Blood onmy hands

(Thanks for decanting this one for me C ). The Agony of Longing was the inquisition scent that I was looking least forward to. Strong floral blends are not my thing. This one isn't really bad though. It's a soft blend that doesn't go hyper perfumey or sharp on me. It's also something that I would classify as a sweet blend. In the drydown, the florals here go a bit dry to my nose, and yet there's also something clean, sweet, and breezy about the whole thing. I'm horrible with picking out flower notes, but this doesn't exactly smell like rose, violet, or freesia to me. Longing is a blending of flowers that equals out to a clean sweetness on my skin. It does smell like floral perfume, but without the negative sharpness that I usually recognize from such blends. A soft, pretty, clean floral (almost like a sweet floral dusting powder on me after a while as it goes a tad powdery). I still wouldn't find myself wearing this sort of fragrance, but it doesn't bother me and I am kinda fond of it.

I've already traded my bottle of Ecstasy of Infatuation for this one (thanks C!), lol. While I do like Passion more than Infatuation, neither of them are really me scents. In the bottle this is a warm, powdery musk. It smells very womanly and bold. On my skin it turns into a sensual, powdery haze. Ecstasy of Passion is not a full out baby powder though (thankfully), the spice keeps it from going that way. This is a warm fragrance, dominated by musk. The sweet clove and vanilla give it a kiss of sweetness. The red musk, amber, and ambergris keep it very warm and musky. It’s MUSK, but with a sweet edge and a touch of powder. Something about musk fragrances like these are very adult to me. I imagine a beautiful and confident woman in her late 30’s+ wearing this scent. It’s sensual, bold, confident, and assertive. It’s just not the sort of thing that I could pull off… it doesn’t seem right on 19 year old me. I'd say it was for a more experienced seductress than myself; more for a woman who knows exactly what she wants and how to get it. I want to be this woman, but both of us know that I'm not really there yet. I feel like a little girl who got into an amazing older someone’s perfume collection when I’m wearing this. It's not a passion that fits a young Tania, lol.

The TKO Panacea oil is one of my favorites, so I was excited to try the bomb. I've been having issues with my insomnia again, so I decided to take a bath with this one at around 2 AM today. I was already exhausted and had a throbbing headache from lack of sleep at that point. The fizzie in its packaging was pretty nicely scented. Once it hit the water it faded a lot and became barely noticeable. I also ended up liking the scent more in oil form. The Panacea oil is lavender, sugared vanilla, and spun sugar on my skin. The TKO fizzie left me smelling like baby powder (which I hate) and hints of vanilla, while smelling more herbal and powdery in the water. Thankfully I wasn't awake for very long, so the smell didn't bother me. Hot baths are my cure-all for all that ails me (depression, muscle aches, insomnia, illness, headaches) so I love having an aromatherapy bomb to throw in there as well. The only negative thing that I noticed was that my legs got sort of itchy and red, though I'm not even sure that was from this bomb or just a stress reaction on my part. Eh. Anyhoo. Lightly scented water that wasn't exactly a pleasant smell, but seemed to do the trick. This wasn't really moisturizing either. As far as I can tell, this worked for its purpose of knocking me out. I wanted to sleep right there in the tub. When I finally did drag myself to bed (with my hair still soaking wet), I was laying there and trying to think and felt really muddled, like I couldn't really pull one thought together and my brain was done. I forgot to put on my engagement ring (it drives me crazy when I don't wear it now) & turn on my fan (drowns out the noise of my family fighting and being inconsiderate). I just stayed in my bed for several minutes debating how much I really needed either of those things, lol. All in all, I think I fell asleep within 10 minutes of getting out of the bath. I'm not crazy about TKO's scent translated into bath bombs... I like LUSH's Dream On a lot more for my insomnia baths (sunset orange color, super moisturizing, love the Dream Cream scent). This has been my favorite of all of the BOOMs that I have tried, but I doubt that this will be a repurchase either.

In the bottle this makes me think of fruity shampoo. It has a medley of sweet fruit notes and then something clean and breezy underneath. On my skin, the grapefruit and lemon verbena take over at first. This is very sharp, white, and effervescent on my skin. Citrus shampoo. In the drydown… the breezy florals, champagne, and clean white musk are giving this a clean and soapy something that I’m not exactly crazy about. The citrus edge fades over rather quickly and I’m left with soapy florals. This is a very white blend and thus is giving me an awful migraine. Ecstasy of Infatuation makes me feel a bit ill. It’s like inhaling a cheap shampoo and getting that soap caught in the back of my throat after a while. The accompanying migraine also isn’t so great for me. Someone who likes white floral perfumes would probably love this. It’s a soft blend in the drydown, but still too much for me to handle. I never can pick out any cherry, which was the note I was most hopeful for with this one

