Elegba

[Deliciousness]

The Spirit of the Divine Messenger, the Lord of the Crossroads, He Who Owns All Doors and Roads in this World. He is the intermediary between the Orishas and mankind, and stands at the intersection of humanity and the Divine. He opens all paths of communication, both mundane and Heavenly. His ofrenda contains coconut, tobacco and sweet, sugared rum.

 

In the imp: Sweet and almost buttery ... Yankee Candle?

Wet on skin: The tobacco comes forward with a backdrop rum. The creamy sweet base of this scent must be the coconut, but it smells a little more like vanilla - at least to me.

Dry down: Wow, this is like Perversion, minus the smoke - which is just fine with me. I wish I was getting more of a coconut smell rather than "vanilla candle", but it does at least keep the tobacco note, which can go a little sharp on my skin, in check. The rum stays in the background, lending a bit of complexity to an otherwise sweet and waxy scent.

[Balame]

It's my old pal sensual lover French Tobacco SN but in a blend, yeah? I do get the "Yankee Candle" reference because wow is this butterscotch rum/barrels of candy corn sweet. But it's got that rich, deep and yummy tobacco in the background. I get whiffs of coconut as it dries and the rum loosens its death grip, but despite smelling less commercial it's still a sugar overload.

 

The combo of the caramel-like scent from tobacco coupled with sweetened rum and coconut is just too much. Pretty sure I would've loved this if it was only the coconut/tobacco since I can tell both of the notes are gorgeous here, and the tobacco's earthy edge would've come into play instead of getting smothered with sweets. Should be great for anyone into intense gourmand blends though.

[frankenlizzy]

I totally agree with the person that said this is Jack Sparrow in a bottle!

 

Elegba is such a great scent. I smell all the notes listed (coconut, tobacco, sugared rum). They are blended together quite nicely. If I had to put another description on it, it would be sexy pirate voodoo. Captain Jack Sparrow indeed! I believe a bottle is called for.

[WickedSage]

Elegba is perfect for fans of coconut and rum. Thats is exactly what you get a coconut rum scent. Its basically the coconut/ beachy version of Grog. So fans of Grog should really give this a try.

[squidhearts]

I posted a mini-review of this on amazon and Beth responded, so it was basically the coolest thing ever. I think this was the first scent that made me really "get" the complexity of BPAL. This is a very personal scent to me--it's very personal even conceptually--so I was thrilled that it worked.

 

So, liberally taking from my insta review--

 

Here's what I have to add that most reviewers don't: I know what an ofrenda to Elegua smells like. I grew up in Miami, and attending santeria and later voodoo ceremonies was the norm. My mom had Los Guerreros set up in the garage, and every Monday the altars were tended to, and the smell of coconut and tobacco and rum and that buttery/greasy substance I don't know the English word for that everything is anointed with--this is intimately familiar to me, even a decade later. When this stuff dries on my skin? IT SMELLS LIKE THAT. IT SMELLS EXACTLY LIKE THAT. IT IS AMAZING.

 

Wet it smells like buttery coconut rum. Delicious--yet straightforward. The complexity unfurls from here.

 

Drying, it goes through a stage that smells like the coconut flavored clove cigarettes that my friends smoked while bumming around goth clubs in my baby bat days. It goes through a phase that smells like the beach at sunset, which is my favorite place to be. Many hours later the light, sweet smell of pipe tobacco lingers on my wrists, and it reminds me, faintly yet insistently, of my dad smoking a pipe on the porch when I am five years old. This stuff is like a timeline of my life in a bottle. I love it more than I can possibly convey. PERFECTION.

 

So--buttery rum; clove; coconut; pipe tobacco, to summarize. But seriously, this is gorgeous. Elegua must be proud.

[Jeni Mullen]

My scent palette: I'm a foodie that doesn't tend to like the lab's vanilla scent unless there's something sugary in it. Eat Me is one of my favorite scents along with Captain Lilith (more boozy but still sweet AND technically it's BPTP but whateva). I love FOREST smells (like pine needles, juniper, leaves, moss and grass) but sandlewood, rosewood, and things like cedar or oak just don't do nice things on me. I love Magnificent Autumn and Druid on the dry down but they do nasty things to me when wet. I wear Druid regularly so obviously I can get passed the wet phase. I like spices too as long as they aren't kitchen spices (like mint and sage). Frankincense smells a little like sage so I haven't been too happy with that in my blends either. Scherezade and Sapphics are my go to spice oils. My biggest no-no are florals. Lavender and Jasmine, ylang ylang and peony run rampant. That said, carnation and sometimes rose can be quite nice on me if they're toned down. I also am not sure about my take on citrus. Lime is overwhelming (but I liked it in Lily Witch right up until the leather note hit). As an aside, leather, vetiver and hemp tend to give me headaches. I have not found a single scent I like with those notes in.

