Opus XI Amouage 2018

This one is fun. Opens dry, herbal, and green with a lifting, effervescent quality that gets louder and louder for 20 minutes. A very bitter, pungent marjoram is the star of the show for quite some time. The oud is immediately apparent, but it's very obviously not a real oud: no barnyard funk, no real resins, no deep woodiness. I think this is where the "fake news" dynamic is most apparent--it's oud, but it's clearly synthetic oud. Instead of the real thing, I'm met with some of the more strident top notes found in Cambodian oud; namely, an astringent, medicinal, almost gasoline accord. Probably sounds weird, but this is the best part of the fragrance.

A few hours later, it dries down into a cheesy, "dirty socks" note that, while not repulsive, is also not especially wearable.

Opus XI is one of those scents that I love to smell, but I wouldn't want to smell like. Christopher Chong was a wild man back in the day. Good stuff.

After wearing it a few times, Opus XI seemed so familiar...and yes, yes, I have already smelled it somewhere!
Testing it in parallel with Abdul Samad Al Qurashi Aoud Fawah (Fragrant Oud oil): they're definitely related. Opus XI is a different type of leather (drier) and a different type of oud (cleaner), like a sharper-dressed, citadine relative of a much more expansive Aoud Fawah with its animalistic oud and fresh, warm leather.
This type of oud always awakens an adventurous side (if not in deed, at least in mind): I daydream of horse riders arriving at the edge of an ancient forest (Rohirrim at the edge of Entwood), or cowboys and the conquest of the Wild West...And if the wilder Aoud Fawah by Qurashi is what Indiana Jones would wear (- but it is unisex to my nose, and if you fancy yourself a female Indiana Jones you could definitely pull it off) the more polished Opus XI is for a Mughal princess on a falcon hunt. In a nutshell - if you're up for an adventure while being dressed to the nines, Opus XI will be your best companion!