Bogue Maai

Maai smells expensive and like something produced before allergen regulations. How the oakmoss and civet smell (are?) so real and are used in such quantities, I do not know. The problem to me is that it smells like an imitation of old fragrances rather than a new one. Perhaps I am too susceptible to marketing, image, and stories attached to perfume but wearing this is not nearly as pleasing as wearing actual La Nuit, Montana, Kouros or what have you. It feels incomplete. It has no history. ELDO Rien is a similar old-style opulent chypre but it is its own entity, and its cast of rubber and tar over aldehydic floral make it feel modern rather than a dogmatic imitation of the past. My first thought on smelling Maai was not that it was incredible, but that it smelled uncannily like Marilyn Miglin Pheromone or Charlie. Actually, my first thought was "Aviance Night Musk!" I have never smelled Aviance Night Musk, but Maai smelled like my mental image of Aviance Night Musk, if that makes any sense, something from 1980 that would've been advertised with an image of Dressed to Kill pantyhose legs in heels. It almost has a feminine bowling alley dowdiness to it. It feels bizarre to pay $300 for Marilyn Miglin Pheromone. In ten years if they still make this and all the real chypres are gone, we'll see how I feel. On another note, the perfumer himself, Antonio Gardoni, is very nice to look at. Perhaps if I smelled Maai emanating from his chest hair it would not make me think of Sally Struthers in Five Easy Pieces so much.

Estee Lauder Knowing

Knowing is one of the few fragrances I wear where straight men stop and ask what wonderful "cologne" I'm wearing. It is highly unusual for heterosexual men to stop a 6'4" male stranger and tell him he smells good, so it must really pique their curiosity. The current formula is more streamlined, bitter, and dry than before--fine with me--which causes it to edge more toward Bandit and perhaps more suitable for masculine wear. It's an intelligent scent that conveys a degree of sexiness while remaining nicely aloof. Additionally, it's one of the few remaining real French (though parodoxically American in origin) chypres still on department store shelves. Like Aromatics, it seems to have a devoted cult following and still sells well, as evidenced by the fact that Lauder didn't relegate it to the "House of Lauder" collection recently as it did all its other older scents. The original ad with Paulina Porizkova, arms crossed in a tuxedo, is one of my favorites. The fact that it's a ripoff of the Deneuve No. 5 ads from the 70s doesn't detract one bit. There aren't smart ads for smart perfumes for smart women in tuxedos anymore.

Perfume of Contempt: Dior Poison

Poison is a proto-Lutensian medicinal purple tuberose apothecary syrup, at once radiantly whorey and ascetically anti-food anti-joy anti-sex antisocial. I have come to prefer the current EDT to the old Esprit de Parfum because it is drier and gets to the resinous-sticky incense musk drydown a little faster. For me, sometimes nothing but Poison will do when I am feeling prickly, edgy, unapproachable. I am young enough not to have formed downmarket associations with Poison because of its popularity in the 80s, so it is more austere, medieval, cruel and anticipatory of Serge Lutens to me than it is shoulder pads and Dynasty. Some facet of the tuberose smells strongly of blood at the opening. A disturbing favorite.

Perfume of Contempt: Gucci Rush

Of course I love this. It's an 80s powerhouse throwback named after poppers that smells like poppers. Electric youth indeed!

Old man on bus, with tone that is not necessarily complimentary: "Excuse me. Whatever that is you have on..."

Me: "Oh, thank you! It's Gucci Rush."

Old man on bus, shaking head: "Whatever that is you have on..."


May it always be in production-- this is all Gucci still have going for them on the perfume end. Tom Ford's perfumes were so interesting before he started his pretentious eponymous line.

If you wear Rush, make sure to wear a lot. This is a statement scent that is meant to be big and opaque. Transmogrify into an electric red rectangle; the instructions are there in the bottle design. I am dismayed when I smell a stale little whisper of Rush, a stale little whisper of Alien, a stale little whisper of Angel, a stale little whisper of Coco Mlle, on women. Oh, what it will take to undo the damage that modern American beauty magazine editorials on the alleged proper way to wear fragrance have wrought--spray and walk through, one spray, others must only be able to smell you when they lean in close, all that prim 50s etiquette guide bullshit. Above all, don't listen to Goody Onespritz when she admonishes you that it is better to risk underapplying than to be "perfume lady" or "cologne guy."

