Review & Recommendation: 9 Possets Winter 2014 Scents (Part 2 of 3)

This is part 2 of my review of the 26 decants of Possets' Winter 2014 scents I got. Part 1 is here.  For my previous Possets reviews, you can click here or on the Possets tag on the right. Hurry and grab these scent if you like them! They're gone by Jan 31!

As always, all scent reviews are done blind until the TL;DR part's written. Overviews are written if the notes surprise me. 

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Dance of the Hours (Ponchielli)

"Mint, coconut, copra, and Meyer lemon make up The Dance of the Hours. This one is so pretty and reminds me of snow falling gently at night. Foody and delectable."

Minty coconut lime! It smells like this Bath & Bodyworks Coconut Lime Verbena scent, with the addition of sweet peppermint.

This is the scent I'm talking about
Image courtesy of jabong.com

The coconut bit leans on smelling like sunblock or old oils on me after about 5 min, unfortunately. I'm kinda sad because the initial smell was so great, and it's just the perfect creamy mint flavour that smells delicious and wearable instead of going full toothpaste. Maybe it'll smell better on a different skin chemistry.

TL;DR: Bath & Bodyworks Coconut Lime Verbena with sweet peppermint.

Overview: I had to check out what copra is and turns out it's just the dried meat, or kernel, of the coconut used to extract coconut oil.

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Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy (Tchaikovsky)

"Fruit wine with a powerful violet snap to it. Very cold but deeply musky. Fruit never smelled so perfumy before, it really crosses the line, as when an ingredient is used in a different context, here fruit is used as a volatile part of the perfume and does it with great finesse. Very graceful and quite regal I would say."

In the beginning this is like a sugary white wine sangria with hints of florals. Unfortunately, after 5-8 min, the white wine sangria bit turned into artificial grape and there's hints of this old crushed plants smell. It's more of the Japanese artificial green grape scent rather than the "Western" artificial grape scent, so I found it more tolerable. Unlike the "Western" artificial grape scent which I personally find cloying and immediately makes me think of bright, purple drinks/medicine, I find the Japanese artificial green grape scent more clean, light and fruity. If you've tried this candy, you'll know the scent I'm talking about:

It's Kasugai's gummy candies. I looove these candies so much. I blame 20% of my childhood cavities on them.
Image found on amazon.com

The old crushed plants smell makes me think of squashed spinach that's been left in the kitchen for a few hours. I'm not sure how I feel about the combination.

TL;DR: Japanese green grape gummy candy with squashed spinach.

Overview: I love Possets, but I think a lot of their fruity scents turn very artificial. I can't find the violets in this either, so it's very well blended into the scent.

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Danse Chinoise (Tea) Nutcracker (Tchaikovsky)

"Pekoe tea, green tea, incense, and lime leaf. Incredibly soothing, with the tea marrying perfectly with the scent of unburned incense. The lime leaf adds a small and subtle green note."

This reminds me of a scent I've sniffed before in a high end boutique in Indonesia/Singapore. It's a slightly smoky, lotiony scent and I smell hints of jasmines and earl grey tea in the beginning. The jasmines and tea blended into the scent fast though. It's definitely a more Indonesian sort of scent and I can totally see this as a Thann scent.

Thann Spa in Phuket
Image courtesy of asiaprwire.com

While it smells a lot like a massage oil I can see being used in a Thann spa, it's still a massage oil I'd gladly walk around smelling like –it's' smoky, lotiony and floral, with hints of tea.

On me, the smokiness is the first to go, and the scent becomes more of a floral with a deep, dark and rich black tea after about 40 min. It's still a very gorgeous scent though.

TL;DR: Thann massage oil.

Overview: Btw, if you're wondering what pekoe tea is, it's just a grading system. Here's the Wikipedia definition:

Pekoe tea grades are classified into various qualities, each determined by how many of the adjacent young leaves (two, one, or none) were picked along with the leaf buds. Top-quality pekoe grades consist of only the leaf buds, which are picked using the balls of the fingertips. Fingernails and mechanical tools are not used to avoid bruising.

Basically, it's a pain-in-the-ass-to-make tea. Oh, and I'm impressed with Possets' incense. This is the kind of smoky incense I often smell in Asian (the entire continent, including India) spas...none of the weird game-y stuff some perfumers like.

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Eine Kleine Nachtmusik (Mozart)

"Melon, mint, a schmere of marzipan, smoke, resin, fruity, musky, woody, smoky, astringent but with a very smooth edge."

This starts off gorgeous. There's definitely a Japanese melon candy smell but it's bundled up in a scent that makes it smell very wearable and more mature. This scent is clean, cool, sweet, and smooth. It makes you think of the finest cashmere smoothly caressing your skin.

By about 10 min though, the scent starts getting more and more artificial until it reminds me of a room scent. It's the kind of room scent that's vaguely floral, but mostly this sweet, blown up plastic sort of "clean" scent. It reminds me of a room scent in a tuition centre I used to go to.

TL;DR: The clean room scent of a tuition centre.

