Profumo

Who appreciates the on the one hand herb-floral, on the other hand green-grassy violet leaf, will be best served with 'Portrayal Man'. It is absolutely in the center of the fragrance. Vetiver reinforces the fresh and green aspects, while juniper contributes dry spice and woody, as well as leathery nuances determine the base of 'Portrayal Man'.

The fragrance is reminiscent of violet leaf-centered scents such as Geoffrey Beene's 'Grey Flannel' (minus the radiant freshness), Dior's 'Fahrenheit' (minus the petroleum note) and Guerlain's unfortunately discontinued 'Arsène Lupin' (minus the guerlinade), but without achieving their strength of character and sophistication.
Portrayal Man' is a rather linear fragrance that doesn't develop much during the course of the process

Christopher Chong reports that the fragrance can be read as an olfactory portrait of the 1920s, inspired by a time of dramatic social change and people who rebelled against the cultural restrictions of their time. The fragrance is a study about the birth of a new age and the freedoms that came with it.
Well, I'd say: typical marketing swirl that doesn't find any equivalent in the fragrance at all.
Because 'Portrayal Man' really doesn't convey something rebellious, revolutionary, but rather something static, stiff - no 'roaring twenties', rather English Tea-Time-Biedermeier.

Mr. Chong's words also suggest fragrances like Piguets 'Bandit', Molinard's 'Habanita', or Chanel's 'Bois des Îles' or 'Cuir de Russie' - fragrances that reflect hedonism and rebellion against a traditional gender image rather than this new fragrance from Amouage. Even though there is no denying a certain dandyiness: the scent of the violet or violet leaf is also well suited to it: floral-elegant, fresh and green, not at all sweet or even indolent. Oscar Wilde or Marcel Proust might have been the appropriate carriers for a violet soliflor, but they were typical turn-of-the-century plants and not representatives of the twenties.

But sei´s drum.

Despite the cross linking, 'Portrayal Man' is not bad at all. But hardly any more. It is neither modern nor innovative, and on top of that it has hardly any refinement. He doesn't surprise with daring contrasts and manages completely without inner tension - in short, somehow a bore, but not a bad smelling one. It's something...
Only I could have imagined such a fragrance in the catalogue of Penhaligon´s rather than in that of Amouage. I still think of the old Amouage fragrances of oriental opulence: 'Gold', 'Dia' and 'Jubilation'. But already the last creations of the house, 'Imitation', 'Figment' or 'Bracken' had no connection at all with the original scent DNA.
No matter, the house Amouage is just broader, wants to be carried worldwide equally and is just as worldwide a synonym for fragrant luxury. And luxury doesn't always have to be glamorous or even shrill. No, it's also more restrained, with British understatement, so to speak, with 'Portrayal Man' for example.

Durability and radiation (I avoid the word 'Sillage' at all costs, because it always reminds me of silage: stinking silage in agriculture) are typical of Amouage and absolutely flawless.

Conclusion: 'Portrayal Man' should have been a bit more exciting, more courageous, more glamorous, corresponding to the 'dance on the volcano' of the twenties. Here, however, stiff, somewhat old-fashioned elegance prevails.

Quite nice, but not anymore.

There is a video about this fragrance that wants to tell us a story about the creation of 'Music for a while': two older men tell us here how they worked together to create the fragrance. In contrast to the text with which the fragrance is ultimately advertised on the website or cardboard box, this video is actually informative.
The starting point was therefore: we designed a lavender fragrance.
And indeed, the Editions de Parfums portfolio lacks a lavender fragrance. In general, lavender is quite popular again - Tom Ford is kicking out one lavender scent after the other, Chanel has launched the wonderful 'Boy', Bogue the heavily applauded 'Mem' and when you look at it, lavender scents pop up.
Don't mind, I love lavender!
This one is really a special one - a kind of 'Lavender-Fruitychouli'.