The combination of lemon & sage in the bottle smells kinda like lemon pepper seasoning. Lemon pepper and hints of the lab's tart, bitter blackberry note. On my skin... The lab's red patchouli is really iffy on me, and it's awful in this blend. It quickly amps up and smells like body odor in the worst way. A definite arm pit sort of smell. The bitterness of the blackberry and the strange lemon pepper seasoning mixed with that BO is not a good impression. In the drydown, the citrus notes and sage here are just too sharp on my skin... paired with the dirty patchouli (and I love regular and black patchouli)... this really smells like sweaty arm pits on me

In the bottle this is herbal, slightly sharp lavender and a hint of something smoky. On me, the 'burning love letters' bit goes into full bloom and this is ultra smoky. It's not smoky in a resinous way or anything... it really smells like burning paper. The lavender amps up after several minutes and takes over the blend. A really strong, herbal lavender with an unpleasant smokiness to it. I might smell a bit of clean sandalwood in here as well, but it's mostly lavender and smoke. I'm not really liking this one much. I can't see myself ever wearing it as a perfume... and I wouldn't want a room fragrance that's this smoky either.

I'm torn about using 'Oof'. Does it work? Yes, just as well as (and other people have mentioned) Vick's Vaporub. A cold menthol. Sinus clearing and bright. My mother actually loves this smell and has stolen my decant to wear as a personal perfume. I just don't know if I could justify paying $25+ for a bottle when a jar of Vicks is so much cheaper and lasts me a long time on its own. I'm glad this is available in bath bomb form though, because I can imagine this being a great scent to bathe in when you're feeling stuffy and sick. I ordered one of the fizzies and wish I had it to bathe with right now, actually.

I've put off trying Isaac because the tobacco frightened me. I don't really like the Living Skeleton, but it's such a light scent on me that it doesn't bother me or make me hate it either. I'm just sort of 'meh' about the whole thing. Mostly this is an incredibly dry, powdery scent on my skin with hints of a dirty grittiness lingering in the background that I am attributing to the tobacco. It wants to be a sharp man's cologne on my skin, but is too dry to fully give off that impression. Like cheap men's cologne that has been layered in dust and sitting around in tobacco smoke for a while. I thought that the boozy notes might give it more life, but it stays bone dry and bland on me. Thankfully, this is a light scent on me and fades pretty quickly.

Meskhenet is another fragrance that is hard for me to pin down, perhaps because I'm not really familiar with most of the notes. It makes me think of a muddy riverbank in fall, where there's damp mud and dry grasses crackling in a chilly breeze. There are wafts of a sweet, smoky incense and floral perfume coming in off of that breeze as well. This is one of those scents that I admire in concept, but I wouldn't actually ever wear it and I don't find myself wanting to try it out again. A lightly smoky incense, some perfumey florals, and something that smells like dry grasses to me.

I like blue lilac, but Virahotkantita is just too much floral for my skin chemistry to handle. This goes intensely sharp and soapy on me rather quickly. Soaps scented with a sharp floral perfume.

Kalantarika is a sharp, herbal, lavender fragrance on my skin. It's not the smooth, slightly sweet lavender that I love... it's herbal lavender, which is almost bitter and medicinal on me. The other reviews have summed this up pretty well. A sharp, bitter, herbal scent. Slightly green for some reason... and with lots of herbal lavender that amps up for me even more in the drydown. Not something I'd wear as a perfume, but perhaps as an aromatherapy blend in an oil burner.

Ugh. My bottle of Dark Delicacies had a crack in the cap and leaked all over. I got a good amount of it on my hands trying to get it out of the packaging though, which makes for easy reviewing, lol. I wonder if it was outside in the cold for long or something. Meh. I thought that this would be a sweet fragrance with creamy tonka & coconut backed up by some earthy resins and patchouli. It's not. This is a horribly musky floral on me. It's so sharp and heavy that it literally makes me cough when I smell it. Perfumey. Like bad drugstore perfume... like Britney Spears' Curious... This is all perfumey, unnatural, 'floral' smell. Sharp and bitter and not at all sweet on me... and it doesn't get better in the drydown. It gave me an awful headache and I had to remove the packaging from my room. I thought that I may have overapplied initially (on accident), so I took a bath and tested only a little dab of this... it's still just as overwhelming and unpleasant to me. Musky, perfumey, sharp, metallic, bitter floral... none of the sweetness or resins that I was hoping for

Kataniya is ozone and florals to my nose. The ozone is almost a cold, static before the storm sort of scent. In the drydown it just gets more dryersheet soapy on my skin. The floral part of this is sharp and perfumey. I can't pick out any one flower, it just has that horribly unpleasant, almost musky sharpness that I hate in floral perfumes. I wanted to love this, because I love the artwork for The Clockwork Woman, but this floralozone-esque blend is not for me.

