Mad Meg

[shelldoo]

 

Mad Meg, Pieter Bruegel the Elder.

Fire-scorched earth, black mandarin, cinnamon bark, bitter almond, sage, vetiver, and balsam of peru.

 

in the bottle, dark , smokey. vetiver is obvious

 

wet: earth and vetiver

 

this is earthy, very earthy, lots of vetiver w/ the slightest breath of cinnamon.

[Heavenlyrabbit]

This goes so terribly wrong with my skin chemistry. It contains SEVERAL Heavenlyrabbit Bane Notes:

 

Cinnamon, Bitter Almond, Sage.

 

And although BPAL has done the miraculous and presented me with some options for patchouli and vetiver, this is emphatically not one of them.

 

However, with those who can handle such dark scents, this should be a winner.

 

Sigh, wish this wasn't the first of the new Salon scents I'd tried. Off to scrub my hand.

[Jilara]

Wet, there is a heavy quality of sweaty steel and gunpowder. This scent is HUGELY metallic in its wet stages. I think the "scorched earth" is why I get "gunpowder." It makes me think of a gun recently fired. It's that smell of cordite and metal.

 

As it dries down, the vetiver starts to predominate. It still smells like sweaty steel. The cordite backs down a little. Something makes me think of artimesia, not wormwood, but something more like southernwood. It's probably the sage note combining with something else. This is the scent of war. It's not friendly, and it's definitely evocative of the painting.

 

I think this is going to be my perfume of choice for when I'm reenacting English Civil War.

[vylit]

This is a very heavy scent. I want to say that it's masculine, but it's more gender neutral leaning toward masculine.

 

The vetiver, balsam, and cinnamon are the strongest for me, though the vetiver is the most powerful note by far.

 

This is a dark scent, but one that I think would work better on a man.

[clover]

It's interesting reading the preceding reviews - on me, this is anything but dark or heavy.

 

I was a little bit scared to try this out, the description sounded so dark and masculine and mean. But sniffing from the imp, I noticed right away that it didn't smell nearly as dark as the description sounded. I tested a bit out, and sure enough, on me, it's all almond and orange with a really light hit of cinnamon. The balsam of peru has a sweet, smooth effect - and to me the vetiver and "earth" are nowhere to be found. It's kind of...foody? But not in a phony dessert kind of way. Perhaps the vetiver is coming out slightly - but vetiver always smells like warm, golden grain on me.

 

I really like this scent, although I have to admit that when I close my eyes, the image of Mad Meg isn't what I see. On me, it's more like Breughel's paintings of the harvest - golden and autumnal and sun-dappled. Vaguely reminiscent of Dana O'Shee, actually. Good stuff!

[supremegoddessofall]

Strong vetiver and very dry. Not really for me.

[cuervosueno]

so I got the imp pack and tried this and the Smiling Spider first, and on me they are very similiar, though they don't share a lot of the same notes.

 

And I like this better.

 

They are both dark, dry scents on me, with a hint of spice and bitterness. Smiling Spider is sweeter, from the cloves I suspect. Still, the initial dark bitterness is the same in both of them. They are dusty black scents.

 

This one turns heavily to vetiver, though, which is fine with me because I like vetiver. I get vetiver and a bitter spice, which I think is the cinnamon combined with the bitter almond. there is also the scorched smell, which makes this even darker.

 

I don't get the mandarin or the sage, though there is a slight sweetness to this which could be the mandarin.

 

Interesting scent....but I haven't decided yet what I think of it.

[sookster]

straight sniff from the bottle is vetiver and earth....strong and commanding...

 

once applied a sweetness comes forth ... cinnamon and the black mandarin...

 

gorgeous!!

 

this is such a compelling blend...i absolutely adore it and the morphing is just outstanding

[euterpe414]

This one is quite the morpher on my skin! Wet it is all vetiver and mandarin (well maybe a little itty bit of earth, but it is well mixed in). I like vetiver a lot, but with citrus sometimes it makes me feel a little bit queasy . However, as it dries the mandarin goes away and it becomes smokier- the herbs and almond appear and the vetiver calms down - A LOT. I don't ge a lot of cinnamon- which is sad... Also, it only seems to throw in the wet stage, which is when I don't want it to, heh.

 

I like the drydown of this a lot- an herbal, earthy scent with a touch of almond creaminess. I am definitely keeping my imp, but I don't think I will buy a bottle b/c I don't know how often I can handle the beginning stage.

[dawndie]

Wet: sweet greenery

 

On skin: dusty dirty base with sweet orange on top. Weird combo!

 

Half-hour later: more green woodsy, but sweetned a bit with the mandarin

 

In conclusion: I thought I would dislike this one, between the bitter almond and cinnamon bark and "fire-scorched earth." It's an interesting blend, green woods and earth with an added sweetness. The end result is more than the sum of its parts, and I ended up really enjoying it. Another unique blend!

