A little perplexed at where my review of this is? I'm sure I penned one way back when I first tried this but never mind. I can't really add much more than some of the brilliant reviews below, don't take my word for how good Io is, just read theirs. Io is my favourite creation from Chris and I will always associate him with resins and specifically the coulter pine resin that he gathers himself from his home in California. It's very weird smelling stuff, oddly sweet and almost myrrh like toffee and vanilla nuance, but highly medicinal and starkly modern smelling, like scotch tape or brown parcel tape. Not sure if it features heavily in Io but it's laden with resins regardless, translucent, and sepia stained and with a twang which replicates saffron in heat and impact, but not smell. As for the feel... This fragrance depicts an almost post apocalyptic, sci-fi landscape, the Dune novels, Tatooine, Mad Max, or ("get your ass to...") Mars. A barren, parched, place. I can hear sweeping, analogue synth pads and piercing, mock native riddims, or less cerebral and representing Io's rougher side, dusty, southern rock, like Kyuss or Clutch. The dry woodiness supplied by a smokey, lightly peppered, cedar and earthy tones but not bogged down or big smokey OD's. I like Chris's work and he's actually very eclectic despite having quite an uncluttered and minimal aesthetic. I said I feel he has an affinity with wood and earthy materials but that's perhaps because I haven't sampled his more floral offerings. He has control over his materials, unlike some indy perfumes that produce heavy soups & stews, he prefers to let the naturals have a little breathing space within a minimal, synthetic construction, and the mixed media approach is working for him. I think Io is a triumph, shame I didn't put my money where my mouth is now it's all gone. :(

Those who think this is like Salome or Tabu, what brand of crack are you smoking? Even when my fragrance collecting pal shared with me her vintage bottle of Bal a Versailles, as part of my intro to classic perfumery (this one is not even that old in the grand scheme but a classic nonetheless) all those years ago, I don't recall it as being as animal and edgey as the slabs of sex which are Dana Tabu or Liz Moores Salome. In any case I felt I needed to review this as it's one of the many classics I've neglected to pop a review on, because well...there's only so many hours in the day, but a sample of a modern bottle was long over due so here goes. The opening is the swirl of notes you'd expect from chypre citruses, to heady labdanum, peru/tolu cinnamon coke quality this is still a really beautiful, complex scent. It then dries to something resembling a sheer, nightie of an amber. It's basically a tarted up Bain de Caron, with a strange almost rubber, herbal, fougere accord. I bought Cologne Intense from Houbigant recently and that has a similar, furrow or nose dive in it. Almost on the edge of unpleasantness but with a creamy clove note to it also and amber being warmed by spices. I think I've touched on almost every perfume genre there, but that's kinda what Bal a Versailles is, even in it's current incarnation. I have to say that I'm not one to bemoan 'performance' this is a beautiful perfume I enjoy wearing but it's just not as bold as the my recollection of the old bottles, so I'm not in a huge hurry to get it, even though it has a great quality to value ratio. I've not really got a bad thing to say about it.

Finished my bottle of this long ago and was delighted that I took some time out from acquiring new stuff this Christmas and got an old classic. Couldn't be more classic than this. Guy Robert one of my favourite perfumers, my dad wore it yada yada... And not to delve too deep into the composition because to me it's an unassuming powdery, leather scent which in fairness being from 1968 actually predates many of the things you might be able to compare it to, no doubt it supersedes some too. I love the powdered nature of Robert's work with little gems and treats poking out. This has a the mild clove sensation of carnation and while thinking about it a bit longer, Equipage is not a bad comparison, but these are vastly different to those who study the masculine classics and can do a deep dive into what is the same seemingly rehashed accords of leather, wood, musk and herbal elements. The top notes have faded a touch on this vintage but only mildly I still get a citrus, bergamot/lemon but quite muted until it properly builds up and it only takes a minute for the glory to strike. There's a mild greeness too I think there's galbanum in there and a geranium effect created by the powder and also like a version of the peachy chypre notes of Robert's Caleche albeit a much more butch take. It all sits in this lovely leathery range. It's magnificent, starts out great and just gets better, it's not a huge impacting scent or a life changer, but it's a steady pair of hands.