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Flight of the Bumblebee (Koraekov)

"Erratic green notes of grass and green leaf combine in totally unexpected ways with deep resins of the East making a very unusual and attractive perfume which is at once daring and comforting. Can't classify it but it is a cutting edge blend if ever there was one. Out of nowhere a violet-like note weaves in and out of the blend, and the heavy patchouli and saffron positively dance."

I LOVE this! There's the most delicious honey, a citrus tartness and a fresh green note that makes me think of sprays of young leaves. There are so many layers in this that I just can't describe. There's florals, something that makes me think of swishes of cloth...it's so amazing. It makes me feel like dancing on a wet meadow. I actually bought 20ml of this because I love it so much. I think a perfect ad for this scent would be this gorgeous photo here:

Though I'd make the models run about a bit. This is a very happy, lively scent.
Amazing photography by Dmitry Yushkov

I can see this as a unisex scent, but it definitely leans towards feminine to me.

TL;DR: Dancing in a meadow.

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Hallelujah! (Handel)

"A deluxe Black Musk pairs with black oude, grey musk, sandalwood, myrrh, and blonde luan wood."

First thought: this BETTER get better.

It started off as that horrible, bitter wood smell but it does better. This is a LOT of wood so if you're a wood fan, you'll love this. I smell that fragrant sandalwood that leans towards masculine to me, but I also got this sweet, nutty scent. I love, love, love the wood. It smells so luxurious and sweet. It makes you think of intimate caresses with hot guys in luxurious rooms full of rich, dark, wood panels. It's a cool, exciting scent, and definitely not one of the cozy, warm type of wood scents.

TL;DR: Hooking up with a hot guy in a luxurious room full of dark wood panels.

Overview: I looked up luan wood and another name for it is Meranti. That's actually the wood my dad's factory uses to create their plywood. I visited the factory a few months ago and it does NOT smell this luxurious. Just for fun, here's a gif of how they turn the log into sheets of wood:

This is taken on my iPhone and sped up 6x

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Moonlight Sonata (Beethoven)

"A soft red raspberry and heavy sugar, topped off with an extra dusting of clove, a heart of white musk to ground it and a fluff of almond to start it all on a charmingly melancholy note."

Finally! A song I can play on the piano! This scent is a cloudy raspberry. It's definitely the artificial kind of raspberries that made me think of a Gushers flavour at first, but luckily, everything else blended beautifully and counters that artificial raspberry scent. Once everything settles, the raspberry becomes muddled and there's this cool slightly dusty scent that follows it, which makes me think of clouds on a moonlit night...but maybe that's just a suggestion. I wasn't really expecting artificial raspberries for this song, but the cloudy bit is definitely what I expected.

Kinda off topic but I actually attended a lecture by a music professor who did extensive research on Beethoven and the era he's in. Based on the design of pianos in those days and Beethoven's style, he concluded that the Moonlight Sonata is supposed to be "cloudy". You're supposed to play it with the peddle pressed much longer than people usually do, so the notes "muddle" with each other instead of sounding clear and crisp. He played it the way he thinks it's supposed to be played and it was so hauntingly beautiful.

As it dries down, I get hints of this zing that makes the back of my throat itch. I'm not sure what it is, but this could be an issue for certain skin chemistries.

TL;DR: Cloudy raspberries.

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Nocturne (Chopin)

"The best of balsam fir and a thick crust of sugar. Beautiful in the moonlight."

I got the most amazing vanilla cream scent, but it's mixed with that chemical smell of whiteboard markers. I'm not sure what's going on. Is it myrrh? Myrrh often has this whiteboard marker scent on me.

After about 10 min, the scent finally settles and the whiteboard marker scent faded. It's still a clay-like, slightly chemical-ish vanilla though. The smell seemed oddly familiar and after a while, I finally put my finger on it –it smells like vanilla scented plastic toys I used to have.

Is it just me, or did kids toys get fancier since the time when I was a kid?
Image courtesy of polyvore.com

I like the smell on my toys as a kid, but I don't exactly want to smell like it.

TL;DR: Vanilla-scented plastic toys.

Overview: Balsam is usually very icy on me, but I'm not sure how balsam fir is supposed to smell like. I guess the combination with sugar creates this weird scent.

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Silver Coconut

"Milky coconut and the silver base."

This is not in alphabetical order, but /u/weepy asked for a review, so I'm pushing this scent review early.

Initially, I got a burst of berries that dissipated pretty fast, but it was definitely confusing for me since I wasn't expecting any berries. It was quickly replaced by this watery, metallic kinda smell. It's a smell I used to think liquid mercury would smell like (luckily for me, my science teacher kept a close watch on me and stopped me from sniffing mercury). The watery, metallic smell is just watery and metallic –it's not sweet, or icy, or blue. It just smells like liquid metal. If it has a more salty, coppery tinge, I'd describe it as the smell of blood from someone on a high-iron diet. The watery bit is the way some leather notes smell watery, so if you're not a fan of that, you probably won't like this.

The coconut part is Possets' coconut, which tends to smell like sunblock and old oils on me. So now this smells like old sunblock mixed with mercury, garnished with berries.

TL;DR: Old sunblock mixed with mercury, garnished with berries.