[penemuel]

I'm going through my imp pack in alphabetical order, and this one is next

 

In the imp, yes, there it is, my old nemesis, Vetiver. It actually seems to be playing well with others right now, so I'm not too scared away.

 

Wet on my skin -- VETIVER. Oh yeah, and some other smoky burned spicy stuff...

 

Dry on my skin -- oh my, this turns out NICE! The vetiver backs right down (yay!) and this deliciously firey spicy smoky scent comes out. It's like sitting by a raging fire, but it's definitely not one made with pine wood. Some other kind of wood that lends a kind of spicy scent to it. I know this scent -- someone around uses something like this in their fireplace every winter, and I love it, I just have no idea what wood it is. The cinnamon is there way in the background, too, adding an almost sweet spicyness, but it's so close to my skin I really have to lean in and snorfle.

 

I'm always reluctant when I see Vetiver in a blend, but it works very well in this one. I might contemplate a bottle of this

[sarada]

Wow, would you believe that for my entire life I thought this was a Bosch painting? When I was a child I would stare at Bosch paintings for HOURS in my mom's art books, and I guess that because this is similar in style, it imprinted on me as such. And to think that despite 12 college credits in art history and a lifetime as an art-lover it took a perfume to shock me into realization with that!

 

Embarassment aside, this contains a lot of my favorite things: earth, vetiver, sage and I do believe that I like balsam of peru. Not such a fan of the cinnamon, though bark seems okay (c.f. Geek, which I love). Bitter almond also was my friend in King of Clubs even though I normally hate almond. Mandarin...is okay. What we get here is largely a deep, earthy, rich vetiver scent, with a sweetness that borders on being chocolatey. I think bitter almond confuses my nose.

 

It is almost too strong, with almond and mandarin trying to distract me with hints of sweetness, and the dry sage and cinnamon bark emphasizing the blasted, dry, chaotic hotness. This is a scent that would work similarly well for a Bosch painting, come to think of it.

 

Cinnamon bark and bitter almond are a little too strong in this in the middle stage, and I just want to get back to earth and vetiver and other deep dark scents. I wore this to bed and fell asleep before I could tell what the drydown was...and in retesting it, I'm still waiting to find out what happens after a couple of hours.

 

As a scent, it's definitely something I'd consider a bottle of because I like rich earthy scents, though it is fairly similar to The Great He-Goat in terms of being a strong vetiver...the strength of almond and cinnamon in this might be too much for me to wait through though. As an interpretation for this incredible work of art, it's spot-on, with all of the colors of burning earth, the chaos and contrast and surreality.

[Deanalouise]

Mad Meg: I tend to like the masculine scents rather than the "pink" sweet scents but Mad Meg was a little too dry for my liking. There is no bit of sweet in this scent. It fits the name.

[gwynethr]

I'm trying to think of the word this is bringing to mind, and the only thing I can come up with is tough. It's dark and smoky and has earthy, scorchy qualities that make it seem like the kind of perfume my inner tough girl would want to wear -- the one I never really get to revisit much any more. I haven't liked some of the other scents like this much before, but this one hits the spot.

 

This reminds me a lot of the smell of air after you've been shooting. I think it'll be great to wear when I want to smell like I'm not to be trifled with.

[Lunaratu]

At first this was a bit overpoweringly burnt smelling to me but as it dried….wow is all I can say.

 

This became such an intriguing scent, very complex and magnetic. It reminded me very heavily of an old Beltane ritual performed during the medieval ages. The entire town gathered round the bonfire to celebrate the fecundity of life, getting drunk off of mead, strewn with flowers, with a type of fierce magnetism underlying the surface of the dance. Something almost wickedly sensual in its strength in the orange light. Mad Meg is definitely a scent with presence that I was greatly surprised to like and like I certainly did. I couldn’t help but be drawn to this scent…and I mean literally! I couldn’t stop sniffing myself! I have smelled nothing else like this in bpal’s catalogue and think it is just amazing.

 

This was a scent I was on the fence about even getting in the imp pack and wow has it shot up my list right quick, despite my dislike of its wet stage I couldn’t help but be so drawn to its dry stage it’s that indelible. This is both dark and glowing with some of the burnt nature to it but also this sweetness from what seems like honey, oranges, and herbs with some savory spices thrown in for good measure (I’m gathering that’s the cinnamon bark).

 

This is yummy without being foody and aggressively sensual without being trampy in that it seems just above skin scent. This is definitely a scent I could see a succubus wearing while she embraces you—very “yeah, I’m from hell but I’m so sexy you don’t really care, now do you?” mmm, love, definite love for this blend.

