Goo's Reviews

Gourmands

Delicious and nutritious.

"Wet and in the bottle: woah cloves and allspice. Smacks you in the gd face. Kind of nutmegy that vague licorice quality it has. It's giving older perfume, rich and spiced but almost medicinal. I was really into this.

Wet and just applied to skin: Tart hyper realistic stewed green apple cuts through the heavy dense spices. I'd seen some reviews of this one, all glowingly positive, but many folks said it was a candy type apple and that is not my experience. I used to make homemade apple sauce by cooking down a variety of apples real long and it smells like that.

Dried down on skin: Literal true to life apple crumble. Not pie, but crumble. There's a sense of oatiness rather than buttery crust. Sticky, deep, spiced. You can smell that goo that apple crumble develops from the pectin and sugars. Incredible stuff. And the zingy spices keep it from going too foody even though it is a very accurate smell. I think sometimes gourmands have a sense of hyper reality where they smell more like the thing than the thing and it can be a bit unsettling. This doesn't do that at all. Again, surprisingly dry without the marshmallow, I'd suspect. Which I think is cool!

Final thoughts:

"Wet and in the bottle: Very interesting, a sense of bakedness, a dry deep sweetness, slight nuttiness that kind of bolsters the bakedness.

Wet and just applied to skin: Deep and rich and buttery with something reading a little tiny bit zingy, perhaps the maple syrup.

Dried down on skin: it blossoms as it warms into a delicious photo realistic sweet potato pie with buttery flaky crust. You can smell the orange flesh all blended with cream and spices and sugar. The nuts are boosting the buttery crust. It's surprisingly dry until the marshmallow comes in which makes it seem much more real.

Final thoughts: I do think lover might've slapped though and will put it on next year's list.

Does it Vampire Blood? (This is the part where I admit I layer everything with BBW's Vampire Blood bc I'm obsessed. This section of my reviews will denote if it can be layered with VB) It can but I much prefer it without. In fact I've been cheating on VB with a new spray from BBW called pumpkin caramel swirl. It's bomb with this."

"Wet and in the bottle: Doughy and sweet. I was a bit afraid honestly as sometimes raw dough type frags make me feel weird.

Wet and just applied to skin: Blooms into brioche. Rich, moist brioche. The coconut is working to only add fattiness to me. I don't detect it fully as its own thing. You can actually feel the crunch of the sugar crystals. A gorgeous slice of brioche covefed in those huge sugars.

Dried down on skin: It deepens here in a way that's difficult to explain and I attribute it to the moss and such. A masterful blend so that it doesn't do that hyperreal food thing I mentioned earlier. I wish I could explain it better but it's maybe slightly herbaceous, slightly green. Just fully enmeshed with the brioche in a way that doesn't give "I dropped my bread in a puddle" but maybe rather "I ate my bread outside". On a second test, this phase is spicy and deeply warm. The herbaceousness swirls with the spices to read as like an upscale dessert.

Final thoughts: Very cozy and interesting. Hard to layer with, though. I think unfortunately i was so blown away by my other frags that this one didn't grasp me the way it has some other folks even though I do love it.

Does it Vampire Blood? (This is the part where I admit I layer everything with BBW's Vampire Blood bc I'm obsessed. This section of my reviews will denote if it can be layered with VB) I love it with VB! I feel like they come together to make some not yet made bath and body works scent that the girlies on the sub would go wild for. In the best way possible. It's giving spiced, buttery cotton candy and jasmine."

"Wet and in the bottle: Delightfully fruity, juicy, fizzy berries. A candied strawberry sensation.

Wet and just applied to skin: Blossoms into something I can't quite pin down. This sounds gnarly but it's giving macerated strawberries you left alone in the fridge a bit until they fermented slightly and became kind of fizzy. I did this once and it was so delicious I felt feral. It smells like this. Just like this.

Dried down on skin: Shortbread starts to peak its head, I imagine this is the pocky and cake elements. It's a pretty vague toasty flour scent. It feels like it's mostly keeping the frag from floating away. Rounds it out, reels it in. Can feel the grit of undesolved strawberry sugar in my teeth. It morphs now though and becomes a photo realistic sprite. It rests here for awhile. This frag is strong and long lasting. After about 2 hours of sprite the strawberry returns, but the sprite doesn't leave. I'm unsure how Milky got the fizziness to stay around. Usually it's outta there quickly. Even in Alien, for example, the sense of carbonation leaves but not here.

