MamaMoth

2010 decant Red musk like whoa. Sweetened and slightly boozy red musk. It smells good, but I think it needs to sit in the dark and do its thing for a good long while before it reaches its peak. It's a intensely sharp and perfumey (and a little plasticy) right now.

Disclaimer: I'm not a foodie person, but every note in this is one that I love in other blends, so I couldn't resist a decant. Nutty, gloopy chocolate and spices. This goes on heavy and nauseatingly rich. Dries down much lighter as a cardamom chocolate. It also still smells quite nutty to me. If this was swirled in a jar, I'd spread it on toast and I'm sure it'd be delicious. No ginger, no coconut, no rum. Disappointed. I wanted boozy coconutty spicy chocolate. I just got it in the mail today, so I'll let it settle a while and try it again in a couple of weeks.

2010 decant I can only describe this as "perfumey." Smells like the endless floral/perfumey-musk blends that you find on a perfume counter, and it's not doing anything for me.

An itch that needs to be scratched: Snake Oil and three types of honey. Exactly as advertised. The honey is a little more dominant than I'd hoped, but I think the Snake Oil will gain some muscle as it ages. No-brainer bottle purchase.

Going through my Luper decants, this is the first one to be granted a skin test. It smelled that intriguing in the vial. I looooove this. Seriously. It is primarily honeyed sandalwood on me. BPAL sandalwood can sometimes be too dry-smelling on my skin, and honey can sometimes be to sticky-sweet. But here, they complement each other gorgeously. Not too cedary/woodsy, not too icky sticky sweet. I can't detect a floral note at all, but there is almost a creamy fullness to it, so perhaps that could be the rice flower? The pepper is fairly imperceptible. Since I know it's there, I can sense a gentle little pepper bite, almost like a slight note that leads it to the nose. Oakmoss can make an oil smell to masculine to me sometimes, but here it just meshes with the sandalwood to contribute to the soft woodsiness. Throw leaves a little bit to be desired, this is definitely a skin scent. Four hours after application, I can only smell it if I press my nose to my wrist. But where it rubbed off my neck onto my shirt, it's still wafting about nicely. So this may be the blend that prompts me to invest in a scent locket. ETA: After letting this settle for a few days, the pepper becomes more prominent. I'd describe this as a honeyed peppery sandalwood. SO freakin good.

In the imp, this is a little scary. Heavy and scorched and fairly masculine/cologney. It lightens up considerably when it touches my skin, though. Faintly sour and bitterish, but in an interesting and compelling way. Dark and smoky, with a bit of a spicy-resin quality. It seems so heavy and thick at first, but my skin just eats it up until it has very little throw. It's not nearly as demony as I would have expected. Hastur is sexy and dangerous... a beautiful arsonist. I wish it lasted a bit longer. After an hour or so, it's just a vague smoky trace on my skin. :\

Black Heart is fruity, and a touch floral. Delicious plum and grape, a little dusty. Sweet and pretty. Picks up a bit of a woodsy incense vibe as it dries. Reminds me of Dionysia a bit.

2010 decant Sugar notes are a little sour on me sometimes, and this starts off the same way. But luckily it fades back here. This is the same musk that's in Dorian, but instead of the intense soapiness I get there, here it's sweet and creamy. A little bit boozy when wet, that fades away fairly quickly. It dries a little powdery, creamy and sweet, musky and incensey. Very rich. I like this, because it's pretty and feminine without being floral.

Luperci 2010 All of the components are meshed really well here, so it's hard to pick anything out. The patchouli is very subtle but it's there as a base. Juniper scares me at times, but it's well behaved here (although it and the oakmoss are what is giving this a bit of a masculine edge.) Honey sweetens everything up a bit but it's not a prominent note. I can't detect any beeswax. Overlaying everything is a vague muskiness. Overall I'd call this woodsy and fresh-green tinted, slightly sweet and musky. It's unisex but leaning toward masculine.