 

Rating: 4.5/5

Edited October 9, 2007 by Lunaratu

[forspecial_plate]

Mad Meg. I love this scent. LOVE it. I was expecting a whole bunch of vetive like the Great He-Goat. Not the case. The whole scent is very smooth and subtle. Up close I can smell the earthy vetiver, and sweet orange. The throw however is something special. Enigmatic. It darts around and reminds me of things, elusive and hard to pin down. It kept reminding me of another bpal and I couldn't think of what. Then I realized it was reminding me of Mad Hatter. Why?? I don't know! But there it is.

 

It's a great scent. Spicy, sweet and earthy. Very smooth and much lighter than I was expecting. Really fantastic.

 

edit: I wanted to add that this lasted a really long time, and I kept getting little hints of that 'scorched' note in the throw....really fascinating the way this scent presents different facets of itself. Definitely worthy of a bottle purchase!!

Edited June 25, 2007 by Forspecial Plate

[edenssixthday]

Mad Meg - I hate how freshly-applied vetiver oils smell on my skin, but I always suffer through it because I know that once it dries down, it's going to be TEH AWEZOME!!! Sure enough, this is yet another amaaaaazing vetiver blend *after* it dries down. When first applied, it's entirely vetiver, but once it dries down, the almond blends with the vetiver to give it a semi-sweet and meaty type of scent...yet the vetiver is still super strong and almost gravelly. The cinnamon bark is there to lend it a bit of warm, woody, spicy feel, without being all about red hot candies. I LOVE IT. Vetiver is one of those notes that is just perfect on my skin -- it always has the perfect level of throw on my skin and lasts all day long. This is one for the permanent collection, that's for certain!

Edited June 27, 2007 by edenssixthday

[nineveh]

In the bottle, this smelled like burning wood and chocolate. Once I put it on my skin, however, it changed into the best parts of King of Clubs and Priala, plus a little orange thrown in.

 

It's sweet, dark, earthy, and smoky, but still oddly light in feeling despite its shadowy nature. Ever hold your hand in incense smoke and feel the soft film it leaves behind on your skin? That's what the smoke note is doing to my nose, which gives the whole blend a velvety, airy quality that's just gorgeous.

 

This ends up being unusually sweet and pretty given the subject of the painting, but it definitely fits the colors.

[yeahbutnobut]

Mad Meg

 

In the imp: whoa, scorched vetiver-the 'evil' variety!

Wet on skin: oh, this is interesting, now it sweetens and softens nicely, with mandarin coming out.

Dry on skin: mmm, this is actually quite nice! The vetiver is strong, but there's a wonderful spiced mandarin note to this. Like candied orange peel with chocolate and cinnamon! I also smell the dry earth and some almond too, but I'm surprised at how pretty this chocolate orange and cinnamon scent is. it almost reminds me of Christmas sweets and a roaring fire in the chimney on a cold winter's night, cosy and warm and smoky. Some vetivers tend to turn chocolate-like on me, this is one of them. The mandarin is wonderfully strong-usually this note is faint, but here it smells sugared and delicious.

After a while: this becomes smokier and more charred, more vetiver-y and oddly, fruitier. There's something here which is almost like banana, pineapple or some kind of creamy fruity liquor! The mandarin is gone but the creamy cinnamon is still there, it reminds me of that lovely cinnamon chai scent from Pinched with Four Aces, but in here I get a hint of something which is bizarrely like bananas with pina colada! I have no idea why my skin is distorting the scent from a comforting scent of roasting spices to barbecued bananas with flaming pineapple cocktails…very weird. It's not a bad scent-it's a lot nicer than the vetiver overload I expected, that's for sure! It reminds me of Death Adder.

The weird tropical fruit stage does go away, but the scent remaining still reminds me of Death Adder, sweetened vetiver with a lovely cinnamon cream scent over the top. I wonder if the Peru balsam is what is responsible for the sweetness? It's a sweet, almost amber-coated vetiver with a little spice and soft smoke wafting over it. There's that lovely tonka-like quality to the cinnamon that was in Pinched, but with the ashy, greenish-yellow scent of vetiver added. There's even a hint of something like saffron to this. The drydown before it fades is gentle dry grassy vetiver, reminiscent of those vetiver place mats my mum has, with a hint of myrrh. This vet isn't of the evil kind after all, it seems.

Verdict: ok, this scent is heavy on the vetiver as expected, but this is actually really lovely. This is what I hoped Azathoth would be like, when it comes to woodsy mandarin vetiver. I was expecting a harsh, maddening, charred scent, but instead, I get a gorgeous creamy cinnamon-vanilla like scent weaving through the vetiver, almost like chai, with soft fireplace smoke and candied mandarin peel, all of which smell very festive. This immediately struck me as being a perfect winter scent. There are times when the balsam comes out and smells like resin or amber, and the fire scorched earth a lot gentler than I expected. The cinnamon bark note that Beth has been using in recent blends is fantastic. I like this a lot but ultimately the vetiver wins out, takes over as usual. There's even a weird 'pina colada' stage to this scent which I'm a little freaked out by. But I'm surprised by how pleasant this is. I don't think it's a bottle scent yet but I'm debating whether to keep the imp for the colder months or not.