On me, King Cobra smells like someone removed the sweet parts of Snake Oil and added in some woodsmoke where the vanilla sweetness would have been. It smells like some sort of dark musk & wood smoke, and it's just too sharp and acrid for my tastes.

I would recommend Boomslang... but I might have a slight bias, because that is my current favorite (I'm rather fanatical about it, actually, lol). Even though it is the chocolate blend, it's not really a sweet blend to me. The vanilla is more pronounced in that Snake than any of the others that I've tried yet, and it has the teakwood in it. If you already like Snake Oil, Boomslang to me was Snake Oil with a more pronounced vanilla, rolled in cocoa powder. Sooo good.

I was hoping for a foodie marzipan scent touched with hints of Snake Oil, but the notes in Asp Viper seem to go all awry on my skin. The scent opens up with a strong blast of almond, which smells like maraschino cherries on my skin. Super-sweet and with something of a chemical edge. In the drydown, the almond calms and fades, but a sharp citrus note and a really smoky resin takes its place. It quickly morphs into something of a dry, powdery version of Snake Oil with a sharp citrus squeezed over it. it's smoky and dry rather than foodie on my skin. Love the label art, not so fond of the fragrance. ETA, June 2008: I've let this age a bit and the almond is even stronger and more terrifying on my skin . The almond is hyper-sweet maraschino cherries, and it's so strong and sickly sweet that it makes me ill. It's rare that a scent is too sweet for me, but this is just too much. With age (or maybe my skin chemistry changing), this has turned into crazy, bad, long-lasting almond that starts going to baby powder after about an hour. I think this is my least favorite of the Snake Pit. ETA, May 2016: I'm retrying this to compare it to the Asp Viper 2016 blend and it's actually REALLY good now, lol. It's finally the creamy, vanilla and nutty almond marzipan with the dark musk of Snake Oil that I always wanted it to be. It smells like an earthy red musk and hints of marzipan. It just took 9 years to get here, and I can't believe it's been that long

Coral Snake smells like a little bottle full of cider. Normally I have trouble wearing the lab's cider-esque blends because they're too sharp or something in them goes a little earthy and funky on my skin. This, however, is a perfect apple cider with sweet apples and warm, soft spices. It's smooth and sweet on my skin. I was a bit afraid of the floral notes listed here, but I can't even pick them out exactly. If anything, the flowers just add the slightest touch of a creamy, breezy feel to the blend (and add a sort of complexity that keeps this from smelling too articifial and candle-like on me). It's the sweet apple and the hints of spice from the Snake Oil that dominate. My skin amps up the spice over the apples after a while and I like this a bit less, but it's still lovely. I don't love this like I love Boomslang & Banded Sea Snake, but this will be a great once-in-a-while wear when I want a spiced apple.

I received a wee decant of this one from Thursdae (thanks!). In the imp and first on my skin, Temple: Haitian smells like cinnamon toast and the spicy lemon cookie-ish scent that I get from Cerberus. Lemongrass and cookies. After a while the citrus scent gets stronger, and this smells like cutting into a fresh lemon. But I'm still getting something like sugar cookies and gingerbread in the background. After an hour or so, this has dried down to a smokier, slightly powdery incense that reminds me a bit of the Chakra blend Sahasrara (candied incense), only this is more subtle and bakery-ish on me. Very lovely.

Hope & Faith just aren't really standout blends for me. I was hoping for a strong candied violet and a strong sugared rose. They're both incredibly light fragrances though, clinging close to my skin and only sticking around for about an hour tops. I think that I like Faith more than Hope. Hope has a soured edge on my skin where Faith just goes powdery. Violet powder with an added sweetness that reminds me a bit of vanilla cream. Creamy vanilla-violet powder. Not so bad, but probably not something I'd find myself wearing a lot. I might keep my decant of this girl though. I haven't had great luck with the lab's violet scents thus far, they usually go either powdery or soapy on my skin. The only violet blend that I've really loved was Marie... which started out actually smelling like candied violets and dried down to sweet, candied roses & violets on me. I like Marie more than Hope or Faith.

Hope & Faith just aren't really standout blends for me. I was hoping for a strong candied violet and a strong sugared rose. They're both incredibly light fragrances though, clinging close to my skin and only sticking around for about an hour tops. Hope is a light rose on me, but with something of a sour edge. I actually don't get a ton of sweetness or much of a sugary vibe from this one. Faith was a sweeter blend to me. I have pretty good luck with the lab's roses (Marie, Peacock Queen & Parlement of Foules being my favorites). Marie is more of a strong, sweet, sugared rose (in its drydown) on my skin than Hope's light, sour rose.

