Tum

[hypothermya]

LIBER RESH VEL HELIOS: TUM

 

Hail unto Thee who art Tum in Thy setting, even unto Thee who art Tum in Thy joy, who travellest over the Heavens in Thy bark at the Down-going of the Sun. Tahuti standeth in His splendour at the prow, and Ra-Hoor abideth at the helm. Hail unto Thee from the Abodes of Day!

 

Initial Impression

 

It's really hard to identify any of the scents in here. When I first take a sniff of this, I get a really clear, sweet scent which immediately morphs into something like lavender or something else herbal. It mainly seems like a floral/herbal blend.

 

Wearing It

 

Wet, there's still that sweetness which is almost woody, and almost honey-like. I wonder if it's balasm? The scent of the herbs has faded now into the background, and there's a faint incence smell that's emerging. Not quite like myrhh...perhaps it's frankincence? All the same, it maintains a sweet honeyed incence smell, which reminds me a bit of Cairo.

 

Even when it's all dried, there's the faintest scent of herbs and wood, and on top of it the bitter sweet incence smell pervades. It reminds me more of the altars that you would worship Tum than the actual setting of the sun. The mood of the scent is pretty accurate though -- it isn't a bright scent, nor is it a dark scent. Instead it maintains a sort of twilit haze.

Edited December 20, 2007 by Shollin

[any_old_actress]

FIRST SNIFF: something sweet, cherries and wood

 

WEARING IT: i'm having a very hard time distinguishing any scent in particular. there is a dull, dark sweetness to it - almost like cherries, sweet roses and wood all mixed in together. it's very different.

 

VERDICT: unsure, still debating it.

[clover]

Tum

 

Upon first application: Wow, this is pure grape juice!

 

After a few seconds: But it immediately mophs into something more. It starts to sparkle. Really, it does. Wow, that's seriously completely glorious. It's like a glittery purpley-magenta scent on my skin. In the background is the incense/resin scent that all of the Stations of the Sun seem to have.

 

After a few minutes: Suddenly it turns just a little bit cinnamony. And maybe a tiny little bit floral.

 

A few minutes after that: When I was trying this out I couldn't remember what station of the sun Tum was. But now that I've checked and discovered that it's the setting sun, I'm just amazed. It's amazing how on me the purple/grape/sparkly incense scent coexists with the slightly spicy cinnamon scent and the two don't mix at all. It's honestly reminiscent of a sunset-streaked sky, and a complete triumph.

[Astburygrrl]

In the bottle: This is a spicy, regal grape fizzy scent

On the skin: Sweet, spiced up mead..dark pink & orange in my mind, its very intoxicating. Mmmm..

Afterhours: This is very much like the setting sun..a soft yet vivid coziness, yet theres a sense of melancholy. A bit like a grape dreamsicle, w/ soft florals & resins sighing in the background.

Me loves!

[ladymeshel]

This is *really* different. A combination of grape Kool-aid and clove. My first reaction was...ewwww, not for me....but the clove is really pulling me in and I am most certainly going to have to keep this imp and give it another try. I'd love to know what all the different scents are.

[Theravada]

I tried not to read any of the reviews for the Stations of the Suns scents because I was getting a full set of four imps from Diabolique (I love you!!) and I wanted to sniff them all four at the same time with no expectations.

 

But I agree with most everyone else that Tum has a grape base. It's very lush and fruity. I'm not the best at picking out individual notes but my first impression was ripe red and purple fruits, maybe grape and strawberry with a licorice or anise note mixed in. I was really kind of surprised and a bit confused until I remembered that Tum is the setting sun! Now I really appreciate this. It makes me think of warm evenings watching the sun set into a reddish-purple sky. It's really quite lovely.

 

Tum is the strongest of the four sun scents and has the most throw.

[alston78]

At first sniff: A very familiar smell. I sat around for 10 minutes or so trying to remember what smell it was- all I could discern was that it was grape and from my childhood.

 

At first applicaton: Wait a minute...sniff...sniff...colds...HEY! Dimetapp?! Robitussin?! I'm getting a battle between the two. I smell grape and cherry and herbs, but the sweetness and fruitiness of this blend reminds me distinctly of the medicines I always took for a cold when I was little. Fortunately, I happen to be a fan of both Robitussin and Dimetapp, so I don't mind.

 

4 hours later: The herbiness has left somewhat, and I still smell a sweet, primarily grape blend. I'll be sending this to swaps- although I like the smell perfectly well, the childhood medicine association won't go away, and it's not exactly the smell I want to present to everyone else.

[Faerykin]

Liber Resh Vel Helios: Tum

 

Swiped across wrists and along collarbone.

 

Initial Wet (8-8:30am): This goes on thick. The rich scent of honey surrounded by a golden veil. A warm scent, indeed.

