Tabac Balzam Rimo Scent

Having tested two other Rimo’s and being quite impressed by them, I decided to give this one a go. The notes seemed interesting enough.

Upon first spray, you’re welcomed by a harsh roasted coffee and a touch of scorched caramel. About 15 minutes in, it slowly reveals soft mandarin like notes. Maybe some creamy vanilla. This is the best part by far, almost worthy of a perfect score.

Alas, it doesn’t last long, maybe an hour or two before mean mister sandalwood turns his head and says hi. He does it very slowly so kudos for the transition but as you’ve guessed, I dislike that note.

So overall it’s okay, too bad about the generic ending. The other two were quite the opposite having a very good climax.

Evening light shines through thousand soft fibers of maple red-golden tobacco colors. It breaks their leaves full of benzoin crystals. Toffee caramels with liquid cores of Siam creams. Darkly iridescent with bitter liqueurs. Candied Cossack coffee beans. Earth fermented into nut-brown port wine. Bark structures in resinous balsam. Embers through a brandy glass by the crackling fireplace. A medicine for wintersouls.
**
Mushtaq Rahim from Pakistan, the perfumer behind Rimo Scent, is self-taught and crafts all his fragrances by hand. “I bring together the ancestral craftsmanship of Pakistan, rich in emotion, intuition, and ritual — and the refined standards of French artisanal excellence. This union gives life to perfumes that are both raw and elegant, timeless and grounded,” he writes on his website.
This fusion is noticeable in “Tabac Balzam.” From the outset, the eponymous tobacco is almost caramelized in form, with a slightly medicinal note reminiscent of benzoin resin. The benzoin-like quality certainly also comes from the dark vanilla, which, together with the creamy sandalwood, evokes distant associations of cream-filled toffees, but with subtle tart and spicy overtones from aniseed, which takes away some of the sweetness of the overall impression and gives it the aromas of a bitter liqueur, which becomes more earthy as it progresses, transitioning into a patchouli liqueur with nutty coffee notes. Oud remains very subtle in the background until the end, contributing at best a slightly woody-resinous depth. This is astonishingly complex and maintains a pleasant balance between bitter and balsamic notes, between creamy and crystalline, sweet and medicinal. A spicy-warm balm for the soul for fall and winter.