Category: Fragrance

One of the more ubiquitous sights on Basenotes is a thread to the effect of “Given what I already have, what else do you all recommend I get?”   I just commented on one of them a few minutes ago, and I’m responsible for three or four of them myself.  One of them had several people suggest Antidote by Viktor & Rolf, the same perfumers that make the ladies’ hit Flowerbomb.  Now, these recommendations were from members whose opinions I value quite highly, so I took it to heart and committed the name to memory in case I wandered into a sample of it.

And wander I did, into Von Maur at Louisville’s Oxmoor Center, where they had a display of Antidote, and that beautiful bottle.  It is seriously one of the most stylish bottles I’ve got, pictured to the right.  But a pretty bottle is only part of what Antidote offers.

The opening blast is big and strong, a host of woods and spices.  It’s full, lush, even sparkling is a term I’d use to describe it, as it definitely has a sort of effervescent sensation to the nose.  The main players throughout are sandalwood, cinnamon, and vanilla.  Despite the massive note pyramid, I think these three are the great majority of the scent.  It is sweet yet robust all at once, and remains so for about six hours when a base of amber becomes more prominent.  This is also when the fragrance becomes slightly less masculine, but still an excellent evening wear fragrance.

The closest thing out of my wardrobe to this one is Original Santal by Creed, lovingly referred to as “The Bombay Flamethrower.” The best thing I’ve found to layer with this is, unsurprisingly to serial readers, Aramis Havana.  What I find with this “Havantidote” … (More) “V&R Antidote – Sovereign Specific”

Unfortunately, readers, this is one of those fragrances I just won’t be able to be objective or unbiased on.  My history with Romance Silver goes back several years and across oceans and nations.  It was my first designer fragrance, or at least what I’d consider designer now; prior to that if memory serves I was wearing Avatar by Coty, which I’ve only ever seen at Wal-Marts.  That said, you may come across with an idea as to what it’s like, yet.

Romance Silver starts out with a very well-done suede note, one of the first good attempts at suede in the business.  For those that aren’t familiar with the smell of suede, it’s probably because it’s more or less an invention by perfumers.  It’s a spicy note that has both ozonic and woody elements.  So it’s a slightly different take on your traditional fresh scent, and when combined with the other notes in the composition Romance Silver is unarguably masculine.  There are some wild, fruity elements to it as well, but on the whole the composition is rather tight, it’s tough to pick out individual notes.

The scent is linear, no progression to speak of in my experiences with it.  Projection is weak, but I’ve received a few compliments with it.  Longevity is outstanding, it stays on clothes for a long, long time.  As in days/weeks.  On skin I still get a good 8 hours.

Knowing what I know and have tried now, would I recommend it to myself?  I honestly don’t know, and that’s why I’m withholding a recommendation either way, except as always that one should try it if one sees it.  I mean, it is in my top 3 of the 2003 releases, below Un Jardin En Mediterranee and Gucci Pour Homme but above Burberry Brit (not … (More) “RL Romance Silver – Flashbacks”

I’ve written previously that the mainstream community, by and large, has awful taste, a message that I can reinforce by pointing out consistently high sales of fresh aquatic after fresh aquatic after fresh, bored-to-tears, are-we-there-yet aquatic.  Every now and then, though, we can find something that bucks the trend and Armani Code is the best example of that in recent years.

2004 had Armani generally doing their own thing, the Armani Prive collection was seeing more love than anything else, their last mainstream attempt (Mania) failed to impress the masses.  So they went to an up-and-coming perfumer named Antoine Maisondieu (It seems that serial readers of the blog will have heard the name before, generally in glowing terms) to commission their new men’s perfume.  Maisondieu opted to go the route of an oriental, something that Armani had never done in mainstream fragrance.

Suffice it to say that Black Code, as it was called, was an unmitigated success story.

Code is really quite unique, a kiss of citrus gives way to spice, smoke, and warm tonka bean, though it’s not a typical tonka as it’s slightly altered by the presence of Guaiacwood, which gives the whole thing a distinct formal tone.  The initial blast is strong and masculine, with lemon and olive flower being the main players.  As it dries down, it picks up a detectable “warmth” from the smoke and tonka bean.  It projects very well for such a mainstream scent, and longevity is decent at six hours.

Why, then, is Code so frequently cited as a cliche?  I suppose every cliche has a basis in fact, and the fact is Code is extremely popular across the nation (and in worldwide circles for that matter), and has very good odds of being found (overapplied) in a middle/high school environment.  Simply … (More) “Armani Code – Not Just For Everybody”

Kicking off the Bond No. 9 marathon, I chose to…choose the fragrances at random, and I’ll be mixing in my as-yet unreviewed fragrances out of my wardrobe and the Bond No. 9 fragrances for your reading pleasure. This also takes a lot of that pesky thinking out of the equation; I now can tell you what I’ll be wearing on any given day for the next month or so (and I’m working on a calendar to show you as such).