But back to Carlos and Frédéric: Lavender should be the center of the fragrance, carried by a base of patchouli, vanilla and labdanum, and introduced by a Hesperid cocktail of mandarin, bergamot and lemon - the roadmap was written
So far, so good, so unfashionable.
So how to breathe modernity into the rather classic scent frame?
Et voilà: the pineapple!
Creed's Aventus sends his regards. And the unbelievable success of this fragrance has probably also amazed the gentlemen of the Editions de Parfums.

Said, done, and the attached pineapple note now stands quite cheekily in the center of 'Music for a while' and competes with the no less cheeky lavender for supremacy.
When I looked at the pyramid of notes of this fragrance more than a year ago, on the occasion of its introduction, it was exactly this pineapple note that kept me from even taking a test. I was so sure that I wouldn't like this new mall.
Far from it.

More out of boredom I tested it now and I have to say: Wow, what an exciting, contrasting and exciting fragrance!
I probably would have liked it even without the pineapple note, but I have to admit that it is she who gives this fragrance that certain something, that special kick. I really didn't think so!
The herbaceous-spicy lavender does not really harmonize with the fruity-sweet pineapple. But somehow it is. Just like you eat strawberries with pepper, or pineapple with fresh mint - supposed disharmonies enliven the whole thing tremendously
So it is here. Through the Anitpodes Pineapple/Lavender, the fragrance indeed gets an inner tension that is fantastic, but also one or the other, or the one or the other might overstrain.
This is also how I explain the fierce defense, which partly opposes this scent, while many find it again quite great. A fragrance that polarizes. Interestingly, however, not because of its supposed animalistic parts, which otherwise let the spirits separate in some scents, no, simply because this inner tension is exhausting, perhaps also too exhausting. The sweetness of the pineapple soothes the herbaceous pungency of the lavender, while this very herbaceous one prevents the fragrance from tipping over into the all-too-sweet, syrup-like one.
So 'Music for a while' is not really a nosefeller, not a gourmand-like lavender dessert to all fogging cashmere dunk and - God sei´s praised - also not a lavender ambroxan booster for Muckibuden-goers.
No, this scent does not flatter and it does not cuddle - it demands.
He demands right at the beginning when his two main notes blossom so incredibly intense. Strangely enough, at first I only smelled pineapple, while the lady in the perfumery thought she was only taking lavender. When she mentioned the lavender, it was - zack - also with me there. What a Janus-faced scent!!

Now I actually smell lavender at first - lavender 'brut' so to speak, really fat and untamed, with all its spicy nuances. Far from the polished elegance and softness of Caron´schen Lavender. But shortly thereafter, the tangy fruity aromas of pineapple penetrate the lavender, which had previously trumped up almost arrogantly.
The already mentioned Hesperides trio plays at best a supporting role, but not an unimportant one, as it forms a kind of clamp between the fiercely antagonistic protagonists in the beginning phase.

Strangely enough, 'Music for a while' reminded me of a completely different scent right after the first spraying on: 'Mitsouko'. Here, too, the contrast between ripe, yellow-fleshed peach on the one hand and bitter-moosy chypre background on the other. In 'Music for a while' it is now the pineapple that challenges the two Fougère actors Lavender and Coumarin (also part of the fragrance!), but also a dominant fruit chord that contrasts a bitter-herb or herbaceous one.
Maybe therefore the classification as Lavender-Fruitychouli is also not quite correct and I should call the fragrance rather a fruity-oriental Fougère. But no matter how man´s turns and turns, the scent remains hard to grasp - just a Janus-faced scent, which you can never look into both pairs of eyes at the same time, no matter how hard you try...

As for the name of the fragrance: yes, it really has music in it. But not the music of Erik Satie, which accompanies the video. Much too harmonious and lulling she splashes along. No, rather music from the sound cosmos of Arnold Schönberg: exciting, atonal and exciting.