In the bottle: Coconut, but in a sunscreen sort of way. Hm.
On my wrist, wet: Yay there's the rum! This reminds me so much of Captain Lilith that I'm really happy I found a sort of GC equivalent!
Fifteen minutes later: Mutes itself way down. The scent of tobacco is finally there.
Thirty minutes later: I'm still not sure if I like the smell of tobacco. It doesn't give me a headache and it reminds me a lot of my grandfather and my mom. The sunscreen is gone and you're left with a definite beachy, pina colada sort of scent that isn't overly boozy or sweet. It's very different from Captain Lilith after all!

Verdict: I need a bottle of this. Underline the need.

[Mokiefraggle]

Frimped this one with my Phoenix order. Oh, I so need a bottle of this~!

 

Wet, it's a lot of chewy coconut scent. Like one of those Girl Scout cookies with the coconut and caramel, or like my mum's German chocolate pie when it's warm. Sweet and thick, with a little spike of rum in the background. Can't distinguish the tobacco, as I think its sweetness is getting mingled with the coconut to produce that delicious sweetness, and I'm amazed that this doesn't smell like suntan lotion or like a bad candle. And wowie, does it pack a wallop; I can smell this one on my wrists even with my hands well away from my nose, though it doesn't seem to bother anyone around me.

 

Dry, it's a little more tobacco, still with the marvelous sweet coconut; they're more distinct now. The rum lends a little more sweet and a little bit of its own kick, and makes it a well-rounded scent that I can see as an all-year thing, even though the heavy (though not cloying) sweetness should lend itself to something I'd wear in the winter or fall. This, however, seems like something equally at home around the pool in summer as it does curled under blankets in the winter.

 

Big bottle. Need it. And my wallet weeps.

[Veronica]

Wet, this is coconut and spiced rum. As this dries, the coconut recedes into a background note and this is mostly spices over sugary rum. Not for me.

[DiesMali]

In the imp: Buttered rum.

 

Wet on my skin: Sweet, sugary, buttered rum.

 

Dry: Tobacco usually goes more sweet than smoky on me, and this is no exception. It's mostly a tobacco and buttered rum scent on my skin, creamy in "texture." I don't get much coconut as its own note, but I think that's because it's part of what my nose reads as buttered rum. Oddly, and I think this is because of the tobacco's faint burnt-smoky note combined with the sugar, I'm also getting the impression of butterscotch or maybe caramel. Either way, it's a very tasty, summery blend.

[Teamama]

So sweet! The notes are well-blended, and interesting in the imp.

 

However...

 

Wet on my skin, it was an immediate mismatch. It smelled unpleasantly like I'd spilled some kind of coconut-rum-butterscotch drink all over myself. The rest of the notes vanished. Time did not improve matters. Not for me.

[themeaningofV]

A few hours after drydown, this is amazing - it's a really subtle and lightly sweet creamy coconut-tobacco blend. However, the wet stage is tooth-achingly sweet and has that almost dusty quality that made me recoil from Grog, and the coconut goes through a weirdly earthy phase for a while that does not smell very good on me at all.

 

I already have Perversion for my rum fix (and it's just a muuuch better balanced blend on me), so I'll be passing this one along.

[LizziesLuck]

LOVE Elegba. Beautiful smoky coconut. This is a less complex version of Red Lantern. Not as good, but still good!

[porcelaincrypt]

Imp: First thoughts- warm, dessert like, rum and fruity. It smells like some doughnut I've had before. I like it!

 

I can smell all the notes but it took me a while to realize it was coconut I was smelling, but once I did it started to remind me a little bit of 'Coco Cabana' Bath & Body Works Body Splash that I used to use in high school.

 

Skin: I skimmed most of the reviews and I feel like mine is an usual interpretation but there is something Autumn like about this scent, it makes me think of going apple picking. Near my college there were many orchards and nearby was a farm market. As the weather turned colder they would open for the season and I would stop by to pick up their homemade sugared cider doughnuts (I figured out this is the doughnut I was recalling when I smelled the imp) and a cup of hot, spiced apple cider. Mind you, I'm not getting any apple note at all when I smell this but for some reason that was what it was bringing to mind, maybe it's the rum. It's a strange combination of Coco Cabana and Cider Doughnuts...

 

The coconut is the standout note on my skin I smell a hint of the tobacco in the imp but on me it's coconut with the sugared rum. I really like this one and it is probably going on the full bottle list. Usually when I think coconut I think summer but this coconut is versatile and can transition from summer to fall. It's really fantastic!

[Casablanca]

Wand: Sweet coconuts and a drop of rum. It's kind of root beer-adjacent.

Wet: Holy coconuts! And sugary rum, yes. Tobacco is a backdrop. Add some cannabis and you have Coki Beach in St. Thomas.

Dry: Rum and tobacco come forward as this dries. I can't smell this without thinking of the Caribbean cruise with my hunny, which is perfectly good. I don't usually go for tobacco blends, but it's such a positive association. Associative memory... parsing smells... same part of the brain, and that's really showing here!