So this one is 'Overtake 320' and at first (despite liking it's themes) I was like ahhhh this is the overly sweet, gourmand, BOMB of the group and it sort of is, but that's not the whole story. The opening is full of that Mugler, caramel sweetness and candy floss I associate with ethyl maltol but here it's not crude, it's actually very carefully done and much better than sickly stuff like Shay & Blue's Salted Caramel for instance. This is because it develops into dry woody accords not dissimilar to the first two of this collection but always gives warm (what is said to be a tonka bean) vibe in this. I suppose it does smell a bit coumarinic and coffee tinged but it doesn't go all vanillin or vanilla heavy or creamy, it maintains distance from it's sweeter potentially cloying elements. It's like one of those 'Sexy' or 'Night' perfumes of the Men's game a few years ago, but less sledgehammer. I say all this having only sprayed it on a test strip, so not the best way to review but I will update if required. Oh don't be fooled by their representation on here (Fragrantica), the bottle shown (gold one) is part of an exclusive special edition version made from a choice of Stainless steel, titanium, and a gold plated ( the one pictured here) three different designs all of which are AMAZING!!! However, they are 3D printed and the technology for metal 3D printing is absolutely cutting edge and as such these incredible flacons cost a whopping $10k each! so unless you have an F1 drivers salary, it's unlikely any mortal 'fraghead' can afford the bloody things. So just to note then that the 'normal' bottles (retail at £195) which are AMAZING too (just not like the pictured one is my point) are also 3D prinnted but from a much more affordable resin material, in a kind of biomech latticework which reminds me of a combination of muscle tissue, HR Geiger artwork or Cronenberg's New flesh, and the roof of that fancy art gallery/museum in Dubai. I want one quite badly they are seriously COOL!!!

Another huge success for this line in the sense that it's Wasser delivering an exquisite fragrance, truly. However, I'm not going to give it a glowing appraisal for a couple of reasons. The main one being that I was expecting patchouli ardent to show us some exciting and dominant take on patchouli, perhaps a little naive of me to think that Guerlain would all of a sudden stray from keeping things friendly and aesthetically, just so. I kinda did though. So I'd say I actually like this one better than one I own from this line, the oud, which to me is fairly uneventful (never bland), but plugs into the whole comforting aspect of why I like a nice, minimal musk fragrance for example, it's unobtrusive and I'm unlikely to get fatigued by it. Patchouli ardent does definitely have an earthy patchouli lean to it in the start of the fragrance but it seems like it's such an amalgam of some of the others in this line, a thread running from the musc and amber right through encens and bois. So really patchouli ardent is a musky, rose fragrance with a kind of heady, airy, incense trail, darkened by a shade of patchouli, mainly manifesting when you first spray it. Like I said it's glorious, lovely, lasts forever & all that stuff but there's just no pleasing some people (me sometimes) and I'd hoped for more patchouli, and something I could gush over and need in my collection. I wanted a hyped up, muscular, Givenchy Gentlemen or Zino Davidoff re-imagined and elevated to the level of this collection not just from a quality standpoint (because frankly it hits that high water mark) but from a creativity point of view too. If you call it patchouli I want to bludgeoned with patchouli in some sense, and this didn't do it. Is it good? Yes it might even be great! Would I buy it? probably not. I will investigate this further because I shouldn't keep writing reviews based on spraying it on my wrist once, and I will concede that you can only get to know a fragrance properly through wearing (multiple times if possible) but also sometimes you have to respect that when someone has tried a lot of perfumes their intuition is pretty good and they can extrapolate out the full experience (not always accurately) but most of the time a fragrances destiny is sealed from that first few hours of trying on skin.

I think this is quite possibly one of the most important fragrances I've tried in a while. Something about wet, realistic florals of the Narcissus, lilac and hyacinth variety which stir me and the combination with strong also quite natural smells of the animalic, indolic or in this case naturally sweet, honey. It's quite a sickly piece of work, I mean the honey is so well realised it starts to go to caramelised, wheaty, grainy, bran like, heaviness and a feeling of beeswax too. Against this you have this wafting, dark floral undercurrent sweeping through the fragrance like the pungency of linden blossom (which I can't say I've ever smelled although it does grow in the UK so perhaps I have?) and apparently it is carried on the breeze for long distances. I get some spice a sort of traditional, sweet, creamy musk and vanilla body, even a mild clove, this is like musc ravageur meets kilian back to black in florists. Yet still there's something edger than those comparisons. My experience of Baruti was the oud fragrance, with no oud in it. A curious hit of oud characteristics, painfully sharp and bitingly resinous, I actually made an oud frgarance myself by combining and balancing all the oud bases I had and stuff which I associate with oud or fake oud. The results were quite similar, a searing stew that I suspect would be popular if released as it has the same beastmode, bro-down qualities of an TF Oud wood or an oud for greatness or Montale So I think Onder de linde is bewildering. Experienced sniffer that I am, I didn't realise what this was and afterwards I sort of staggered out of my first sniffing as if I'd agreed to fight an ageing Mike Tyson, only to discover I didn't want that Iron Mike smoke. So all this complementary stuff I'm saying is about a fragrance I don't think I could ever fancy wearing, but I respect the hell out of the person who does.

