NicheOnly

At this point, it feels like every 2023 release that has high anticipation has completely whiffed. Doesn't matter if it's PR product and influencer hype (see: "Lovers | Fragrance Du Bois" & "Althaïr | Parfums de Marly") or premium niche flankers (see: "Hacivat Oud | Nishane" and Masque Milano Ruby collection). I am going to place "Jubilation 40 | Amouage" into that same basket.

[in-doors test, went through scent evolution 2 times]

Make no mistake about it, J40 isn't just a concentration flanker to "Jubilation XXV Man | Amouage". The opening instantly goes in the direction that Sebastian (The Perfume Guy) said it would - the scent smells camphorous. On my first impressions, I felt like J40 opened like a hybrid between J25 and Amouage's woody-aromatic-herbal fragrances like "Beach Hut Man | Amouage" or "Bracken Man | Amouage". On my second wear, I started to find reminiscence to an evergreen or a Christmas tree. This vibe specifically made me think of a comparison like "Fille en aiguilles | Serge Lutens". The top/opening is very much a woody-aromatic fragrance and doesn't really even smell like J25.

Another note that causes significant difference is the bay rum heart note. The feeling that it brings to this fragrance is akin to the blackberry in J25 done in alcoholic fashion. I don't really know of many fragrances that do boozy this well, to the point that it smells realistic boozy. The only one that comes to mind is the opening on "Ytzma | Royal Crown".

In terms of the scent pyramid & accords, this could be viewed as a boozy oriental with a woody-aromatic top. I don't think we can think of this as a fruity amber like we did with J25. I can only smell the J25 tones from very up-close. But the issue is this doesn't address the biggest criticism people have with current J25 - the performance. Much like "Aventus | Creed", prevailing J25 batches are a shadow of its true former self. To me, J40's performance is just as awful as that of the current J25. The concentration might be high because of the sheen on the back of my hand, but there is no sillage to go with it and the 4 sprays on my first evolution are barely there 3 hours in.

While I was extremely underwhelmed on my first wear, I am mildly less underwhelmed on my second one. I think the underlying product is good-to-great, and I would say that it does a great job at differentiating itself from J25 with the camphorous top-middle and the boozy middle-base. Yet at the end of the day, if you're not an influencer getting this for free, you'll be paying €455 for 100ml on this poorly-performing camphorous-boozy alternative of J25. I cannot, in good faith, recommend that you purchase this. I think I would struggle to justify purchasing this even if it was €345 for 100ml. People wanted vintage J25 and they got current J25 version 2.0.

*these are initial impressions on an indoors testing*

The House of Oud's Crop line, in my opinion, is the lone interesting part about their house. While their original line has an overt reliance on that sweet-powdery accord you see in scents like "Almond Harmony | The House of Oud", "Wonderly | The House of Oud", "Golden Powder | The House of Oud" and others; the Crop line brings something interesting to niche perfumery with these limited edition blends where they combine oud with various accords.

Just like the previous release, that being "Crop Edition 2022 | The House of Oud", this fragrance is similarly an aromatic release. Upon the first spray, it opens mildly sweet with a very unique aromatic feel. On my second time experiencing the open, the opening feels like this is a derivative play on the so-called "bitter fougère" scene, as I get mild hints of something like fig tree or violet leaf, making "Crop Edition 2023 | The House of Oud" reminiscent of fragrances like "AM | Fragrance Du Bois", "Burlington 1819 | Roja Parfums", and "B683 (Extrait de Parfum) | Marc-Antoine Barrois".

But make no mistake about it, there is more going on here than just another bitter fougère. While the overall fragrance has this bitter-woody-aromatic feel in the air, it is a very unexpected sweet greenness that you find in the base of "Crop Edition 2023 | The House of Oud". It took me a while to figure out what I was smelling, but those bitter tonalities combine with the sweet hints to smell reminiscent of a sweetened rhubarb accord, comparable to a fragrance like "Encelade | Marc-Antoine Barrois" without all the synthetics (or in terms of isolating this accord, you could also compare it to "Elysium Eau Intense | Roja Parfums").

To those familiar with the Crop line, this having almost zero oud should not be that surprising. The core accords, for most of the wearing experience, will be woody-green-sweet. I find the sillage on this to be quite lackluster - it opens moderate-to-strong (8/10) and then dies down to weak (4/10). The longevity on this is also lackluster, with the scent appearing to last around 6-7 hours. I feel like the uniqueness and the blending are there, but it is the value and the performance that I struggle with. At €420 for 75ml, a 30% discount (likely coming in a week on Black Friday, as of when I'm writing this) would bring me to a 50-50 decision.

And after 24 hours, I'm calling it: neither has Xerjoff. In one of the most bizarre releases this year, Xerjoff has opted to release "Torino23 | XerJoff" into the Nitto ATP Finals Torino collection. It's not bizarre that they released T23 because they'll continue to release these as long as the ATP Finals take place in Turin which I believe is the case until 2025 (inclusive). It's bizarre because of the underlying product.

I assume many of the folks here on Parfumo are familiar with both "Join The Club - Torino21 | XerJoff" and "Join The Club - Torino22 | XerJoff", but worst case, at least familiar with one. Torino21 is one of Xerjoff's best-rated scents and arguably their top summer fragrance. T21's key accords are the minty freshness with the sweet-honeyed white floral accord. T22's key accords are the eucalyptus freshness with the sweet-spicy saffron accord. If you read those sentences back-to-back, you'll notice that while the notes are different, they bring out similar accords and do so in different ways. But then you get this complete 180.