Central Park was the first of the Bonds to test, and unusually for me I began completely blind; no reviews, no ideas what to expect, nothing. The opening blast was a very green one, with citrus being the most recognizable thing right off the bat. I knew something was coming to me so I stared at my wardrobe for a minute until my eyes settled on Creed Virgin Island Water. I’m not calling them similar, but the lime and verbena were a very high-quality much like VIW. What Central Park has over the baby Creed is a lush assortment of woods in the background, it’s not a straight cedar but there’s plenty of cedar present in the base and you guys know that’s a good way to get my attention. There’s also a fair amount of musk but it doesn’t stick around terribly long, which isn’t necessarily a bad thing. It has a definite progression, the “crisp edges” so to speak fade and you’re left with a very nice cedar drydown, sweetened with lime and a whisper of jasmine, it wasn’t until I saw it listed as a note and actively went looking for it that I noticed it. It’s marketed as unisex but this one, I believe, leans toward the masculine side rather heavily.

It wasn’t until I sat … (More) “Central Park – It’s Easy Being Green”

With the niche experiment winding down I’m hitting the second of three by Kilian Hennessy, Cruel Intentions, and this one was recommended explicitly for me out of not only the Kilian line but all of perfumery, by the Basenotes crew. Well, how am I supposed to not sample it when you get a recommendation like that?

Now, I’ve been wearing these fragrances to work, all of them, even the sugary-sweet concoction known as A Taste of Heaven. I wore Cruel Intentions two days ago on Sunday, hoping to see why it was recommended so highly. Still in high spirits from the job situation I elaborated on a few days ago, I entered work with a level of confidence and high spirits that I haven’t had in weeks (months?). I was more relaxed, smiling more, taking a deeper interest in customer issues. And Cruel Intentions was almost transparent, and this is where it’s gonna get hard to explain. I definitely smell it, a sort of refreshing mint gourmand that I’ve gotta describe as the olfactory equivalent of having a word on the tip of your tongue. It was so familiar to me, but yet so fleeting. That Sunday ended up being the busiest Sunday I think I’ve ever worked with the possible exception of the weekend after Christmas. I mean absolutely slammed to the point that even taking a lunch break was entirely out of the question.

But there was something strange; anything I tried to sell, the customer was buying. They just would not say no and I racked up sales (and commissions) all day long. By the end of the day I exceeded my typical commission payout by a mind-blowing 1,000%. I did better in one day than I typically do in the course of an entire … (More) “Cruel Intentions – Cologne to $$$ to.”

I’m gonna be honest, I won’t be wearing this one again. Had the same oud opening as Black Aoud, just a touch sweeter, and for the next 4 or 5 hours after that I had a headache from the stuff. Then it changed into this sweet figgy fruity thing and more or less faded away. Won’t be revisiting it. Probably the shortest review you’ll ever see me do.… (More) “Montale Attar”

In my initial ratings just smelling the vials, my commentary on Cereus No. 7 was “I got a big old whiff of Green Irish Tweed right off the bat.” I was so confident today that I’d hit on something that I skipped the solo wearing and wore it side-by-side with the Creed offering. Today’s an important day too, I’m in the middle of possibly making a job change and wore the fragrances in hopes of putting my best foot forward with my possible new boss.

More news on the job hunt to come but let me say that as rarely as I make correct predictions…I was spot on with the comparison to GIT. Before the Creed fanbois start sending me hate mail, read on.

Cereus No. 7 starts out with a very familiar soapy opening, the same one I smelled just off of the dipper from the vial. Surface appearances, however, are only a little bit of what No. 7 offers. It takes a little while for No. 7 and Green Irish Tweed to start differentiating, about an hour. While Green Irish Tweed stays fairly linear, Cereus No. 7 adds a pepper note that, in my opinion, does wonders for the masculinity of the fragrance. Let’s face it, GIT is a linear soap-inspired scent evoking cleanliness and a gentle demeanor. Cereus No. 7 is a more roguish creature; while GIT might be the well-to-do businessman on the black-tie date, Cereus No. 7 is the well-dressed young romeo with an adventurous side. It’s more contemporary, it’s just slightly dirty and it does a fantastic job of setting itself apart from Green Irish Tweed by a minor adjustment that appeals to a whole different clientele.

There’s another issue, one I make frequent mention of on here and that’s price. As niche goes, … (More) “Cereus No. 7 – BFFs”