R'lyeh

[Faeried]

Ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn. The sunken city of the Great God Cthulhu. A hellishly dark aquatic scent, evocative of fathomless oceanic deeps, the mysteries of madness buried under crushing black waters, and the brooding eternal evil that lies beneath the waves.

This one I like. It's softer than Cthulhu, doesn't have that bite to it.
On me it smells like a soft aquatic, like rain.

But I'm not sure I'd have a full 5ml, but an imp on hand would be nice.

[puck_nc]

Origin: Frimp in an eBay purchase

 

Initial Thoughts: I'm not very into aquatics, so this isn't one I would have bought for myself.

 

In the Bottle: Very heavily aquatic, shot through with a green note. Dark and troubling.

 

Wet: Wow, something floral is rushing up from the depths! It's almost as if sunlight were erupting from beneath the waves! It's a high, crisp white floral scent.

 

Drydown: Okay, now it's slightly more fruity than floral. The watery impression is back, with a chill to it. Not at all what I expected.

 

Verdict: I think I'll play with this one a while. I could see myself wearing it when I need a shot of springtime.

[wikkidraven]

i got a testable sniffy of R'Lyeh from a friend who said she thought it would suit me, so i'm assuming she thinks i should smell like a ripe pink grapefruit with a bit of sugar sprinkled on top. i'm not quite sure why.

 

i don't get any of the aquatic notes yet, but i've only been wearing it a half hour. all this scent is to my nose is pure grapefruit, not entirely unpleasant, and sort of refreshing even. but i doubt i would hunt up a bottle of it.

[tempestteapot]

sweet and citrus. Wow I didn't expect this one either. I guess I should read descriptions before I try them on. I love the bright grapefruit with the deeper scent that draws you in.

[cinderfallen]

It's kapow! Aquatic citrus loving! It dries down too quickly, though, because I love that initial stage. It dries down to a danker grapefruit smell. Hmm.

 

Edit to say: Final drydown was completely nasty. There must be something like...I don't know, vetiver? Musk? Because it smells like pee and cat fur. Same for my friend.

Edited December 13, 2006 by cinderfallen

[oh_the_horror]

In bottle: Spoiled fruit.

 

Wet and drying down: This smells like a dark brooding underwater cave with crumbling black minerals and silt. It's not even aquatic. How strange. It also smells like bubblegum.

 

Dry: I smell like a clean, soft, nondescript scented candle. The wax would be pale green. Maybe with some sort of melon in it. I don't really like this one.

[Voleuse]

Dark, ozoney. Bottomless ocean and...grapefruit? Pink grapefruit, even, which seems odd with the other notes, but works surprisingly well. The aquatic notes murk up the citrus, emphasize how light and elusive it is, while the grapefruit keeps the darker notes from being too overwhelming. Over time, the grapefruit actually gets stronger on me, but it stays cool.

[femmefatale]

Ouch, that is really really strong at first. And it's a very perfumey scent. Not liking it so much wet.

As it's drying down, ew, it's not changing much. I'm not geting any of the grapefruit. It just smells like some bad perfume I tried years ago. Maybe it would work better with hubby's chemistry becuase it's just not working with mine.

[waternight]

Got a bottle of this from Bard.

 

In the bottle: Fruity and ozoney.

Wet/Drydown: Salty! Crisp and ozoney and slightly tangy-sweet. There’s a grapefruit element that I’m getting. A very pithy grapefruit – like the white pith on the inside of the rind. There’s definitely a sweet aquatic note combined with the salty ozone; the salt is on the top, but little wavelets of the sweet aquatic keep playing hide-and-seek with me. More citrusy than Tempest, but quite similar to it as well. Ooo… on an extended inhale, I got a whiff of grapefruit juice. The salt is starting to calm down and let the sweeter aquatic and citrus notes show through more. Now I’m getting an unexpectedly musky note, but for some reason it works in the blend. The saltiness has really died down – it’s still there, but it’s in the background, subtly emphasizing the aquatic/ozone feel of the blend.

Dry: So well blended! Musky, salty, aquatic grapefruit, and it’s wonderful.

 

I'll definitely be wearing this more often.

[roxyhead]

In the imp, really didn't get a good smell because it got all over me when I opened it so I closed it quickly. On me, we have aquatic pine with a little citrus, and...cookies.

 

Cookies?!?