The description of the fragrance on the website and on the cardboard: plain chocolates.
With the best will in the world, I don't associate this fragrance with a woman's back whose slipping fur reveals a view of bare shoulders. The two older gentlemen would like that!
No, much more I see here a freshly barbershoped hipster enjoying a pineapple munching - the scent is quite masculine, not to say: very masculine.
Durability and radiation are - and this is really worth mentioning - simply sensational! I once made the mistake of spraying two sprays of 'Music for a while' on top of each other, just as I often do with scents that aren't very persistent. But in this case the effect is devastating. The fragrance has an incredible potency and should therefore be used sparingly. A glance at the bottle also reveals why: it is indeed a 'perfume'. No 'eau de parfum' like 'Musc Ravageur' and no 'eau de toilette' like 'Bigarade Concentrée' - no. It says 'perfume' unmistakably, and I don't think Frédéric Malle is fibbing.
The fact that 'Music for a while' has a very dense texture also goes well with this concentration of scent - the scent is strong and heavy, like a thick carpet. Fortunately, the proportion of fragrance components is manageable, so that the fragrance does not appear overloaded despite all its heaviness and density.

One last word: great!

At first I thought it was a joke, a bad one at that. A somewhat puffed up and old-fashioned cologne scent next to heavyweights like 'Derby' and 'Chamade pour Homme' - same wannabe noble presentation, same indisputable price segment?!
Is Guerlain really serious? 'Arsène Lupin' and 'L'âme d'un hèros' out and 'Le Frenchy' in on this strangely marginal and overpriced series?!
I'm afraid so, they're serious.
And after testing it several times, I have to admit it's okay.
Not that the two fragrances mentioned have disappeared is ok, not even the ugly wood-frame flacon, certainly not the 212 € that is demanded for it - all that is not ok.
But the scent is good, very good!

Le Frenchy' is now already the third guerlain´sche infusion in 'Verveine' (Verbena). First Aimé Guerlain, then Jean-Paul Guerlain and now Thierry Wasser. Which parts of the old formulas have flowed into the new, I cannot judge, I do not know the old fragrances. The notes that characterise them suggest, however, that they must have been typical cologne scents with volatile citrus components, in this case mainly lemon verbena.
And since the lemon verbena has this peculiarly pungent, herbaceous, almost metallic aftertaste (or smell), these old colognes, like so many other fragrances in which verbena is part of the part, must have been influenced by this typical Odeur. Lemon verbena is often found in old men's fragrances, especially those of the post-war period: in 'Moustache' by Rochas, for example, or in 'Monsieur de Givenchy' and Chanel's 'Pour Monsieur'.
In 'Le Frenchy' she celebrates a comeback so to speak - but of course not alone.

Basically, there are two fragrance concepts that merge here in a very successful way: the well-known and ancient concept of a classic cologne, and the comparatively young concept of an aromatic Fougères, because apart from the verbena mentioned above, it is above all lavender, tonka and sage that shape the fragrance.
All in all, a wonderful blend of a typical 70s Fougère à la 'Azzaro pour Homme' and the 50s verbena classic 'Monsieur de Givenchy' is created.
A very powdery lavender-coumarin chord lies like mildew over the bitter metallic bitterness of verbena and bergamot, and over the aromatic sage in the heart of the fragrance.
This all-encompassing and flattering powderiness on the one hand and the bitter aromas on the other hand form the tension arc in which the fragrance develops. It doesn't develop very dramatically - the powderiness remains, but it gets warmer and warmer in the base and tends towards classic Fougère, with green-mossy accents.
In this last phase 'Le Frenchy' reminds me again and again of the old aftershave bars 'Sir Irish Moos' and 'Brut' from Fabergé. And in fact 'Le Frenchy' has a certain aftershave feeling, but - and this has to be left to the scent - in a kind of 'de luxe' variant.
But if you think 'Le Frenchy' is a hopelessly old-fashioned scent with all the backwards looking references, you are wrong about my feeling. Le Frenchy' is as old-fashioned as 'Boy' by Chanel or 'Invasion Barbare' by MDCI, namely not at all. Of course he has a certain nostalgia factor and he wants to have it, but Fougères, respectively Barbershop fragrances are just 'in' again and so one tries everywhere to imprint a more modern stamp on the 'new' Fougères despite all nostalgia.
So Tom Ford, who was leading the way in 70's Fougère revival - 'Rive Gauche pour Homme' - just threw 3 new Fougères on the market again (unfortunately you have to call it that, because 'introduction', especially when so inflationary, can hardly be talked about anymore).
Guerlain is content with a single new Fougère, unfortunately all too hidden in that strangely hybrid 'Les Parisiens' series, which hardly any buyer will ever stumble over, as it is rarely and if ever presented, then mostly quite carelessly.

