, I like most of the Lab’s chocolate blends that I have tried. When I can smell them, that is. The orange blossom in Vice seems to cancel the chocolate out. It very quickly becomes chalky and sour-smelling on my arms. On the back of my hand, the cherry and chocolate put up more of a fight, drying down to something piquant and not overwhelmingly sweet and making me think of chocolate-covered cherries.

 

Orange blossom rarely works for me, but if you like it, Vice is worth a try.

[roseus]

Unfortunately I pretty much only got cherry cough syrup from this. After an hour it softened to a smooth chocolate-cherry, but I the cough syrup phase was too much for me. Alas, passing the imp on to someone else who will hopefully love it!

[Shadowdawn]

I adore cherries and dark chocolate, so this should be sexy for me right? I don't know much about orange blossom, but maybe it will keep it from being too foody??

 

WHUT. What a strange reaction... I now know all about orange blossom. And I almost wish I didn't.

 

The minute this goes on my skin, all notions of chocolate (which was a backdrop note for me, even from the bottle sniff) are immediately completely gone in every sense of the word. In fact, there aren't even any cherries. This is all entirely orange blossom (which I recognize now as the smell of straight up soap). I do think that while I can't actually smell cherries, they are lending an astringent, antiseptic quality to the orange blossom, sort of like a backdrop of cherry cough syrup, but just cough syrup I guess. It does not play well with the orange blossom in the least, and as another reviewer mentioned, it becomes "generic pink bathroom soap" found in many public restrooms. Very, very, antiseptic. And medicinal somehow. I'm sad. It's a also a little plasticy now... yikes, I might have to wash this off.