Emoticon rating:

Is it a keeper? not sure-the vetiver does get strong, but it's one of the nicer scents in the 'pungent vetiver' genre.

If you like this, try: Azathoth, Priala, Great He Goat, Two Monsters, Death Adder, Music of Erich Zahn

[alicia_stardust]

I get a sort of dry, dark, heavy sort of scent, redolent of dark caves and hot fires. I can detect earth, fire, a touch of cinnamon, and a whole lotta vetiver.

 

This is once again, an artful scent representation of the painting. This isn't the sort of scent I normally wear, but anyone who likes earthy scents should definitely check this out.

[moon_lemming]

Wellll if that's vetiver it's not all that bad. It smells like acrid, sort of spicy, smoke. I've smelled worse (CIVET).

 

Mad Meg is not a blend I'll be seeking out, but it fits this painting very well. I know I say that a lot about the Salons -- I can't help it, it's true! At first it's nothing but (what I take to be) vetiver, smoke filling my nose.

 

As it dries, some spices come out. I smell some almond as well; that gets even stronger as time goes on. It's a nice blend for what it is, even if it's not "me." I like the way all the elements play together.

 

Seriously, this is one evocative scent. Not something I will ever reach for, since I don't like the way vetiver smells on me, even if I don't recoil in horror at the thought of it. But an awesome sensory experience when taken in part with the painting.

[Ajila]

In the bottle – Initially the almond, then the cinnamon and finally the vetiver

 

Wet on me – Very, very faint almond

 

Dry on me – Warm dry incense, probably the earth and the balsam of peru

 

Overall – It’s not really me, but a colleague liked it so I’m going to offer her my imp, even if she was convinced it was patchouli

[Blood onmy hands]

I rather like Mad Meg on myself and the boy (it's super sexy and aggressively spicy on him in this deliciously sweet, peppered sort of way), but my boy just gave it a 6 out of 10 and said it was 'okay.'

 

On me, this smells a bit like LUSH's Silky Underwear perfume at first, with more heat and earthiness added to it. Over time this sweetens up and softens on my skin a lot. It has a powdery feel to it, like a dusting powder scented with hints of orange and earthy sweetness (almost vanilla-esque on me). I normally hate smoky scents, but the hint of smokiness underneath the other notes is really attractive in this blend. I expected this to be awful and darkly earthy with the scorched earth and vetiver, but it's not overwhelming to me at all. Mad Meg is much sweet and softer than I was expecting, dappled with orange and spice.

 

This isn't full bottle worthy (especially since my boy isn't crazy about it), but I'll probably keep a decant of this one .

[Miss Lynx]

This is simultaneously very fiery and very earthy. The vetiver's quite noticeable, although it doesn't completely take over (yet, anyway -- we'll see how it develops), and it smells as though there's some patchouli in there too -- maybe as part of the scorched earth note? But it's also got that same rich smoky cinnamon as Priala, which is a very nice addition. And there's a touch of sweetness, and a herbal element...

 

Thankfully the almond is not too strong at all -- I dislike almond, but it's never stopped me from ordering a scent, because it's one of those top notes that fades fast, so there's a limit to how much damage it can really do to a scent.

 

Some people would probably read this scent as masculine, but I don't -- there's nothing men's cologne-ish about it at all. Mainly it's just earthy-spicy-incensy, in quite a nice way. Quite reminiscent of Priala the Human Phoenix, really, which is one of my favourite CD scents, but this one is more complex and oddly a little lighter. And it's definitely got that lovely multilayered complexity that many of the Salons do -- sweet, dark, earthy, fiery, herbal, incensey, spicy, and a strange almost-metallic edge at times.

 

On the whole, I very much like it, and I suspect my half-imp sample will not last long. Don't know that I'd be up for a bottle of it yet, since I still have almost a half-bottle of Priala left from my decant circle, but maybe once I run out of that... I think between the two of them, this is the one I like better.

 

Grade: B+

[Thursdae]

On me, Mad Meg is bitter smoke. No trace of citrus, cinnamon, or sweetness. I saw a comparison earlier to the Smiling Spider, which I adore. Someone else mentioned Priala, which I likewise adore. Mad Meg is not even a runner-up for me with those two in the house.

 

Funny thing about the Smiling Spider, though. I was staying with someone that I thought was a friend, and he harshed on the clovy richness of the Smiling Spider. Luckily I don't have to see him ever again so he won't have to smell it ever again, because I plan on wearing it lots and lots and lots!

Edited October 4, 2007 by Thursdae