"A woman who wears too little fragrance instead of too much has no future" -me

Jean Patou Colony

I bought some some of this years ago and didn't hold on to it long, though it did come packaged with a lovely silk scarf. It was a light old-style feminine leather (is "Patouaide" a thing?) overlaid with a metallic canned pineapple note-- nothing earth-shattering but historically interesting and perfect for 30s French ladies en vacances. The un-PC French colonial concept is delightful; very Marlene Dietrich "Hot Voodoo" or Josephine Baker banana dance. Colony serves in a pinch as a more affordable alternative to my sadly discontinued signature scent, Vigny Le Golliwogg.

Serge Lutens Rose de Nuit

As a lover of animalic rose chypres, I had high hopes for this; I was already fantasizing about it becoming my mysterious and elegant signature scent, how I would pretend it was Nombre Noir. While it is beautiful, it is simply too quiet to be worth its $300 price tag. Perhaps if I could purchase it in Paris where Lutens bell jars are about $150 I would spring for it, but the import cost is obscene.
The reputed strangeness of Rose de Nuit is dependent on the wearer never having smelled an 80s rose chypre. If you are familiar with Montana, Coriandre, La Perla, La Nuit, Magie Noire, Paloma Picasso, Aromatics Elixir, Knowing, Aramis 900, even Agent Provocateur, Rose de Nuit will seem like a disappointingly quiet and short-lived version of those with an admittedly gorgeous silky texture and top-notch raw materials. If you are not, it will probably blow your mind as rose chypre accords did when I first smelled them. It is an exotic odor often termed "old lady" but framed with cool Lutens opulence and exclusivity that make it palatable and mysterious. It's like how someone who has never seen a truly out-there inscrutable art movie (Andrei Rublev, Persona, Melancholie der Engel) would have their minds blown by, say, It Follows. Rose chypres are shocking to modern noses because millennials, having grown up with no fragrance except the occasional calone or Iso E, simply can't comprehend someone choosing to smell like that.

Still, if I make my way to Paris, I may buy a bottle. The prospect of dumping it on copiously from a bell jar is appealing.

Reformulations of Contempt

KOUROS:

Kouros is still my favorite masculine on the market and, along with Yatagan, the best deal. If you love the smell, it becomes truly addictive, and the clean-dirty dichotomy present in all my favorites--Angel, Amouage Gold, Yatagan--is key to my continued fascination. 
After coming to terms with how excellent the "new" Opium actually is, I felt compelled to purchase a fresh bottle of Kouros. I was familiar with a post-2010 version from an ex-boyfriend who had it. It smelled like Kouros, sure, but had an almost bubblegum sweet quality to it and less complexity. I remember the bottle being plastic and cheap-looking. 
Maybe I'm crazy, but the new bottle I received from Amazon (dated 2014) seems leagues better than what I smelled last year. The packaging has changed, I assume to coincide with the launch of Kouros Silver. Regardless of the ho-humness of that flanker, I'm glad that they're giving more attention and a new advertising campaign to Kouros. This new bottle is white glass without silver shoulders, and it looks expensive and well designed, not like a cost-cutting measure as the first L'Oreal ones did. The logo has been slightly modernized and "Eau de Toilette" is gone. The box it came in is shiny navy and silver foil, different from the brighter blue ones I've purchased in the past. 
Most importantly, it smells excellent and lasts forever! The thin sweetness I detected with the plastic bottle my ex had is gone. It's not as strong as my first bottle, but it's gorgeous and smells exactly as Kouros should. It lasts through an entire work day, fading into a nice clean floral musk at the end. The shocking trademark Kouros sensation of a musky man wearing a soapy floral perfume is there--at times I was even reminded (positively) of Giorgio, like a dirty man had sprayed on Giorgio. 
I think YSL took customer complaints seriously and improved the formula for the launch of the flanker. Kouros Silver may have been a blessing in disguise.OPIUM:

