Brand: Alkemia
Scent Description: A dark and ferociously sexy blend of black oud, black musk, labdanum, and spiced pipe tobacco blended with a seductive purr of Black Opium.
A collection of indie perfume reviews
Brand: Alkemia
Scent Description: A dark and ferociously sexy blend of black oud, black musk, labdanum, and spiced pipe tobacco blended with a seductive purr of Black Opium.
strong! has a fruity smell of dark fruits, something that i don’t like it in though, not sure what
I agree with unearthlyapothecary…this is giving me vibes of EL’s Youth Dew only better. When first applied on my skin it has a sharp almost animalic musky note that borders on offensive. Thankfully it’s a short lived stage and this sweet cola scent begins to come forward. Is it cola or cherry cola? My nose can’t decide. A syrupy, cola- tinged, musky Oriental fragrance is a good way to describe this. Usually my skin eats Alkemia scents but this bad boy has lasted on me for 9+ hours, impressive! It’s a very well blended fragrance. So much so that it’s difficult to pick out the individual notes. This goes through about four stages on me and finally settles into a musky leather cola scent. I like it but agree with others that it’s very assertive. I would recommend a sample before taking the plunge on a FS bottle.
Wow! Hellcat is the Alkemia version of EL Youth Dew. A very strong, dark, Coca Cola- syrupy oriental + leather. I have never been able to tolerate YD, some aroma chemical ( I suspect the nasty aldehydes) just make it completely nauseating and intolerable. Hellcat on the other hand is indescribable in its beauty. Dark, rich and intoxicating. The leather just takes it to another level of amazing. Has incredible throw for an oil. Not for the faint of heart!
fizzy spiced musk and incense
Thoughts: It’s hard to discern where one note ends and the other begins but it has an effervescent cherry soda-like quality. In the background is something like myrrh or possibly the oud but I can’t say for certain. It starts out very bubbly witch and drys to a great musk. Very cool.
My sample is a few months old. This starts out a lot more perfume-y and floral than it did when it was brand new (it smelled kind of a bit funky in a bathroom-y way). I’ll be honest, the first 10 minutes or so it gives me a headache, and I applied just the tiniest possible bit because I remembered it being quite strong.
After that, though, it starts to settle into my skin and some warm, dark depth comes out that I think is the oud. I also definitely get the spiced part but not so much the tobacco. There’s still definitely an “expensive perfume counter” scent here, and I’m not sure what to chalk that up to: the opium? Labdanum? Maaaaybe the musk? I think that actually might be the oud, but other perfumes with oud don’t tend to smell “perfume-y” on me.
Toward the end of wear, I really started to like it, and I think that’s what it’s aging into. This one may be one that needs aging.
Heady and overwhelming. Not bad, but just… it’s A Lot. Fuzzy and musky and animalistic. It’s almost got that candy-cherry flavour underneath which I’m not such a big fan of on its own, but it works with the overall blend. I hope one day I’ll be woman enough to wear this to a party.
This is so dark! It’s very leathery and feral and musky. It’s almost offensive when first applied, but warms up as it dries into a delightfully sexy skin scent.