I'll probably bring this imp to the beach. The tobacco and maybe hidden things give enough woody earthiness that I can see how it could work for other times, too.

[littlesparrow]

At first this is pure rum (my skin really likes to amp rum, and unfortunately for me my nose really doesn't like to smell it!) but with the tobacco and coconut it dries down to quite a nice blended scent, but I actually find it slightly too masculine for my tastes. Maybe its the tobacco that gives it that gnarly edge? I definitely get the sexy pirate references!

[Soupy Twist]

I smell like the world's best pirate. Tobacco and rum in the bottle. Goes on as a foodie tobacco, not a smoked one. A sweet edge develops as the rum comes in, and it turns into that brûlée/burnt sugar crust note from Sugar Skull. This rum/sugar note stays as the medium tobacco note comes in and out. Marvelous. Bottle for sure.

[elile]

I gave an imp of this to my man to test. He wrinkled his nose in disgust - on his skin it's a lot of coconut and rum, very sweet and cloying.

On my skin: Salty Pineapple! All I get is salty pineapple

[roseus]

Imp: super tropical coconut rum

 

Wet: coconut gets a little less sweet and the rum comes out more

 

Dry: well blended tobacco and rum, sweet and earthy. The coconut is creamy and light.

 

Probably a bottle!

[gloame]

Top notes: omgosh vanilla sugar. But it mellows really quickly and then it's a lovely, smooth, sugared tobacco. I'm struggling to pick up the rum note. Maybe I should drink it more often to be better familiarized to it.

 

Caribbean, sunny, warm. Love it.

 

Where I'd wear it: Drinking Dark & Stormies in the Caribbean

Edited July 15, 2017 by gloame

[renfair]

This one I got as a frimp straight from the lab, with another order of imps I didn't know what I was going to think of it, cause I'm not a huge fan of coconut. Basically I don't mind it if I'm actually on the beach, but that's it.

First Sniff Impression: Coconut, and something extra sweet. Pina Colada without the lime.

Wet in Vial: Definitely coconut and a slight boozy whiff of sugar rum. Not getting any tobacco at all yet.

Drying Down on Skin: What must be the tobacco is coming out a bit, cutting out some of the sweetness of the coconut and rum.

Dry on Skin: This one continued to get nicer the more it "aged" on me. After a few hours it was warm, boozy, and the tobacco came out even more for a very light, smokey, herbal undertone.

Conclusion: It's really a lovely, sweet scent, but tropicals aren't really "me." I highly recommend this to fans of tropical scent and coconut in particular! Super yummy! (Edited to add, the description made me think this would be great for a gender-bent Jack Sparrow!)

Edited February 23, 2017 by renfair

[kajacana]

Full disclosure: I am a FIEND for coconut, and the Lab's various renditions always tend to work for me.

 

In the imp, Elegba has a butterscotchy thing going on, just like Grog. Literally smells like a boozy Werther's hard candy.

 

As soon as it hits my skin, though, the coconut comes out in full force. Seriously, if you don't like coconut, you won't like this. This is sweet, sugary, rum-drunk coconut, and as it wears, the tobacco peeks through which darkens the blend just the slightest bit, and gives it that signature... chewiness?... that tobacco tends to add. I'm not really getting anything smoky. It's sweet, tropical, foody, lots of coconut, lots of rum... reminds me of waves crashing on a tropical beach under bright sunshine.

[torikitty]

Coconut loooooooooove! It does kinda smell like a slightly boozy pina colada that's just coconut. It smells real, it doesn't smell artificial. During drydown, I can smell the vanilla candle thing others mentioned. I think I'm amping coconut because I get that and a bit of creamy vanilla. The tobacco definitely gets pushed to the back.

 

Edit: after hours, the tobacco came out more, but it was still coconut and tobacco.

Edited July 27, 2017 by Carrie

[Lucchesa]

Mmm, foodie. Tested blind, I was thinking caramel and hot buttered rum. So the coconut was unobtrusive on me -- with my skin chemistry, if you hated coconut, you'd be fine with this. Now three plus hours later I can tell there's coconut since I'm looking for it, but it's still faint. The tobacco is one of those lovely warm golden chewy tobaccos, not one of the tobaccos I amp to an unpleasant degree, and it plays a supporting role here. Elegba is comforting but also kind of sexy. I like it!

[mishi-bear]

Elegba is warm and syrupy sweet. Mostly rum, with the coconut and sugar adding extra sweetness to it. Then the tobacco kicks in, making this scent warmer and a little more down to earth.

 

I like it a lot. I always worry about tobacco as a note, but in this it just adds a bit of earthiness and warmth.

[achildoftime]

Well, this is certainly very foodie. Not that I'm too surprised, but I thought maybe the tobacco might temper it a little. I was wrong. It's like a over-sugared baked good, like a doughnut. A coconut sugar doughnut. I'm not a foodie person at all so this is not for me whatsoever.