 

Initial Dry (8:30-10am): The honey takes a back seat as it is overwhelmed by the golden veil. The scent feels orange and yellow to me – like the golden horizon of the sunset. There is something beginning to peek its way through the veil … could it be grape? How odd. A splash of purple just entered the horizon ... of course, it lasted all of 10 minutes.

 

This is certainly a swirl of notes – as there are so many it is difficult to distinguish between them. A little spicy, a little incensy/resiny, a little sweet … very reminiscent of a gorgeous sunset.

 

Throughout the Day (10am-on): This is still a swirl of notes. Spice, resin, incense … is that myrrh? It really is a lovely, warm scent, and it really does evoke the vision of a beautiful sunset.

 

I think this contains one of those notes that gives me a headache. Either that or it is just one of those days. I’ll probably give it another try before passing it along – but, chances are I won’t keep the imp.

[Shollin]

First sniff: Syrupy-sweet, with a very strong burst of golden fruit asserting itself in the afterscent – it’s almost pineapple, but not quite. Tum is one of those scents you can almost taste as you smell it, a burst of yellow sweetness just in the back of your throat.

 

Wearing: Strongly sweet, bright gold, very juicy. It was a bit too sweet for the first couple of hours, but dried down to a nice warm fruity golden sweetness that wasn’t screaming – I just need to be a bit more restrained next time I try it on.

[Ishtar]

This is different from what I expected -to me sunsets in Egypt will always smell of the warm powderiness of sand and of hibiscus flowers. I suppose I also expected something a little darker, since Tum is the aspect of the Sun that makes the transition from the hours of the day to those of the night and has to get ready to fight and eventually defeat Apophis.

 

Tum started off quite fruity and sweet on me, but it only took the grape note a few minutes to turn into a rather sour scent, almost vinegary, reminiscent of the mimosa note in Old Madrid.

Thankfully this stage did not last. When the blend eventually settled, Tum ended up smelling more like spicy, honeyed incense than fruit. The drydown had an exotic feel to it that somewhat reminded me of all the spice smells wafting from the markets in Assouan.

A highly complex and changeable blend, Tum is very well made and evocative. I canot wait to try the other Stations of the Sun

Edited December 6, 2004 by Ishtar

[Penance]

Got an imp of this from Mrs. Black.

 

Preconceived notions:

 

I'm a little leery of this one based on the reviews. I'd rather not smell like grape Dimetapp (or Mountain Dew Pitch Black, which tasted like grape Dimetapp), but because I'll never know until I try, I want to give it a shot.

 

First sniff:

 

Hmm, that's grape all right, but not grape cough syrup...more like grape soda, maybe? Or grape Laffy Taffy? It's something very artificially grape smelling but not in an unpleasant way. There's also something vaguely spicy/resiny underneath the grape that I can't put my finger on because of the super strong grape note.

 

Wet on skin:

 

Grape soda and some kind of sweet incense, maybe? It smells almost like frankincense, but it could be some sort of spice, too, since the grape smell is so strong that it makes it hard to get a handle on the other notes. This is actually quite nice smelling in an odd sort of way, not at all like I imagined it would be.

 

Dry down:

 

Mmm, the grape has disappeared, leaving a faintly sweet resin smell...I'm thinking maybe myrrh is the culprit here. I actually really like this, but there are other incense blends that I prefer, so I don't know that I'll be keeping this. This isn't at all like I expected it to be, it's very...innocent smelling, but resiny at the same time. It's very hard to explain.

 

The bottom line:

 

This is nice, but I think since I already have so many incense blends that I prefer to Tum, I'm going to be swapping this one off for something else. It's a nice scent, but I don't see myself wearing it often enough.

[ChupaChup]

I can't say that I get any grape from Tum. I'm really not sure what I'm getting from it, except for honey. And it's not a very sweet honey, not like the honey in Athens or Jezebel. It's much more waxy, so maybe it's just beeswax. There are definitely other notes but this blend is very confusing to my nose, I can't identify them. Not a favorite for me but not bad either, just kind of meh.

[Serenity]

I didn't read the reviews till after I'd tried this on and let it dry down a bit.

 

I do get a bit of a fruit undertone to this, but it all comes together to be Essence of Mulled Spiced Cider on me. Cloves, Allspice, Cinnamon, that's what's lingering.

 

I'd love for this to be fruitier on me.. but fruit notes seem to be overwhelmed on my skin by other, stronger notes.

[darkling]

Tum was more reminiscent of a rising sun than a setting one for me because it seemed primarily bright and green. This was a very sharp scent like bitter herbs left in the sun.

 

I could not pick out any particular notes and I did not catch any of the grape scent or sweet fruit that others have noticed.

 

This is a strong scent and tends to linger for a good six hours or longer.