However, there is a small gap in the Guerlain catalogue. A gap that Guerlain had not been willing to close so far, as it was not even perceived as a gap. Jean-Paul Guerlain once said in his inimitable ignorance: 'Jicky' and 'Mouchoir de Monsieur' were the only Fougères who counted, the rest were for truck drivers.
It's a good thing they said goodbye to such snobbery.

After wearing it several times I have to say that 'Le Frenchy' is contrary to my first suspicion a scent with flesh and bone - it has substance.
Besides 'Derby' and 'Chamade pour Homme', it's not to be underestimated, and in terms of durability and perceptibility it's certainly not a lightweight, but also not a loudspeaker.
It is characterized more by understatement, with simultaneous presence.

Yes, I admit: a great fragrance, I like!
However, in order to come to this conclusion, I had to make a 180 degree turnaround....
Sei´s drum.
To err is human as we know.

It's hard to believe that almost 20 years have passed since the launch of Musc Ravageur!
Luca Turin's verdict: '.... i shared 'more flashy than good' absolutely back then, and I remember feeling the scent as loud, bold and banal - a slightly too sweet musk-centered work in the mainstream vanilla garb.

What a mistake!

Basically, I wasn't that wrong, but I hadn't bothered to let MR work on me in peace.
MR wasn't flashy, I was. Once sniffed at it and - zap - made a judgement. MR is a scent which, like hardly any other, should be tested slowly and above all several times in order to be able to judge it appropriately.
MR is a true scent chameleon: one time you think you recognize an oriental scent dominated by musk and vanilla, while another time it turns out to be a classic fougère, with herbaceous lavender notes in the head and heart, and a powdery-animal base.
Interestingly enough, he is also perceived just as unevenly - and after almost 20 years many people have really spoken about him in the various forums!
From the ultra-feminine, sweet gourmand Oriental, completely unwearable for the male sex, to the testosterone-laden Mocho-Fougère, this time absolutely not recommended to the ladies. Very, very many sometimes absurdly contradicting judgments can be found among all these comments.
But many, and I belong to this group now, do not share these extreme positions. The scent is not one or the other, it is both.

With MR it's a bit like back then with 'Mary & Gordy': at the end of one of their shows they put off the fumble and the wigs to Frank Sinatra's 'My Way', pulled the fake eyelashes off their eyelids, wiped the make-up off their cheeks and stood in front of their audience at the last bars recognizable as what they actually were: as men. Of course everyone knew from the beginning that the two were travesty artists, but they were so perfect that one somehow forgot. But now, at the end of the show, it was still surprising that it was these guys who did all the fancy work.
A basenoter wrote about MR: '... a sexual dragqueen of frag.'

The scent is just like a striptease - from vamp to guy.
And just as all the glitter camouflages the male core, so initially a sweet-sour, slightly bitter tangerine-bergamot chord camouflages, in the wake of a warm blossoming clove and cinnamon-spicy vanilla sweetness in the heart, the actual aromatic-herbal lavender core on quite hearty animal base (although, it is not so hearty, but later on...).
A transformation from 'Shalimar' to 'Kouros', so to speak, where MR has neither the opulence of one fragrance nor the skingout of the other.
No, MR doesn't look so busty by a long shot, but he also shows off his guts with less legs apart, is slimmer, androgynous - and yet both fragrances are somehow godfathers.

The animal base at all! It is judged as differently as the whole fragrance: from unbearable and unacceptable, to addictive and extremely erotic.
For lovers of 'White-Musc'- and 'Clean-Musc'- scents, of clean scents at all, it might not be tolerable at all. But if you appreciate fragrances with a considerable proportion of civet and/or animalis (a perfume base of various animal secretions), don't faint at 'Kouros', find Dior's 'Leather Oud' wearable and also Bogue's fragrances, you won't have a problem with MR at all.
I find this animal side extremely stimulating (not to say: exciting!) and very sexy!