In the bottle: delicious patchouli, astringent herbs and resins Wet on, the resins and juniper leap forward and almost overtake the patchouli. Sharp frankincense and juniper are the stars of the show here. Aggressively masculine and fierce. It gentles a bit as it dries, but overall this scent is sharp like a sword. I never detected any of the cocoa, which is really a shame.... it could have softened and sweetened things a bit. I'm a girl who likes a lot of guy scents, but I'm afraid this is too masculine for me. The juniper is insanely prominent, and it gives the resins a high-pitched kind of tone. I'm going to cellar it for a while. Hopefully, the patchouli and cocoa can gain a little ground, and the resins can mature a little.

(09 decant) Tart red fruit with a base of.. something chemically and harsh. Well at least it lets me pinpoint an off note I detected in Mme. Moriarty. That chemicalness ages out of Mme, but there's really nothing here that makes me want to wait it out in this one.

In the vial, I smell red musk and bananas. o.O' How odd. Wet on, I smell some various fruits, (pineapple, banana, apple are the only ones I can single out) that dusty-sourish smell I associate with sugar cane, all atop a base of Scherezade. Seriously. Lots and lots of red musk with spice (the spice is probably the chili pepper.) It has that weird kind of fakey-incense thing going on which is what too much red musk smells like to me, and with the addition of the fruit, it kinda smells like gas station incense. :\ Dried, I smell nondescript dusty incense fruitiness.

My favorite of the 09 Phoenixes! Bottle: Astringently green. Something herbal, poisonous, and sticky green. Wet on skin: More of the same, but sweeter. A little bit of resin is creeping out from behind. Drying: Mmmm, sweet plum and poisonous greens. This is such a fascinating blend. The tobacco gives it a little bit of woody sweetness, and it's grounded by a resinous base. Fully dry: It's tangy and green and bitter on top, and sweet and resiny on the bottom. There's a slight pleasant mustiness to it, kind of like some fresh greens from the gardens have. Every so often I think I get a whiff of the tobacco. Love it. One of the most unusual BPALs I've smelled.

Oh how I wish this was what I got from Copper Phoenix. I really love orange/resin blends, so I had high hopes for this one. In the bottle and wet on: this is juicy sweet orange, amber, patchouli LOVE. As it dries, the amber gets a little powdery and the apricot and rose start to bloom out. Not so much love, but still very good. Then my skin chemistry does its (evil) magic, and the rose (and to a lesser degree, apricot) just keeps amplifying. It ends up being a rosy apricot backed by powdery amber and a little bit of spicy citrus. Why is it that I always seem to amp my least favorite notes in a blend? Very sad about this one. It came SO CLOSE to being a holy grail blend for me.

Of all the notes in this, verbena was the only one that I hoped would take a backseat. (Everything else was <3) So of course, lemony verbena is all I can smell. After it's had plenty of time to dry down, I think I can smell the barest whiff of powdery resin behind it, but unfortunately by this time the verbena has taken a soapy tinge.

I cannot wait to slather on some Hypothermia when the weather gets all yucky hot. It almost makes me look forward to summer, but not really.

Wet, this smells really aggressively of black musk and scary chocolate. Really sharp and maybe a little citrussy. I was hesitant to put it on, but thankfully it tempers the longer it stays on. 10 minutes or so after application, this is a soft dry cocoa and sweet smoky tobacco backed by lovely aura of dark musk. Basically, this smells like really rich chocolate pipe tobacco. It's lovely.

This is almost all Ylang-Ylang to me. I can kinda detect the patchouli and myrrh, a little. No clove that I can find. There are some really strong notes in this blend, but they're all utterly whupped by the Ylang-Ylang. I feel a floral headache coming on. :|

Wet, this is dirt and cakey ginger; like buried cookies. How odd, but compelling! As it dries the ginger gets less and less cookie-like, and eventually just fades to a faint sweet spiciness in the dirt. A generic florally smell comes out of NOWHERE to take it's place. Meanwhile the dirt note has backed off greatly. This ends up earthy and rich, sweet and gently floral, and just the tiniest bit spicy. Not my thing. But oils like this are why I <3 BPAL.