Final thoughts: Lasts 8 hours on skin 5/5 blown away.

Does it Vampire Blood? (This is the part where I admit I layer everything with BBW's Vampire Blood bc I'm obsessed. This section of my reviews will denote if it can be layered with VB) YES! My new fave thing to wear with VB. It feels like a cousin of sorts and they both play off of and help each other. I'm obsessed. Someone was looking for something like VB in frag form and I think this is super close minus the Jasmine and plus its own fizziness and citrus elements."

"Wet and in the bottle: Milky honeydew melon. I love honeydew. I loved Alien Lover in part bc it settles to somehow make a realistic honeydew to me. So to get a real honeydew note from LM felt full circle. There's a slight sense of smokiness, like an extinguished candle but you have to fish for it.

Wet and just applied to skin: Honeydew and cotton candy and a milky nuttiness. This amazing fireworks note really comes out on the skin and is so amazing. A small whiff of gunpowder and fire that creates a bizarre and addictive sensation of warmth. Reminds me a bit of PULP's Bedsheet Ghost in that way. It feels the liquid itself is warm.

Dried down on skin: That firework note gets both stronger and more mellow as it swirls into a sweet green seeming musk. I swear I get something like a matcha latte but I think there's just a pool of chartreuse here and my brain is filling it in. Small sense of savoriness, like that sweetened soy sauce they put on dango sometimes. It's deep and rich but feels airy at the same time. Difficult to explain but very familiar. I'm so addicted to the fireworks and melon together.

Final thoughts: Lasts 6 hours on skin 5/5 I'm so completely obsessed.

Does it Vampire Blood? (This is the part where I admit I layer everything with BBW's Vampire Blood bc I'm obsessed. This section of my reviews will denote if it can be layered with VB) Yes! But I think I like it better with something more rich to bring those aspects out. The VB amps the melon which is fun but it steals some of the complexity. Great with Lord of Misrule, though!"

Sweet But Not (Really) Gourmand

These are sweet and often perfumey. Or almost gourmand but not resembling real foods.

"Wet and in the bottle: Out the gate, I smelled fog machine liquid and was so excited I was squealing. I love that weird mapley, warm, almost dusty smell of fog machine liquid in its fog form. It's just like that. Later, I realized that laundry straight from the dryer also smells like this, but to my brain it's fog machine all the way down. Either way it is photorealistic.

Wet and just applied to skin: Starts as pure fog machine, but with some flickers of a soft plasticey or makeupey/lipsticky smell. Like black lipstick you get at the Spirit Halloween. Very much haunted house smells. And then it happened - the honey musk revealed the Art Stuff honeybear scent but maybe more mature and with a backdrop of delightfully halloweeney friends.

Dried down on skin: Very gradually gets less fog machine. Takes about 2 hours to settle into just the honey musk/art stuff honey bear scent with the same whispers of cake makeup/plastic/acrylic paint. It is so hard to describe but it's like musky cartoon honey. Photo realistic honey scents smell like raisins to me, so I tend to like a more fantasy honey note, and that's absolutely this. Probably because of the candy addition I'd guess. It smells like the perfume oil itself should be warm. It is very perfumey at this point (from the musk), light and sweet and beautiful, super wearable for anyone. I also feel like I get a rich fruit sometimes, like a sticky raspberry or pomegranate but it's really just holding the sweetness down.

Final thoughts: 10/10 One of my most favorite recent purchases. Everything I wanted from it. Highly recommend if you're into clothes from the dryer or fog machines.

"Wet and in the bottle: Just rose. In fact, I was a little scared when I sniffed it in its vial because, while I like rose, I tend to prefer a softer rose backed by lots of sweetness or spiciness. And in the bottle it's literally just rose, nothing else. A very pure, clean, realistic rose.

Wet and just applied to skin: Here it opens up a lot. All of the notes are very well blended to create something jammy. It's spicy, it's a little smoky like a pinch of smoked salt, it's the tiniest bit powdery, and very sweet. It reminds me a bit of Lush's Rose Jam, but with more depth and a better blended rose.

Dried down on skin: It dries down into an interesting warm, tangy, flourmand situation. Really smells like a fancy rose gummy, like rich person candy, or warm, spiced rose jam.

Final thoughts: 8/10. I really dug it, way more than I expected to, but I do wish the smokeyness was amped just a bit. I really like mixing it with something with patchouli or incense, I feel like it really gets it to the smokey spicey space I want it. I can see myself reaching for it when I'm in a fancy mood.

