Landshark321

Sampling Bon Parfumeur 902 Armagnac Blonde Tobacco Cinnamon, a fittingly boozy, spicy tobacco scent, very pleasantly sweet also, accessible and not too sharp or heavy, with the Armagnac (a type of French brandy) being the center of the experience, flavored by cinnamon and tobacco, but not too much of either, with supporting notes of clove, geranium, plum, patchouli, labdanum, and vanilla. Really a nicely blended boozy blend with a lot of layers and nuance to it, and with very good performance, among the best of the brand that I’ve tried so far.

It shares the brand’s consistent retail pricing of $107/53/34 for 100/30/15ml, sold at boutiques like Ministry of Scent, from which I bought the sample. Overall, I quite like it, though it does not stand out as better than other sweet and spicy tobacco/boozy scents, despite very reasonable pricing in today’s market.

7 out of 10

Sampling Bon Parfumeur 801 Sea Spray Cedar Grapefruit, and it hits the mark reasonably well, being palpably aquatic and fresh, with woody and citric tones. There’s something vaguely dirty and animalic in the sea spray aspect, so it’s not a totally clean, benign aquatic but rather something with a bit of attitude and provocation, all while still being a fairly grounded, fresh experience. It’s pleasant but not especially memorable, and I prefer some of the other freshies in the line that I’ve tried so far. Still, I can see how this would be mass-appealing.

Its concentration is EDP and it has the same standard retail pricing of $107/53/34 for 100/30/15ml, not bad, overall, though, I think it would be more worthwhile for a couple of the others that I’ve tried.

6 out of 10

Sampling Bon Parfumeur 602 Pepper Cedar Patchouli, a fittingly spicy and woody blend with dominant pepper and cedar especially with a more measured use of patchouli, along with some added accords of chili, vetiver, neroli, and incense. It’s a little heady but overall feels pretty well-rounded and workable for most of the seasons, except perhaps the dead heat of summer, but given its liberal use of black/chili pepper, it’s in my wheelhouse, as I love the rich, savory aspect that pepper gives fragrances like this. The fragrance definitely takes on more of a resinous quality as it dries down, and I like that its complexity is revealed more over time this way as well. A very nice entry.

602 is EDP concentration, sold by boutiques like Ministry of Scent and with retailing pricing equaling the other perfumes that I’ve tried in the line: $107/53/34 for 100/30/15ml.

7 out of 10

Malpaso is one of the most recent Happyland releases, a spicy, fresh, sharp expression featuring castoreum, citruses, and florals, primarily. It smells like a bit of a cousin of the suede-rich, earlier release, Man Shit / Hommeland Extreme. Malpaso is a bit more nuanced, pivoting almost toward one of the sharp iris-rich perfumes in the catalogue, so perhaps somewhere in between Hommeland Extreme and, say, Sundown. It’s definitely a bit easier on the nose and less edgy than Hommeland Extreme, just to put that out there, as much as I enjoy Hommeland Extreme as one of the house’s boldest undertakings. I think Malpaso smooths things over a bit better, though, with almost a lavender-type sharpness, paired with citruses and spices, to complement the central-but-not-overused dry, animalic note of castoreum. Really nicely done, with characteristically great performance and pricing from the line.

7 out of 10

Incense Night is a Dua original blend from 2019, at first a high-priced metal plaque entry that’s now on the vaulted list a reasonable price, a dark, mysterious, pungent blend consisting of a variety of fairly intense notes, like cypriol, tobacco smoke, violet leaf, birch, rum, leather, and of course, incense itself. It starts out superlatively spicy and mellows out gradually over time, as one would expect, and it generally devolves into a resinous potion of sorts, not a gourmand, but rather a blend of the sharpness of the violet and rum with woods, resins, smoke, and darkness, an experience that ranges from the raw to the sophisticated. Very interesting, innovative, strong, but not one I reach for often. High in uniqueness and specialness, lower in utility.

7 out of 10