 

Maybe Fudgee-Os or Girl Guide cookies, the brown and white ones, not the thin mints. Thin mint cookie perfume would drive me insane and probably make me gain weight instantly. Evil Girl Guides?

 

I don't think I like what's growing on the cookies. It's an interesting scent, but I like my food unmolested, cthanks. (accidental typo, left in on purpose)

[zankoku_zen]

In the imp: citrusy

 

On skin: Fruity-citrus. There is something musky underlying it, and I can't pinpoint what the fruit is. It kinda brings to mind the 'scented' fruit ink that some pens for children have.

 

On drydown: Definitely musky. Dark. No aquatics... simply musky.

 

Verdict: No water... instead I seem to be straight into sniffing Cthulu, a musky sort of smell. Odd to say the least. I was hoping for some 'deep' water... but apparently, it was not meant to be.

[hipslike___cinderella]

Oh, crap! This is my first review of a "oh, no no no" scent. First of all, let me say I picked this solely for my guy, because he loves HP Lovecraft. This was before I was a forum member, and was only going by the mysterious Lab description.

 

This was very, very wet. Sticky wet. And I was surprised by the sour fruit note. Definitely fruit. On my skin it got worse... fruit, mostly close to grapefruit, and some floral hints I can't pin down. It seems like my chemistry fights with this blend, and my body is trying to bring out a stale department store cologne/perfume note.

 

Further down the road, R'lyeh starts to smell more and more artificial. After about 30 minutes I had to wash it off because I was getting a headache (I promise, I don't usually get this bothered by oils). I don't want to be anywhere near this, ever again.

 

In summary... I didn't find this to be a "hellishly dark aquatic scent" at all. Strong and screaming aquatic, but sour and citrusy, with barely a whisper of herbal hint. So I guess it's not dark, but Yikes! It is vengeful. Let it be known that I really do not like fruity at all, and I'm having a hard time with aquatic scents (although I am still trying to find one I might like!). Neither of us liked this one... BUT the imp found a new home with my mother, and she even asked for 5 ml for her birthday! To each his own.

[captainecchi]

In the imp, I noticed a whiff of something sweet and fruity, but hard to place. Definitely not the grapefruit everyone else is getting; I wore Night-gaunt the other day and compared to the screaming grapefruit in that, there is nothing here.

 

It's hard for me to describe this smell. Definitely aquatic--clean, only a touch soapy. The fruitiness I smelled in the imp, once applied, becomes a sort of effervescence that reminds me of cola or tonic water--I'm told opoponax can do that, but no one else has mentioned that as a note.

 

About a half hour later, this smell "dirties up" as a dry, dusty note came out, like some sort of resin. There's a depth now that may come from musk.

 

It's a complex smell, definitely evocative of R'lyeh for me--I think of bubbles rising off a dark, underwater temple.

 

4 out of 5 for me--I think I need to sample it some more.

[Browneyes]

Imp: the Lab's aquatic, salt water, ozone smell

Wet: the same, but it deepens a bit

Dry: the "grapefruit" note that everyone has mentioned definately emerges on me too as well as something incensy/resinous (??), adding a sweetness and depth to the scent. It's green, watery, ozoney, citrusy at the same time.

 

Observation: Comparing this one to Nyarlathotep is interesting. N is even more green (in a cucumber-y kind of way) compared to this one, which is more fruity. Neither of them seem very dark and foreboding to me though, but are rather pleasant variations on the light, fresh, aquatic, good-for-the-summer-heat kind of scents

I will keep my imps of both!

[brit_brat100]

Imp: I get the aquatic and something else…not quite fruity sweet, but…more fresh. Not as evil as I expected…

 

Wet: tangy citrus.

 

Dry: creeping aquatic notes over a tangy tinged scent that I can’t place. Everyone else grapefruit, but I don’t know about that.

 

Final Thoughts: Pretty and not at all clashy, just not what I expected. I think I'll wait and try again, maybe with less preconceived ideas about how I think it should smell.

[Jilara]

This one I LIKE. It's interesting in that wet or dry, it doesn't morph at all on me. It stays squirmy slithery aqueous goodness, start to finish.

 

I don't get grapefruit or citrus at all, ever, at any time of month, and I've worn this a bit. Not my skin chemistry, I guess. I do get aquatics and a definite melon note. A bit of seaweed. An almost indetectable backnote of swamp water. It's definitely the smell of brackish water with squirmy things. A friend says it smells like tadpoles. Appropriate.