Okay so in the opening I actually get quite a lot of sweet, cassis and citrus with a nice, green sort of accord, very fresh and uplifting, I thought it was very striking. Then it dries out in a massive way, with a huge dose of spices but still showing restraint and the Declaration comparisons here start to make a lot of sense, and while the spicing is similar, I'd say a mixture of corriander, caraway/cumin and cardamom, declaration is much pricklier, sweatier and frankly bolder than this fragrance. The drydown of Rance goes to papery iso e super and ionone rather than declaration which seems to hold it's original vibes, much more completely. A little slug of coumarin or something in here gives this a fougere feel for a moment. I liked it initially but it fell a bit flat and not to moan, but it's not very strong or long lasting and ultimately a bit forgettable.

Right so I love Ruth's work and none of it so far lacks depth and layers, Dagian included. However, I don't like it. The opening is fresh, woody but it smells quite a lot like. I get notes of lime, grapefruit and petitgrain/orange blossom but punctuated heavily with green notes and then aquatics. The base is that slimy, melon, spunk, of salty diffuse woods and Calone or such like, marine/aquatic molecule or base. I'm not completely against these sorts of materials and if anyone could get the best out of it, I'd say it would be Ruth but it's a taste thing, some people are really taken with these aromas, I find them nauseating. The fact that the opening of salty, floral citrus greenery is pleasant is enough of a success but an hour or so in and all I can smell is Aquatic AC's. A rare miss in what is an exemplary collection of fragrances.

So Neandertal have two new Perfumes Us & Them, a sample of which they very kindly sent to me prior to the release (Thanks Brooke and Kentaro) however I still hadn't tried anything at all from the brand at that point, and I didn't really know what to expect. If I'm honest I'd been a little put off by the usual suspects and the seeming saturation of Youtube reviews when something new arrives on the scene. No matter, These are truly artistic from composition to brand concept and marketing, I don't want to be suckered in but I am, Neandertal is just cool. None moreso than 'them'. It's perfect. I couldn't ask for more. A beautiful, resplendent, mildly sweet, smooth, fleshy, leather perfume. I've recently taken up leather craft and this reminds me the most of veg tan, natural tooling leather, thick, glorious smelling and a blank canvas of possibility. This is like the best musk perfumes, minimal but little jewels poking out from a silky, mist of loveliness. In this case it's a sort of Iris/orris feel I suppose but unlike any other you've smelled before. The closest for me is Aedes de venustas Iris Nazarena, but in truth they are as different as they are similar. Them has fresh, vibrant top notes, which keep putting in an appearance after you'd think they'd be long gone. Then a sweetness, that orris theme punctuated by complementary carrot seed which I'm not surprised to see in the notes, such a fine use in here. Then you have a mild sea spray, but not salty or aquatic just a breathy, animal suggestion of ambergris. It reminds me of a trendy Scandinavian furniture store where everything is posh, arty, minimal, low slung cubist, buttery leather sofas and the air smells of wood and leather. Guys this is a leather perfume, we can break down the individual aspects and call it orris and carrot and citrus and whatever but its a fiercely modern minimal pebble of a contruction that conveys leather much more realistically and effectively that a hit of IBQ, saffraliene, birch tar or castoreum. This is clever, clever, clever, by a brilliant perfumer that my pal from Edinburgh told me about ages ago....I should've paid more attention to her. So Euan McCall is something of a revelation to me at this point,his other efforts for the brand are great too but THEM just transcends perfume into a special territory of had to have, adoration for me. Beautiful perfume and comes in a frosted, icicle of a flacon, pure art!

So first of all this is not my first Swedoft but I'm posting reviews out of synch, sadly of the two I tried this just so happens to be the one I didn't like. Okay so I bought these on name alone and haven't consulted with the notes, and smelling the sprayer before application, just the remnants, emanating from it smell of cacao to me. I'm expecting a rich, dark amber woody vanilla perhaps? Then upon application the opening has dense, fruity, date and cherry tobacco notes, and somewhat chocolatey but nowhere near to the extent I'd thought from the pre-cum/nozzle sniff. I don't really like it, and as it develops becomes more like TF tobacco vanille, a fragrance I own but truly can't abide anymore. There's something rough about it's honied themes which turns almost sharp, pickled and with a kind of vinegary effect. It's tough. So I'm not a fan, and just judging by these two, Swedoft are throwing a lot at a composition.