Moon of the Terrible 2013

[Gwydion]

MOON OF THE TERRIBLE
On New Year's Day
each thought a loneliness
as winter dusk descends

Desolation at the last moment in the gloaming on New Year's Day: winter snow with white lavender, benzoin, lychee, white resins, and a cluster of melancholy, lachrymose lunar herbs.

In bottle: The snow note it extremely dominant, but it’s the non-peppermint mint version which I can usually wear, with strong support from benzoin, lavender, and herbs. The herbs go particularly well with snow and lavender in this blend. The Lychee provides a sweet counterpoint with resins in support. It’s really interesting, but might be to heady for wearing. Wet: The lavender steps into dominance of the skin with snow in strong support with the herbs complicating them. The benzoin smoothes transition with the lychee and resins. As it warms, the snow moves back into dominance with the herbs in strong support. It’s quite the morpher. It also has big throw. Dry: Mostly snow kissed with lavender, and nard.

[khemistry]

Thanks to an incredibly generous swapper, I was able to smell several years worth of Moon of the Terrible for comparison.

 

This year's moon is heavy on the florals and snow and much lighter on the lychee note. For the folks that didn't care for the fruity top note in previous versions, this is much more in the background for 2013. Sadly, the lychee note is my favorite aspect, so the 2013 blend leaves me wishing for more. This is a very cold feeling floral scent to me- nothing warm or spicy about this like so many of BPAL's scents. It's not a bright or happy floral either. This feels like flowers long dead and covered in snow.

 

(Side note: on dry after an hour, the various years smell much more similar. I still miss the wet lychee though)

[zankoku_zen]

Snow, lychee and a hint of lavender and white florals.

 

It's mainly a snow blend, which is the slushy white snow note I love in Ice Queen, with a good bit of lychee thrown in. The lavender rounds it out, and you get a slightly Asian feeling lunacy, courtesy of the lychee.

 

It's not as lychee based as previous Moon of the Terrible incarnations, but oddly this particularly mix works better for my skin chemistry. The original MoT smelled too weird to me, and the previous MoT had a weird bitter edge to it that I couldn't shake off.

 

Instead, this is like a soft snowy slushy laced with lychee.

 

I may in fact just talked myself into a bottle with that last line. No lie.

[doomsday_disco]

In the decant: Snow and lychee, mostly, followed by the lavender note.

 

Wet: The snow is the dominant note. It is a bright, slushy, ozonic snow note. The lychee note is the second most prominent note, and the snow note contains a smooth mint. I think this is pretty much Neither Peace Nor Rest + some lychee.

 

Dry: This is pretty much all snow, all the time! I'm not really getting anything else from this.

 

Verdict: Damn, I was really hoping that the lavender was going to be a main player here, but it's mostly snow like whoa.

[Little Bird]

The lab's snow note usually doesn't turn soapy on me, but this is a soapy, sharp aquatic scent on me. I can't pick out the fruit, resins or lavender.