Temple Viper is such an interesting scent. It's one of those blends that I keep going back to, and it's so hard to describe or get a full impression of. It smells like some sort of green, tropical sugar - wonderfully exotic and sweet. I can't pick out any one note from this, but it all melds together into something delicious and unusual. I think the sugar cane really shines and pulls everything together. In the drydown, I get an almost fruity grape smell, but it's not overwhelming or grossly artificial. So... yeah. The best way I could describe how this smells on me is tropical, green sugar with a hint of grape in the drydown . I like it, a lot.

Something about Eshe really bothers me. I think that it might be that the picture and the story make me think about battered women and abuse. The bones poking out, withdrawn posture and the violent story make me a bit nauseous & sad inside. That creepy, unhappy feeling lingers when I wear this scent. I have this same issue with a lot of the Funereal Oils. Trying to put aside my personal bias: The fragrance itself is an okay herbal-floral, but not something that I would ever choose to wear. Jasmine here has something of a green, herby feel rather than a yellowy sweetness. It’s not the overpowering jasmine that I am used to. The whole fragrance has something of a dry, light, papery feel to it. The herbal jasmine stays at the forefront, with a background of very light, slightly powdery sandalwood and a moreso perfumey floral note (which is odd, because black orchid usually smells sort of juicy and sweet to me). Light, powdery, herby floral. Paper-thin and delicate. Not for me...

In the bottle, this smells delicious. It smells like someone took a branch with healthy green leaves and red berries on it, and crammed them into this bottle. On my skin, this is refreshingly fruity, without being all fruit or obnoxious in any way. It's still giving me an impression of tart red berries and thick green leaves. In the drydown, a bit of the smoked vanilla comes out and this is deliciously foodie and unique. I don't get any spice, and (thankfully) there's no amber in here mucking things up for me. After about fifteen minutes, I begin to recognize hints of the smoky, musky Snake Oil underneath the vanilla & berries, and the impression of green leaves has faded away entirely. The drydown is smoky vanilla, hints of smoky Snake Oil, and wafts of the delicious berry scent every once in a while. I like this. I might need a full bottle before the carnaval leaves town.

Banded Sea Snake is my most favorite aquatic ever (my only favorite aquatic?). When I sniffed it in the bottle, it instantly made me *so* happy. It's a bright, creamy, sweet aquatic. Actually, I'm not even sure if it's right to call this an aquatic scent. It has that bright, crystal clear, glass & sunlight sort of thing going on that Sea of Glass does. The Snake Oil aspect comes out more in the drydown (and I find myself wishing there were no SO at all in this) and adds just a hint of something earthy. Even now, the 'earthy' isn't a soil note so much as a hint of soil smothered in dark green. A tiny hint of Snake Oil's vanilla is also coming out now and adding to the creamy sweetness. The Snake Oil isn't so bad as it is moreso adding oomph to the blend than taking it over. It's like the bright crystal aquatic of Sea of Glass, only better... with some mossy greenery amped up by hints of Snake Oil vanilla and earthiness. It has a salty edge that I am loving, and it's so much creamier and smoother than you could ever expect without really trying it. Good stuff.

In the bottle, Boomslang is a delightfully creepy visual (and smell-wise it's just damn good). It's so dark and thick that it looks like there are actual solid particles clinging to the edges of the cap and floating around in here, and there is a layer of light colored oil laying on top of the thicker, dark oil. I took a sample from just the light oil off the top, then shook the whole thing up and tested it normally. The lighter/clear bit just smells like 'lite' Snake Oil to me... the smoky vanilla of Snake Oil, separated from the rest of the blend. (ETA: Over time, that clear layer has disappeared and this oil has gotten insanely thick and even richer smelling.) *shakes up bottle* If you like the smell of chocolate or cocoa in any way at all, you need Boomslang. Even if you're not so fond of chocolate, I'd still suggest trying this, because it's crazy-good, and I've never smelled anything like it before. I personally do not like Snake Oil. It's actually dirty and stomach turning on my skin, whether it's fresh or has been aged for forever and a day. So, I'm really shocked at how much I love several of the snakes. The added components actually make Snake Oil wonderful and wearable for me. Boomslang is like Snake Oil with less of the 'dirtymuskyincense' (or, in my case, unwashed hair and BO) and more of the smoky vanilla aspect, dusted in a generous layer of dark chocolate. There's still a muskiness here that reminds me of hot red musk, but it's just a smoldering, sexy hint at the edges of the fragrance. Boomslang is like the highest quality, creamiest dark chocolate truffle in the world, put into perfume form, and then sexed up with a bit of musk and dark vanilla. Love it.