Just like the few reviews online, I agree that "Torino23 | XerJoff" opens with a flood of white florals as the neroli gives it this fresh and dare I say laundry detergent vibe. First smelling it on-skin, you notice mild spiciness from the nutmeg and cardamom. However, the core profile in the air has very much remained fresh-floral, comparable to something like "Villa Néroli | bdk Parfums". During the first 20-30 minutes, the spices & patchouli combine for this bizarre vegetal vibe in the base. Over time the white floral tones fade and the ylang-ylang becomes a key note. When worn outside, the cashmere wood in the base is prominent as it brings that dry-ashy feel that I recognize from "Casamorati - Bouquet Ideale (Eau de Parfum) | XerJoff", albeit the sweetness in Torino23 is almost non-existent relative to the Casamorati. In terms of accords, I would say the scent opens fresh-floral and dries floral-woody-spicy, with the floral transition being one from white to yellow.

Torino23, to me, smells outdated and imitates feminine designer releases from the 90s & 00s and completely misses on what Torino21 & Torino22 did to successfully establish the series. This will end up going down as my biggest blindbuy fail in years if not ever. I get average performance in the 7 hour ballpark with moderate & potentially leaning weak sillage. Ranking T23 as a standalone, I would give it a 5/10 as I'm clearly not the target demographic for this release and marketing it as a unisex fragrance was very misleading. But within the context of the ATP collection, this is a complete whiff and giving it a 5 would be a compliment. Try before you buy.

I can never quite figure out what is the obsession people have with prices strictly as it relates to Creed. If you're not criticizing other brands for flanker pricing then you might as well not comment on that aspect, especially when there are other brands charging significantly higher markups for their flankers.

On the scent: the opening is unmistakably Aventus-like, but it's really not standard Aventus. It smells sweeter & far more fruitier, like it's "Creed does "Cedrat Boise | Mancera"". Then I begin to notice the fougère-type tonalities that are reminiscent of the profiles of "Apex (Eau de Parfum) | Roja Parfums" & "Sauvage Elixir | Dior" . The scent does take another twist once we exit the first 15 minutes or so, beginning to smell like a very plain fruity musk. This part of the profile is reminiscent of the drydown of either "Accento | XerJoff" or "Accento Overdose | XerJoff" (albeit here it is indeed sweeter, but not as sweet as something like "Lamar | Kajal"). For anybody unfamiliar with these scents, you could also imagine that the drydown is the original "Aventus | Creed" done a little bit sweeter & muskier without the smoky/green tones.

Make no mistake about it, "Absolu Aventus | Creed" does change the profile of the original sufficiently enough to bring these other aspects in. It certainly does a lot more new than Nishane did with the entirety of their X Collection, or what Roja did with the release of "Elysium Eau Intense | Roja Parfums". But the glaring error of Absolu Aventus is that it misses on the key criticism people have of Aventus, that being performance (as a by-product of batch variance). Absolu completely misses on performance, performing only mildly better than my 21Z01 bottle of "Aventus | Creed" that I previously used as an air freshener for my room until I let my dad have it. Sillage with "Absolu Aventus | Creed" is weak with initial sillage being moderate-to-strong, but then drying down to intimate within 30 minutes. Longevity of the scent is genuinely in the ballpark of 4 hours since it does fade very quickly.

The only people buying this should be Creed loyalists and "investors" purchasing a *possibly limited edition* product to sell to some sucka down the road. If you can scoop this on Black Friday with a discount from somebody with stock, you might even make short-term profits. But that's all this should be - a speculative investment and nothing else.

One of the few premium niche releases of 2023, "Aeternum | Royal Crown" is Royal Crown's only release for this year, following up on 2022's "Nocturna | Royal Crown" and "Nizam | Royal Crown". This is not a brand that receives much attention, driven by low PR, poor accessibility, high prices, and to some, tacky bottles. To me, all of these, sans the prices, are a positive as it makes for collection-based standout potential.

Matching the experience to the scent pyramid is quite difficult here. "Aeternum | Royal Crown" opens with a stunning melon note & a prominent aquatic tonality. The melon note specifically is one that I would relate to Nishane's "Ani X | Nishane" which similarly uses melon in the top, albeit here it is more notable and of higher quality. The melon note fades within ~10 minutes into the core of this scent which is driven by a musky ambergris (not amber!) styled accord. As it dries, you may also begin to notice a mild hinge of smokiness, this likely coming from the mysore sandalwood.

The overall feel of this scent is very much akin to eating fruit (or even smelling rocks) by a tropical beach. Or in more simple terms, it is an aquatic ambergris scent with some fruitiness. I struggle to find a lot of the notes, no matter how much I spray or smell the scent & that is something that happens often with Royal Crown - a couple primary accords combine with the high blend quality while much of the pyramid ends up invisible to the nose. Such is the case here with the juniper, metallic notes, orris, osmanthus, and several others. The honey also doesn't pop and the scent has no comparison to something like "Join The Club - 40 Knots | XerJoff".

In terms of Royal Crown's catalogue, the two that I feel have similarities to this are "Nocturna | Royal Crown" and "Sea Island | Royal Crown". Nocturna, similarly to Aeternum, has that tropical fruity component which I notice present with this scent. Sea Island is a creamy aquatic, so I'd say some of the aquatic feel present in Aeternum may appear familiar to those that have experience with Sea Island.

As with most of Royal Crown's fresher catalogue, this is one of those scents where performance is absolutely abysmal. On my skin, it is nearly entirely gone by hour 4. The sillage here appears to be entirely intimate, but I wonder if it has potential for more in the hot summer heat. As such, it may leave you in the same scenario I was in with "Imperator | Royal Crown" before ultimately opting to purchase a bottle. You get elite blend quality, elite raw materials, elite bottle, but horrendous performance and very high pricing. In the end, only you can decide whether that trade-off is a worthy one.