I can think of two more scents that I loosely associate with MR. One is Alyssa Ashley's 'Musk' from the 60s and the other is good ole 'Jicky'.
Musk' was a quite popular fragrance during my school days in the 70s, one of the many hippie musk scents of the time. Compared to MR, however, it is much more boring and above all harmless, not 'ravageur', i.e.: stunning, devastating, destructive.... Nothing like that is Alyssa Ashley's 'Musk', and yet MR reminds me of this scent every now and then, and makes me somehow nostalgic.

Jicky', on the other hand, is a similar scent chameleon - just as difficult to decipher, whether 'pour homme' or 'pour femme', whether Fougère or already somehow Orientale, but exactly this mask play, this vagueness, this elusiveness from the location, that's what I really appreciate about 'Jicky', but also about MR.
With 'Jicky' MR connects another parallel: both are slim scents, which build on a few chords - rather minimalistic scents with maximum effect
Speaking of maximum effect: MR lasts on me incredibly long. I don't think I've ever experienced a scent like this before. Even 2 days later I can still feel it on my skin, and that - unlike Bogue's 'Mem' - is not unpleasant at all, quite the opposite. If 'Mem' is somehow penetrating and killing, MR remains steadfast to one's side, but just 'to one's side', without burying the carrier (olfactory).

Luca Turin's verdict I have to vary: '....not flashy, really good!'
Five stars *

Wow, this fragrance is a real firecracker: full-bodied, polyphonic, persistent and of heavy texture, not to say bold.

Years ago, when fragrances that I cheered for couldn't be loud and opulent enough, 'Mem' would have totally thrilled me. But since then my preferences have changed a bit and I prefer slimmer, generally more subtle fragrances. But 'Mem' is exactly the opposite. Such an enormously orchestrated fragrance has not come under my nose for a long time. Dozens of chords buzz loudly in confusion, drowned out by a booming triad of lavender, honey and animal essences.
But, and I really have to stress this: despite all cacophony and overweight: 'Mem' smells good, damn good.
But you have to like scents like 'Jicky', 'Miel de Bois' and 'Kouros'. Polarizing fragrances, mainly due to their animal exhalations, which reliably evoke associations of toilet blocks or full baby diapers. But the animal side of 'Mem' is, in my opinion, very civilized, especially compared to scents like 'Leather Oud' or 'Figment Man'. Probably it is however for many, for very many even, already no longer tolerable. Especially since the honey chord, which develops relatively little sweetness, lends this animal haze a certain sultriness, which with greater intensity would certainly be breathing. But this way, artfully calibrated, I don't only feel it as just bearable, but also as decidedly erotic.

While the highly praised predecessor fragrance 'Maai' was an attempt to revive the great animalic chypres of the past in a new interpretation, 'Mem' is an attempt to provide a worthy successor to the old Fougère battle horses such as 'Jicky', 'Pour un Homme de Caron', 'Zizanie', 'Brut' and 'Kouros'. And yes, this attempt was successful. With its many references to the past, 'Mem' is a retro fragrance 'par excellence'. However, one who is not content to be a well-made revenant of a well-known legend, but one who develops his own character, a modern face. But to call it, as some do, a modern fragrance, I wouldn't go that far. Too clearly 'Jicky' (lavender vanilla confection), 'Miel de Bois' (unsweet, woody aromatic honey) and 'Kouros' (the almost excessive use of the base 'Animalis') were the inspiration.

All in all a very successful fragrance, but for my feeling a bit 'over the top'. Too much of a good thing in many ways. I wanted it to be smaller, more discreet, and yes, also less long-lasting. Sprayed in the morning, the fragrance is still perceptible in the evening in such an intensity that you want to exclaim exhausted: Off, end, it's enough!
But 'Mem' does not release the wearer, no matter how homoeopathically he dosed the scent, but slowly but surely wrestles him down.

Conclusion: great, but less really would have been more.