[Lady_Ell]

In the vial: sweet sweet sweet with a touch of grape.

 

On skin: this smelled like smushed Concord grapes and sugar, just starting to turn moldy and alcoholic.

[rainbow]

In the bottle and wet on the skin- honey and grape, and possibly something woody. The honey is really strong, and I'm not a fan of honey. (I suspect this would be a good thing for others, but alas, it's not for me). It reminds me of Athens, what with the grape-honey combo, but the honey is stronger, and the whole scent is louder, more brash, and in-your-face than Athens, which strikes me as a more quiet and refined scent.

 

As I'm wearing this softens a bit, and the scents blend together more. This does give off the sense of the setting sun, in that it brings about images of the sky growing dark. It's a thick and cloudy sort of scent. It retains a strong grape scent throughout, but I just can't deal with the honey. It does soften and become more powdery, which is nice, but still there's the honey, and I'd rather not have that. I think there must be loads of people out there who would love this scent, because I get the sense that honey is a fairly popular fragrance, but I'm not one of those people.

 

In the final anaylsis I'm afraid that this isn't for me, and it's going into my swaps pile.

[Shimmershadow]

First sniff: Grape bubble gum! The really thick, Hubba-Bubba stuff! Makes me nostalgic for the days of flouride treatments...

 

On me: It gently evolves into something more floraly but still with those purply grape notes. Sweet in wafts, but not like honeysuckle. I didn't like it at first, but it may grow on me. After a little while, it smells like sweet wine, a prelude to a kiss on a first date. Becomes vaguely incensy and softens out.

 

And so... Admittedly, I hated it at first, but may reconsider adding it to my 5ml list now. Nice for an evening with friends or even Casual Fridays at the office.

[tempete]

Wet, Tum smells like grape juice which makes me suspect the presence of the BPAL wine note (which almost always smells like grape juice on me). As it dries down, Tum slowly evolves into a rich, honeyed, resiny scent that retains only a trace of grape-y goodness. While this is an interesting scent, it doesn't really suit me, so I'm sending it off to the swap pile.

[Julilla Regina]

Tum smelled a little sweet to me, but not candy sweet. I think it's more like a thick honey smell that comes out of this. I think the other note is white wine, the wine that reminds me of "Glitter". "Glitter" was more candy than this one though. I think it's a smooth, aged honeyed wine scent. Very nice.

[diabolique]

urrrggggh.

 

something in this really upset my stomach. i'm not sure what it was because the only blends thus far that have hurt my stomach are zombi, nosferatu, and melpomene. i'm inclined to say it was the sweetness of the blend that did it, but i'm thinking there might've been some kind of moss in it. this didn't smell herbal to me at all because it was all sweetness to my nose. i promptly washed it off, though, so maybe i didn't give it time to really develop. out of all of the stations of the sun, this is my least favorite.

[phaedrine]

Tum in the bottle is like opening a new bottle of grape juice, where that grape scent just comes out and hits you right in the face.

 

Wearing for a while, I get the same thing, as if I'd put on grape perfume.

 

However!

 

After some time of wearing it (maybe half an hour? less?) it fades down to this *beautiful* warm, golden spiced honey scent. Honey, spices and maybe some resins. It's lovely, rich and round.

 

While it definitely screams purple to me, that doesn't make me think of the sunset...here in new mexico, the sunset is all tangerine and pink and bright gold, with the mountains behind you turning lovely warm shades of red and pink.

[xoe]

Well, for me Tum is almost entirely fizzy grape. My co-worker really liked it on me, but I didn't. I felt uncomfortable with Tum. Strange. Oh well.

[paperdoll]

Initial Sniff: In the vial this is sweet fruit with a touch of spice. I can see why people say grape, but I'm really not sure what fruit this is.

Wearing: At first the fruit is overpowering, but as it dries, a beautiful golden glow of myrrh starts lighting the red and purple fruits from behind. The result is a gorgeous sweet glowing sunset - as it ages, the resins become more prominent, appropriately darkening the blend until it fades away to nothing.

Final Impressions: This is the first of the stations of the sun that I have tried, and I must say that I am impressed. This works beautifully on my skin.

[surf-tormented]

It had the same rank garbage smell Delphi had in the vial and putting it on, it takes a lot of time to morph into something I can stand. I wish I knew what note it was that smells like this, I would surely stay away from it.

[strangeling]

Ah, Tum - the only BPAL I have honestly NOT liked, hehe!

 

My husband pinned it down exactly with a short story that started off with.....

 

"When I was in school, one time I had a peanut butter and grape jelly sandwich that I left in my locker over Christmas break, and when I came back......"

 

It smells like old, yucky grape jelly that is waaay past its prime. I almost gagged! I've sniffed sooooo many BPAL oils, and have found a way to enjoy every one of them on some level, except for this one - I just can't describe it!