I LOVE the honeyed-dark-wine vibe of this. BPAL's grapey and honey notes always work rather beautifully on me. There's a lot of resiny goodness coming out here too. I *almost* really like this scent... BUT It has a strong floral headiness to it that is a little headache-inducing and oppressive to me. I adore plum and tobacco, but I guess I'm not too terribly fond of their flowers. Tis making me headachey, will have to wash off. Very sad about this one.

In bottle: slightly bitter. clove and bay, a little bit of scorchy sandalwood wet on skin: Clove and bay are vying for attention at first, but then the tobacco starts to bloom out and sweeten it almost immediately. The blackened sandalwood is there, but it softens up up to become gently woody and smoky, and it mingles with the tobacco beautifully. Patchouli is hanging out in the background there doin it's earthy/woody thing, but not really hogging the show. dry: Clove and bay are still at the forefront, but they're not too domineering. I can smell the sandalwood behind them, with a very light "burnt" vibe to it. The patch is there but it's not obvious to me. Take that with a grain of salt: I love patchouli and always yearn for more presence. The tobacco kind of hovers in a thin haze over everything. This is so rich! It has depth and darkness, but it's not oppressive in the slightest. I can't ever really smell the lemon verbena or lime, which was a disappointment at first. But I think that's part of the reason why this doesn't feel too heavy; they're in there keeping things fresh. The amber doesn't really let itself be known until extended drydown, after an hour or so. It takes on a softly resinous-powdery edge then, but I mean that in a good way. All the notes really do blend in the best possible way here. Clove can be so domineering on my skin, but it really shines here! Black Death is dark but not heavy, spicy but not too spicy, woody, a little bit earthy, a little sweet and a little bitter. I think I'm in love with this. eta: After a full day of wear, it reminds me a little of Mr. Jacquel. I debated adding Mr. Jacquel to my last order, and now I'm glad I didn't as I prefer Black Death.

Educational toys for tots! Learn non-Euclidean calculus, catoptric theory, quantum physics, and the mysteries of Elder magic the fun way! An ancient baetylus floating within an array of bizarre trapezoidal figures, glimmering tubes, rusting spheres, and whirling gogs formed from peculiar metals, glowing tektites, strangely suspended lead mirrors, and eerie driftings of meteoric dust. In the bottle and fresh on, this smells really interesting. Sharp spikes of metal and rust and glittering fragments of machinery. Fascinating and evocative. As it dries, it gets more mundane. Citrus, some kind of astringent greenery, maybe a pale musk. That "dust" note is still in there too. Overall, too piercing and soapy and cologney for me. But interesting. I didn't really think it'd be for me, but the description made it a must-try.

Elegba is one of my favorite BPALs... I think that's the first bottle I bought. It's so great, like butter-rum lifesavers and coconut pipe tobacco.

I've been wanting to try Obatala forever, so an unsniffed bottle will definitely be on my next order.

The world will love its darkness: cistus labdanum, ginger, East Indian patchouli, pimento berry, oakmoss, saffron, smoky vanilla, sage, myrrh, and bitter clove. I had some expectations about this scent that didn't match the reality at all. So I was a bit disappointed and unable to judge my decant accurately when I first tested it. Upon trying it a couple of weeks later, I can approach it with a fresh perspective and I realize that I quite like it after all. First and foremost it is a spicy resiny scent. The clove, pimento berry, and labdanum are up front, giving it a mulled kinda holiday kind of feeling. There's a smokiness behind that, and a woodsiness propping it up. It's sweet, but not overly so. The likening to Raven Moon is spot on, even thought the two don't really smell terribly alike. But they both have the same kind of complex smoky-resin thing going on. As a side note, it has the same kind of slight chemical undertone that Raven Moon had when it was fresh, that is especially apparent if you accidentally put too much on like I did. But that is going away already in my Raven Moon so I feel pretty confident that it'll smooth out in Men Loved Darkness as well. I wish I'd had this for the holidays, it would have been absolutely perfect to wear for seasonal gatherings. As it is, I've ordered a bottle. I'll probably cellar it until the next holiday season for the most part, and I cannot WAIT to see how it ages in that time.