"Wet and in the bottle: Predominantly Cola! I was so excited to sniff this in the bottle and get welcomed by pure cola. It smelled like sticking your face near a glass of fizzing coke. Very realistic, so fun! There's a tiny hint of the leather just at the end of the sniff, like maybe you're drinking coke in a tack room.

Wet and just applied to skin: Here it remains fizzy cola, bright and sparkling. All the lovely herbal aspects we've come to expect from cola. The marshmallow helps to temper the leather which helps to round out the cola, making it sort of clean smelling. Papery, almost. So interesting, makes you wanna sniff it forever.

Dried down on skin: Something fascinating happens here, where I swear it has recreated a coke going flat. As it dries, and for about an hour after that, the aldehydes die down, giving the impression of smelling a cola as it flattens. As the cola flattens, the other notes get amped and it strangely creates a photorealistic honeydew. I love honeydew and found this delightful. It's sweetened by the marshmallow and deepened by the leather. But, to me, it's just a well built, complex honeydew. Definitely fitting for an Alien lover!

Final thoughts: 9/10 I don't see myself wearing this like all the time, but I wore it for a week straight when I first got it and I'm so excited to have the mood strike me again. A fantastically weird fragrance that still retains wearability.

"Wet and in the bottle: Very strong, tangy wood, to me it reads like cedar. Reminds me of my parents cedar closet in the attic. I suspect it's the sandalwood. It's very very strong, you get a sense of a sweetness but it's very overpowering in this form.

Wet and just applied to skin: The intense woody tang remains, but a lactonic, no an oaty sweetness starts creeping up more and more the drier it gets. A noticable musk is peeking out here as well.

Dried down on skin: Now the frag has arrived where it should be, it's creamy and woody and sweet. The cedarey sensation remains but it's swirled into steamed, sweetened vanilla oatmilk. Like a wood latte. Feels like something they sell at dryad cafes. The musk grows with wear. I don't get a "cashmere" note that you usually find in scents that mention that. It feels more like a soft, plush musk, something there to keep it from being just gourmand, because strangely the cedar feels kind of herbal like those flower lattes. Comes a long way from the very non gourmand WOOD opening to where it reads like wood, but wood you can eat.

Final thoughts: I'm actually deeply obsessed with this fragrance. I really really love it, even the intense opening of it. This gave me a sort of paradigm shift, where I realized all my recent faves have been perfumey gourmands and not the realistic gourmands I once thought I preferred. Fantastically imaginitive frag, I certainly would've never thought of it.

Does it Vampire Blood? (This is the part where I admit I layer everything with BBW's Vampire Blood bc I'm obsessed. This section of my reviews will denote if it can be layered with VB)I did layer it, and it was fine. They both kind of exist at the same time but don't really create something together. But they don't clash, which is great news because you know me and my VB. "

"Wet and in the bottle: Dirty coffee, a bit of sweetness. Honestly not all that appealing in the bottle.

Wet and just applied to skin: Warm, delicious toasty coffee sweetened with damara sugar. Musk and something slightly salty make it read caramelled and also ground it. Amazing, almost smokey coffee gourmand here.

Dried down on skin: Becomes a spicy, salty coffee slush of sorts. So roasty toasty, but in a way that's super wearable. Doesn't smell like you just walked out of a coffee shop but rather than you ooze coffee, and it gets stuck in the threads of your lightly perfumed (choco musk perhaps) flannel. Smells like curling up to see the stars with a fancy starbucks coffee, the ones with the crunchy caramel bits on the top. So musky and addictive.

Final thoughts: Actually one of my new favorite frags, which is highly unfortunate because I have about half a slonk and don't feel comfortable ever ordering direct from S92. Will be looking for a fullsize in the swaps. I'm soso on coffee scents, I like them in theory but I think they're either very short lived or not gourmand enough for me, instead becoming a kind of interesting earthy note. But here it's all coffee ice cream type coffee but made round and full by some classical perfumey additions.

"Wet and in the bottle: Very verbena-ey to me. That kind of smooth, almost creamy greenness. Touch of sunscreeney coconut, lots of sweetness. Reads like a fancy slushy summer drink.

Wet and just applied to skin: Much sweeter, coconut imparts a nice kind of nuttiness, very much like Coconut Lime Verbena from bath and body works, which I'm a fan of. Definitely has the sunscreen quality about it. I swear at the end of the sniff, it's exactly like fresh saltwater taffy. That kind of slight saltiness, nondairy creaminess. It reminds me of the blue ones in particular, which I think were blueberry but had a slight herbal quality about them. All of this comes together to really complete the "fancy, slurry summer drink" feeling.

