Floyd

Through hoarfrost mist of cool crystals. Spicy sparks of cinnamon barks. They burn through yellowed memories of citrus grasses in photographs. Through skin of warm sandalwoods. The mulchy bast of resinous creams. Golden fibers in cambiums. The sapwood as soft as puppy balms. Silky shimmers of sweet jasmines. Henna bush prayer flags made of dried fruits. In honey colors. Macis, bitter caramel cloves. Are dream bubbles over fluffy soft tracks. Suede traces in soft clay liqueurs. Fine weaves of white glue blow on the wooden veins of Indian earths. Veils of delicate smoke inward leadin'. To Vrindavan.
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When you see Ray Cappo, singer of bands such as Shelter and Youth of Today, the flagship of the 1980s straight edge movement, on stage, you marvel at how someone can still be so full of energy after more than 40 years of hardcore. And you notice that spirituality is very important to him. So it's no surprise to learn that he asked NOAM to create a fragrance that contains sandalwood and Indian oud oils for meditation.
New Oceans And Meridians (N.O.A.M. Botanical Perfumes), the olfactory space-time travel agency from Switzerland, uses only high-quality natural raw materials for its complex compositions, maintains personal contact with small distilleries, traders, and manufacturers, and was therefore exactly the right choice for such a request. Long-standing connections to India for the multi-layered Mysore, an artisan distillation, Manipur oud, and five-year-aged henna attar from Kannauj, among other ingredients, were used for the composition.
The journey into an inner India begins with cool, green, camphor-like mist (vetiver, ginger, cardamom, bay leaf, lavender) and pungent spices (cinnamon, clove) on citrusy-woody Australian spicatum sandalwood, which soon gives way to the deep, creamy-soft, characterful aromas of Mysore sandalwood, whose multifaceted nature is brought out and emphasized by many of the other ingredients: There are silky jasmine blossoms, sweet champaka, lovely henna blossom, and spicy, caramel-like mace, in which the clove from the top note still echoes. As it develops, it becomes smoky, woody, and earthy (nagarmotha, Java vetiver, Manipur oud), with wisps of smoke drifting over clay-like earth, where delicate, glue-like strands of sandalwood resin also waft. In my opinion, Indian wood could hardly be better staged for a journey inward.

The light of a late summer evening. Everything flows together in slow motion. Curdled whey on the calves' lips within. Soon silky and iridescent like blossoms shimmering. Roots of white chocolate leaves upward flowing, soon warmer and softer vanilla trails of ambergris. The down on the backs of young cloven-hoofed animals. Becomes spicy tobacco, the skin beneath, tanned by time into velvety leathers. Chestnut-brown maduro leaves with crystals of muscovado sugars, decaying into resins of Guinean woods. Withered into mulch and earth soon again.
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The relatively young Pinoy Sirun brand produces natural fragrances, mostly based on musk, oud, ambergris, civet, and flowers, which are handmade and mainly produced in small batches. As is often the case with small artisan brands of this kind, this is probably due to the prices and availability of rare and high-quality raw materials.
The materials for “Purple Tabac Chypre Ghalia” seemed particularly rare, as only four bottles were produced. The result is astonishingly warm, round, deep, and multi-layered. For a few fleeting moments, there are initially slightly cheesy barnyard aromas, presumably from the Sri Lankan oud in the base, which are quickly replaced by the earthy, brightly shimmering iris root. The iris blossoms, in turn, show their lovely side, with hints of white chocolate, and soon blur into a warm, animalic accord of Tibetan and Tonkin musk and vanilla-tobacco-like ambergris, which soon reveal various nuances of spicy-dark, complex, and slightly sweet tobacco varieties. The Papua oud is warm and woody in the base, while the Sri Lankan oud is earthy, spicy, and resinous-sweet, so that the tobacco gradually fades into a lovely earthy and mulchy-spicy finish. A special gem in the truest sense of the word.

(With thanks to Smellspezial)