 

So far, I haven't met a Lovecraft scent I haven't liked.

[citharadraconis]

Oh ugh ugh ugh. Get it away.

 

I seriously don't know what it is about this blend (maybe it's my skin), but something about the scent makes me nauseous and uneasy, both in the imp and on me. It's a weird, boggish, musky grapefruit aquatic--I normally love grapefruit and aquatics, but this just smells...off to me, like the slimy underbelly of something decaying in stagnant water. I suppose it fits the concept well, but it turns my stomach.

Edited April 19, 2007 by citharadraconis

[batsy]

In the vial: salty fruit.

 

On the skin: Holy... I didn't know one could create a perfume that smells EXACTLY like a can of Squirt soda, only salty! Grapefruit ahoy indeed. This is fascinating!

[le fey]

In the bottle:

Citrus and aquatic tones - very fresh and clean. nothing crushing or black here, but I like it.

 

Wet:

Almost exactly as it was in the bottle. Nice!

 

Dry (15 min):

This is staying pretty much as is started - aquatic tones and grapefruit. This is very similar to a scented candle I have and love. I'm getting nothing dark or brooding here though, much less evil. This smells like a summer morning in Florida.

 

Later (45 min):

fading out pretty quickly here - the citrus is gone and now it's a soft, generic aquatic. Still pleasant, though - I love aquatics. I just wish they weren't so ethereal.

 

Wind Down (2 hours):

Just the faintest whiff still left. This smells great to the end, which came way too soon.

 

Verdict:

I never did discover the dark murkiness described, but I do like this very much. It will require frequent reapplications, though!

[taramarie]

Wet, R'lyeh smells like seaweed and murky water. As it starts to dry, I'm getting whiffs of evergreens.

 

I expected grapefruit and got Christmas trees. Weird.

 

This one's definitely not for me. Though, it might make an interesting room scent come December.

[captainoats]

In the imp: Sweet and aquatic-y, with a bit of a pine smell. No grapefruit yet.

 

On, wet: A guess they're a bit of a citrus smell, but no definite grapefruit to me. Still a bit pine-y and I'm getting a kind of dark aquatic smell that I expected. Why does it sound like I'm the crazy one?

 

Drying: It's kind of hard for me to smell, but it's making my nose tingle, which is kind of bizarre.

 

Final Verdict: This is not working for me, but I'm sure it's nice on other people, lol. Silly chemistry. Swaps it is!

[Gemini noir]

Turned fairly quickly from a dark aquatic to heavily perfumey grapefruit to dark, moderately spicy, and slightly citrusy perfume. Stayed quite dark for about half an hour, gave me a bit of a headache.

 

Got less murky, but not really more pleasant. For a while it was "Spicy murkiness" then it became murky and a bit "Hey, did my roommate leave a grapefruit lying around before he went out of town five days ago?" Then... just heavily murky. Like a fog of murk. And... the headache didn't go away. This one is not for me.

[kwsix]

In the imp: Grapefruit and the ocean?

 

From application to drydown, it's salty grapefruit soda with a musky undertone. It's an interesting scent. Although it's much brighter and fizzier than I expected, it's definitely not a typical summery grapefruit scent. It's Fresca on the dark side. R'lyeh, I dub thee Enraged Grapefruit Musk. It isn't my type of scent, but lovers of murky aquatics should definitely try it.

[PersephonesChild]

I'm with everyone else who was pretty surprised that "unfathomable darkness" smells like fruit. I claim it's melon, not grapefruit, and it sticks around, which grapefruit doesn't. Of course, I love grapefruit, I love fruit scents, and this one is an interesting version.

 

It definitely smells wet, and I get a sense of sea-spray, maybe churning up from a whirlpool. Yes, the melon continues, but sometimes it becomes just sweet ocean water. I'm a fan. Very much so. I'd actually be craving some aquatics to help me feel better about the heat here in the summer, and this is a perfect summer blend.

[maribouquet]

imp: Ginger and aquatics

wet: Spicy, warm aquatic. Masculine.

dry: A sweet round smell emerges. I can't identify it but it has the male tang of cassis. Maybe also some seaweed?

 

Fascinating, but not for me.

 

ALSO, I didn't smell any grapefruit! Just phantom ginger. Clearly am deeply flawed as a human being.