Sacrifice

[cuervosueno]

The scent of a vampire cowboy: Sweetgrass and tumbleweeds, cedar and white sage, dusty, wet leather, woodsmoke, and blood.

I was given this as a frimp by a super kind and generous forumite, and it was a total surprise: I never thought I'd get to try it!

I'm kind of hit or miss on leather scents, because I seriously amp leather, though sometimes, if the scent is good enough, I don't care.

And this one is, indeed, very heavy on the leather on me, and while it is that phase, it is ok, if not great. But after about 20 minutes or so, suddenly it is all sharp cologne and leather: imagine aquavelvet spilled on a new leather jacket.

Wierd too, because I don't know what that cologne note is....I usually love sweetgrass and sage, and I imagined this to be kind of like Coyote, which I do like. But it's not.

Very sad, because it's just my chemistry doing this, but I gotta admit, it is pretty awful on me. And it LASTS!

I passed it on to someone I hope will enjoy it more than I did..... Edited March 28, 2010 by Shollin

[ljaylh]

 

Oh gosh.. this is magnificent! The leather is warm and soft, it absolutely smells like a well-worn saddle. The blood is very subtle, but combined with the woodsmoke it's giving the leather a warm and soft sweetness rather than a harsh hardness. The sage does give it a slight cologne-like edge, but nothing that's really noticeable (not like, say, Severin.. which was very cologne-y on me).

 

This is very evocative of the whole cowboy image, it's dry and dusty but not powdery, and warm and comforting with an edge. Absolutely top class, and it stays on my skin for ages. Overall.. just beautiful, and I'd say an absolute must-have for any leather lovers!

[milo]

I was frimped this by a very generous forumite! You know who you are!!

 

Wet, this is a strong, musky leather. It doesn't change all that much from wet to dry, and reminds me of something. Hmm, I do believe this is very much like Loviatar/Crowley. Two blends I adore. I do think this is a bit more masculine, however. I get a bit of spicy sage as well. I really do love this, and would love to smell this on the opposite sex. (I'm sure they love it too, he he). Very sexy, warm, leather blend. Love it!!

[Venneh]

I got this as a tester from a BPALentine; thanks again so much! In the vial, this smells sweet and dusty with a little bit of bite in it. On my skin, it's sweet, herbal cologne. ..Yeah. Not having good feelings about this one. Ends up being a sweet leather herbal cologne. Not for me.

Edited February 9, 2010 by Venneh

[Invidiana]

I took a chance on this with the hopes that it would take the same lucky turn Lord Ruthven did and end up being all sweet, almost berry-ish blood accord and a hint of leather, grasses and woods in the background. My cedar-amping skin begged to differ. On me it dries down into almost all cedar, really sharp and masculine cedar, exactly like those cedar chips you use around the trees and bushes on your lawn. The leather is not a soft leather either; it's a dusty, dry, De Sade-style leather that, like De Sade, is just way too overtly masculine for me. The blood accord shows up for a short time during the drydown until it's swallowed almost entirely by the cedar (this is sadly the extent to which my skin amps the stuff) and it's not the berry-like stuff in Lord Ruthven but a real true-to-life tangy metallic blood scent that isn't sweet at all and again really falls more into the more masculine category. Everything else struggles to show up when this hits my skin, but the final drydown is trumped by the cedar. I wanted to love this so badly because of the vampire theme, but unfortunately this vampire really bit a chunk out of me. I just have to deal with the fact that I don't have much luck with BPAL's cedar, period.

Edited May 22, 2010 by Invidiana

[lavender84]

A generous forumite frimped me some of this and woooH~

 

It is wonderfully soft, dusty leather which brings to mind comfort, slightly sweet instead of harsh. Lovely really.

[Penance]

Origin:

 

5mL bought on LJ.

 

Preconceived notions:

 

Based on the listed notes, this sounds pretty good. The only iffy thing here is the blood, which I'm not a fan of. But, based on the reviews, I have to admit that I'm nervous. I hate anything that's cologney or perfumey. It's an instant deal breaker for me. But I'm stubborn and had to try this for myself when a bottle came up at a price that I considered reasonable.

 

First sniff:

 

Uh-oh, I should have listened to the reviews. This is definitely cologney. Big time. I wouldn't pick out any of the listed notes in this, really. It just smells like a generically masculine cologne to my nose.

 

Wet on skin:

 

I was really hoping that there would be some instant improvement when this hit my skin, but no such luck. It's still (high-ish end) department store cologne.

 

Dry down:

 

And still no luck with the cologne. I was hoping things would settle and the leather would finally come out (and maybe bring its friends) once Sacrifice dried, but no. It smells exactly the same from beginning to end for me.

 

The bottom line:

 

Don't get me wrong. Sacrifice doesn't smell bad. In fact, it's a perfectly pleasant scent if you like the smell of traditional cologne. Unfortunately, I don't.

 

I was hoping for a rugged, leathery scent (I tend to gravitate towards gender neutral to masculine blends most of the time and I'm not one to shy away from a manly leather blend). This isn't it.

[Lethran]

In bottle: This is unique as BPAlL desert scents go. I’d call the sage strongest by a hair, closely followed by what I’m guessing is sweet grass and tumbleweeds. I’d put woodsmoke and blood next, with the rest of the notes present, but less distinct. It’s gorgeous and very big sky and outdoors. It does it the concept and I wish there was something like this in the catalog as I’d love a whole bottle and there isn’t even enough to skin test here. I’m heartbroken there is not only no more, but nothing even close I can think of.

[cfrancesca]

Sacrifice is one of my all-time favorite leather blends. I discovered it around the same time I got into bpal and it's just gotten better with age. It has that smokey and sexy worn leather that I love with a backdrop of spicy woods, soft but very pleasant to my nose herbal cologne, with a musky sweetness underneath it all. It's all very wonderfully blended and cohesive. When I wear it I feel like I've wrapped myself up in an old familiar leather jacket with the soft still-lingering scent of cologne and traces of musk. Also, and I'm not sure if it's coming from my imagination or not, but I feel there's a slight sinister edge to it which I find strangely alluring. To me, Sacrifice is a complex, comforting and quite sexy masculine-type scent. Very yummy!

[Nicnivin]

We managed to get hold of a bottle of this that someone was selling on the trading post, and oh. my. gods.

 

I don't know whether the fact that it has aged for several years has mellowed it out or not, but this is one of the sexiest scents I have ever come across in my entire life.

My husband is an even bigger BPAL fanatic than I am, and his usual go-tos for sexy man-scents are Kroenen and Fighter, but this? Thisssss. It's what I imagine Bill from True Blood would smell like. The leather is prominent, but soft, and sharpened nicely by the sage and sweetgrass.

 

I can't stop smelling him.

[Roogna]

in short - too perfumy and not enough leather for me to keep.

the longer I wear it, the more the leather comes out, always tempered by a sweet grass/cedar note and something that can only be described as "perfumy"

[forspecial_plate]

Someone gave me a sniffie of this somewhere along the way. Dry, dusty leather. It's somewhere between Geek and Brom Bones and Velvet Bandito.

 

Leather, dry, dusty, woodsy, and a hint of soapy-ness. I like it, but since I have decants of the other three I compared it to, I don't need to go nuts trying to find more Sacrifice.