I can't say enough good things about post-2010 Opium. Yes, I went through bottles of the vintage, but the fact is this just smells wonderful on men and women, lasts forever, and retains the character of the original. When you smell it, there is no doubt it is Opium. If it were marketed under a different name it would be hailed as a glorious, baroque throwback oriental. You can achieve the effect of the original by just wearing more. My dirty laundry all smells of sandalwood incense weeks later. I get told I smell like leather and incense.The powder effect that got "old lady" comments is reduced and the myrrh and incense amped up. This is more wearable in 2015 but still strange enough that you will stand out from the aquatic and Iso E cedar crowd and people with dull minds and uninteresting taste will wish you wore something else. I actually admire YSL's honesty in changing the bottle, making it easier to discern between new and old. Treasure this while we have it.

POISON:
The drydown of the latest reformulation of Poison now smells like L'Air du Desert Marocain, and it's lovely--that same incense/wood/musk. The first few hours it is unmistakably Poison, but the 80s synth-fruit recedes more than it used to. Tania Sanchez noted this as an improvement in one of the updates to The Guide. As for tenacity--when you spray it on, you expect that it will be fleeting as modern reformulations of powerhouses go, but it just keeps coming back and sticks to everything. It can be headachey--strong florals all go headachey on me--but Poison is one of the best reformulations on the market. I love Poison and used to make myself sick with the Esprit de Parfum, which fans must experience for the full story, but I am really liking how this new one fades down. Additionally, it can be had for $45 at Walmart.


Edit 7/28: That headache! It smells wonderful but dutifully gives me a headache every time so I can't wear it. The same thing happened with a new bottle of Knowing.
DRAKKAR NOIR:

Drakkar Noir is wonderful! I used up a bottle without even thinking about it, cause it's just such a versatile fragrance, good for day, night, winter, summer, anytime. People always compliment it without recognizing it. No one wears it anymore since it's been a meme for try-hard male sleaziness via jokes on various television shows for 20+ years. I first smelled it on a gorgeous, smartly dressed young guy and couldn't believe it when he told me it was Drakkar Noir. It smells a lot like Paloma Picasso, with a dry mossy patchouli leather and a soapy character. There is a fun gourmand movie popcorn accord in there too. People will pay so much for these allegedly daring niche animalic leather chypres when this is around, everywhere, for no money and in great shape. Would be especially good on a woman.

PALOMA PICASSO:
Current formulation is fantastic and you basically can't get anything else like this, of this quality, for so little money. Don't bother hunting after the old stuff unless you just happen upon it, it's not necessary. As with the current Magie Noire, if this were packaged with a Serge Lutens label it would be acclaimed as a stunning animalic throwback. Paloma smells very much like itself and nothing else--sour soapy floral chypre over woody honeyed animalic base. Great on a guy, great sillage, great longevity. Go to TJ Maxx and get it.

ANGEL:

You don't want to know what's in the attractive new 3-D bottle. It's dark Windex blue and it smells like a thin, ambery body spray. No patchouli, just wan, faint, cheap, and thin, not to mention priced more expensively than ever. I've worn Angel since 2008 and this was truly shocking. I guess the latest wave of EU restrictions on vanilla killed it for good. I smelled what was in the bottle, baffled, for 20 minutes and then drove back to Ulta to return it. Though it's been getting progressively worse the last five years, I rationalized that Angel was so popular and expensive that it would be maintained in recognizable form. My first several bottles got me endless compliments, and it just got thinner and thinner over the years and ceased to amaze. Unless they fix this--and I don't know how they could--the bottles I have now will be my last. If perfume is really dead because of allergen restrictions, I guess I'll just go back to wearing patchouli oil. That was the best part of Angel, and it hasn't been there for half a decade. I'm surprised I haven't seen anything about this anywhere but in a customer review on the Mugler website. One of the greats is gone.