Top Notes 
Bergamot
Spearmint
Blackcurrant bud
Citrus notes
Davana
Frankincense
Styrax
Heart Notes 
Jasmine sambac
Osmanthus
Clary sage
Moroccan mint
Vetiver
Base Notes 
Birch
Blond tobacco
Hydrocarboresine
Date
Saffron
NicheOnly
112 Reviews
NicheOnly
2
Uncapitalized potential
It is yet another year where a majority of the new releases have fallen through the floor. The lack of good quality product is reflected in my ratings: 2024's highlights were exclusively flankers and outside of those flankers, the ratings peaked at an 8.0/10. In 2025, the ceiling so far in is 7.5 and the latest from French niche brand Stéphane Humbert Lucas joins that tier. Most products in this tier of rating typically have potential to be more, but the execution isn't fully dialed in and it's no different with The Queen and the Viper.
The latest from SHL opens green-sweet-spicy with the greenness being opposed by a light fruity tinge. The structure is very clearly two separate parts: you have the green-sweet-fruity parts and then you have the fresh spicy & dare I say resinous parts behind it. The comparisons I came up with for the top are the green mango style open of Unique'e Luxury's Mangonifiscent opposed by an aromatic/fresh spicy tobacco like the ones in Ormonde Jayne's 4. Montabaco Intensivo and Boadicea's Knight of Love.
Once you see the notes, it's surprisingly easy to allocate the experience to the listed notes. The Queen and the Viper features a combination of blackcurrant bud and spearmint in the top with the bergamot likely being the sweetening note. The scent has a spiciness from the first moment and retains that spiciness into the dry-down, i.e. you smell the non-smoky incense in the top and as it transitions, you smell some combination of incense and tobacco. Note that these notes are executed in a fresh spicy style, meaning this fragrance isn't anything like vanilla tobaccos, cherry tobaccos, cinnamon tobaccos etc.
And then we arrive at the flaws. The main flaw is the lack of depth: the notes and accords that you're smelling are constant and rather linear. The only development that I sense is some of the top notes fading away, meaning the well executed sweet-green & somewhat fruity open isn't a core part of the DNA. The actual scent itself, outside of the top, is spicy-green-fresh and perhaps woody. That is to say the sensible pyramid includes spearmint, blackcurrant bud, and incense in the top; followed by mint in the heart and blond tobacco in the base. The rest is essentially invisible: no floral tones feature and it doesn't smell of sage either. Another flaw is the performance: my initial sillage impressions are negative as I'm rating it below average and maybe even trending towards weak; longevity is also subpar with implied lasting power in that 5 hour range.
However, The Queen and the Viper also has its positives. The main positive is the uniqueness: given that I've described the scent's structure mainly as mint vs. incense/tobacco, that is a very thin genre in the modern niche market. The fact that I have to comp it to Montabaco/KoL and even fresh spicy masculine scents like Rehab/Spicebomb means there's nothing like it (at least that I've smelled). If I had to describe the scent through a different product, I would say it's a more spring-fall oriented version of Amouage's amber-mint fragrance Enclave. The value is also above average as SHL has now basically become a value house in the modern niche market: €215/50ml is significantly below the €270-305 that Xerjoff is charging for their latest products and also below the €245-255 that Kilian is charging.
All-in-all, I don't want to give off the impression that the product is bad as it clearly isn't. After I wrote my statement, I put it at #1 for my 2025 rankings. As I am writing this review, I am more open to downgrading it due to the overall package not being as impressive as I'd like. Nonetheless, for now it will likely remain there as I don't have any better options to push to the top spot as value, unoriginality and blending continue to doom many of this year's releases. And ironically, it is those 3 aspects where The Queen and the Viper really shines.
The latest from SHL opens green-sweet-spicy with the greenness being opposed by a light fruity tinge. The structure is very clearly two separate parts: you have the green-sweet-fruity parts and then you have the fresh spicy & dare I say resinous parts behind it. The comparisons I came up with for the top are the green mango style open of Unique'e Luxury's Mangonifiscent opposed by an aromatic/fresh spicy tobacco like the ones in Ormonde Jayne's 4. Montabaco Intensivo and Boadicea's Knight of Love.
Once you see the notes, it's surprisingly easy to allocate the experience to the listed notes. The Queen and the Viper features a combination of blackcurrant bud and spearmint in the top with the bergamot likely being the sweetening note. The scent has a spiciness from the first moment and retains that spiciness into the dry-down, i.e. you smell the non-smoky incense in the top and as it transitions, you smell some combination of incense and tobacco. Note that these notes are executed in a fresh spicy style, meaning this fragrance isn't anything like vanilla tobaccos, cherry tobaccos, cinnamon tobaccos etc.
And then we arrive at the flaws. The main flaw is the lack of depth: the notes and accords that you're smelling are constant and rather linear. The only development that I sense is some of the top notes fading away, meaning the well executed sweet-green & somewhat fruity open isn't a core part of the DNA. The actual scent itself, outside of the top, is spicy-green-fresh and perhaps woody. That is to say the sensible pyramid includes spearmint, blackcurrant bud, and incense in the top; followed by mint in the heart and blond tobacco in the base. The rest is essentially invisible: no floral tones feature and it doesn't smell of sage either. Another flaw is the performance: my initial sillage impressions are negative as I'm rating it below average and maybe even trending towards weak; longevity is also subpar with implied lasting power in that 5 hour range.
However, The Queen and the Viper also has its positives. The main positive is the uniqueness: given that I've described the scent's structure mainly as mint vs. incense/tobacco, that is a very thin genre in the modern niche market. The fact that I have to comp it to Montabaco/KoL and even fresh spicy masculine scents like Rehab/Spicebomb means there's nothing like it (at least that I've smelled). If I had to describe the scent through a different product, I would say it's a more spring-fall oriented version of Amouage's amber-mint fragrance Enclave. The value is also above average as SHL has now basically become a value house in the modern niche market: €215/50ml is significantly below the €270-305 that Xerjoff is charging for their latest products and also below the €245-255 that Kilian is charging.
All-in-all, I don't want to give off the impression that the product is bad as it clearly isn't. After I wrote my statement, I put it at #1 for my 2025 rankings. As I am writing this review, I am more open to downgrading it due to the overall package not being as impressive as I'd like. Nonetheless, for now it will likely remain there as I don't have any better options to push to the top spot as value, unoriginality and blending continue to doom many of this year's releases. And ironically, it is those 3 aspects where The Queen and the Viper really shines.
2 Comments
NicheOnly
Jujulalu
Kankuro
Dabu
BlackbirdHH
Jusch1995
ScentExplorer
Madfrat
Montross
DaveGahan101