Dried down on skin: This scent is pretty linear for its notes, it doesn't change much to me from the wet on skin phase. Maybe that taffy at the end becomes more the forefront. Not as coconuttey a drydown as I was hoping for.

Final thoughts: I like it, but I'm not a huge summer frag person these days. I think they tend to smell kind of samey to me unless they're doing something very specific. But it's very nice, very wearable, definitely sniffed myself a lot. I feel like it's missing something I'm wanting though, maybe just more coconut, or maybe it smelling like coconut lime verbena makes me want a limey note from it.

Does it Vampire Blood? (This is the part where I admit I layer everything with BBW's Vampire Blood bc I'm obsessed. This section of my reviews will denote if it can be layered with VB) Yes! I love this combo bc VB reads very cotton candy to me, and I didn't really detect cotton candy in this frag, more just a general sweetness, and the VB helps to amp that."

Florals

These are either literally just floral or dominated heavily by floral notes/aspects.

"Wet and in the bottle: Sweet laundry smell. Reminds me of hugging a friend in high school and you can smell their "vanilla orchid" scented laundry soap their mom picked out. Idk why that specifically, but that's what it's giving.

Wet and just applied to skin: I saw someone say it smelled like banana to them and I get what they mean. There's a floral sweetness (like a banana) cut by something slightly vegetal, just the tiniest bit green. Finishes with a lipsticky quality, but creamy not powdery. From afar, it smells like it did in the bottle - sweet laundry, but with a proper sniff you get the separate elements making that up. The makeup sensation seems to get stronger as it warms.

Dried down on skin: Very much like Avon lipstick. My grandma was an Avon lady and had so much Avon cosmetics, and it really reminds me of her lipsticks. White floral with a creamy quality, but not lactonic. I've smelled this in other things, someone said it's giving crisco and that's almost exactly right. A smooth but sort of aggressively quality-less creaminess. There's something here that reads as very slightly lemon-ey to me, but it mostly just serves to keep it from being sugary sweet. The laundry smell is strong from afar, similar to bedsheet ghost but more floral and less "hot". This isn't just dried laundry it's a clean shirt you folded and put away the night before. But any closer inspection of the frag, a deep sniff, and it's a heady white floral with creamy elements.

Final thoughts: I usually don't like white florals, but I like this one! I wouldn't wear it all the time, it won't become a regular thing, but I do like it. It has a sense of nostalgia, and it really reminds me of scene kids for whatever reason, which I think is what she was going for.

"Wet and in the bottle: Sharp, biting, headaching rose

Wet and just applied to skin: This is a true rose, leans more realistic than the kind of fantasy powder rose. It's a little peppery like fresh roses tend to be, a little astringent. Like floral in the most literal meaning of the word. Platonic ideal of a floral. Green, planty, smooth, peppery rose. Kind of arugula adjacent (this is how I feel about smelling most real roses).

Dried down on skin: I figured this would be pretty linear as a frag because of how almost solinote-ey it was for me for a good long while. It stays its perfect rose self, I can maybe get zome benzoin at the tail end, but it melds into the astringency of the rose to where it feels like it's mostly aiding in the solinote. But, after a good long while, like 3.5 hours, it becomes pure bitter zingy benzoin. Very very bitter. Like surprisingly bitter. I sniffed my wrist after a few hours to check on it and was like staggered a bit. Interesting touch, I feel like. Makes this kind of dark and spooky in a way.

Final thoughts: I like rose as an element often but I feel like this is too much rose. It's almost scary how much rose it is. I like it and I think it's well crafted and it's cool how realistic it is for me, but definitely not something I'll reach for often. I've been trying to give florals a fair shake recently, as for a long time I'd decided they were right out but for jasmine. And while this one didn't sell me on florals or rose as a whole, it made me think there's something more interesting there than I thought.

Does it Vampire Blood? (This is the part where I admit I layer everything with BBW's Vampire Blood bc I'm obsessed. This section of my reviews will denote if it can be layered with VB) Yes! Makes it a bit more what I'm used to in terms of a rose. A kind of candied, fruity rose situation. More recognizable to me. I do think it gets weird with its endstage benzoin phase though."

Resins and Spices

These are deep and spicey and sometimes spooky.