Let no will-o'-the-wisp deceive you. Don't let the fireflies bite you. Let no ghost find you amid all the flickering warmth of almond marzipans. You are inside spicy gingerbread cookies, in swathes of nutmeg-silver mists and cloves in rough shells of drying mandarins. Eyes shine in bitter liqueurs made from tart herbs, barks and berries, becoming more misty and glassy. A coal fire in the fireplace made of a yule-clog of firs, sung about as it glows. A crackling like of darker walnuts and bitter myrrh resin sparks. And the bird of dawn sings through the night into the freezing morning. Thats how it was like for Washington Irving.
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Barnaby Black's fragrances have always been 100% natural, with moderate longevity and projection, and in the early years they were subject to seasonal fluctuations: “Our fragrances are not romantic notions of a time & place, they are the places we harvest them from,” the website stated. While in the beginning they were pictures of the places where Mathew Sabatino collected the raw materials, including soil, to distill them exactly as they were, more recently it is precisely those “romantic notions of time and place” that he addresses in his creations in the ‘Marsten & Marwood Collection’, fragrances that are more refined and transparent and also seem more complex to me.
“Old Christmas” captures the spirit of ancient Christmas celebrations, as described by Washington Irving in his book of the same name. First, there are almond aromas, warm, almost like marzipan, which, together with the tart spices, suggest the association with gingerbread cookies, before nutmeg veils the impression with a sharp silvery note, and hot cloves and mandarin peel pave the way for the alcoholic bitter drink, which is traditionally made from bark, citrus fruits, berries and herbs. The various woods, red currants, nutmeg, mandarin, and cloves all underscore this alcoholic drink, which was traditionally drunk while ceremoniously burning the Yule clog, a block of wood or roots, in the fireplace. It is the pine tar, together with the bitter myrrh, that conveys the impression of a smoldering fire, leaving a long silent silver veil in its wake with the bitter spices.

(With thanks to TheBladi11)

There's an inner space. Where an incandescent lime bulb hums. Light swirls around it like vortex mists, crackling dusts, smokes and houseflies. In the gray concrete there are no windows. Where the pale veils finally condense. They flow upward in time-lapse drops. They shimmer invisibly like gaseous petrol and fall like needles from a thin fir. It seems familiar, but you're a stranger there. A Bakelite telephone starts to whisper. You gradually dive into the receiver. You look through artificial fabrics that carry you like silk-dull shirts through the world outside that silvery sceens.
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Gatsby Yeh from Seattle has been running his small label Nose of Gatsby since 2023. He strives to offer his audience the widest possible variety of fragrances. He has taught himself a good part of his skills.
According to his Instagram video about the fragrance, “Eau de Lynch” is inspired by David Lynch's films and Yeh's memories of his time working in a movie theater, the plastic smell of the warming film projector, plus cool static electricity and damp concrete. He also describes the opening as like opening a car door at a gas station near a coniferous forest in the coolness of the American Northwest. You can watch the entire clip at the link below.
My first association with the top note was a buzzing bright light bulb emitting a cool lime light, both watery and dusty, condensing on a concrete wall. There's also a strange kind of synthetic smoke. Gasoline (more like vapor) and fir trees (more like withered needles) appear very subtly underneath, veiled by plastic bags. That sounds more abstract than it is, as the overall impression is more of a very wearable, synthetically fresh fragrance, which, however, leans more toward a subtle “arty-ficial” scent than a harsh, artificial mainstream fragrance. Nevertheless, there would be more to the subject, I'm a little lost. I get homesick for nature.

https://www.instagram.com/reels/DSc2I2BkUZs/

(With thanks to BeJot)

In a moment when the spirit begins to crackle in the pure presence of clarity. When the forest exudes its breath like liturgical incense. In the morning. Like soft needles on your skin. Tart and so familiar is this. Branches of pine trees reflected in the surface of a cool mountain lakes. The dew gradually withering from the lichens on the bark of the fir trees in the distance. In a place where you will root yourself with damp earths. Where you encounter nature as a revealing appearance. You feel the epiphany of those moments.
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The Lithuanian House Unda Prisca sees itself as an interactive place for the art of fragrance and sensory exploration. Among other things, it houses an "Aromateka", an impressive collection of rare natural aromatic materials. This is where Laimė Kiškūnė creates her 100% natural fragrances: "The art of blending scents is my meditation — my daily yoga that replaces all other spiritual practices. When I mix aromas, I can reach the deepest concentration, quiet the noise of my thoughts, pause the constant stream of the mind, and silence it, at least in part," she writes on her website.
This meditative spirit is evident in her creations, which are multi-layered, transparent, finely interwoven bouquets. Fragrances that definitely deserve more attention.
“Unda Secunda - Incense” begins with a sparkling coolness and brightness, featuring tart, fresh bergamot on a base of incense that—rather typical of sacred varieties—carries aromas of gum arabic, which, supported by pine needles and fir, are more reminiscent of a forest chapel than a secular church. This has a deeply calming and clarifying effect. Gradually, dry lichen, tart green vetiver, and wet earth become noticeable, but remain embedded in the delicate incense note until the end. A tranquil image of nature. Moderate to intimate, projecting a few quiet hours.

(With thanks to BeJot)