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TBF Project:Blog
Posted by Dain, Tuesday, July 12, 2005 2:06 PM (Eastern)
I picked this up yesterday, and after finishing it, I must say, I've quite thoroughly enjoyed it. It strikes a balance between science and art, and now I'm just slavering to get a copy of Dr. Turin's Parfums: Le Guide, which is not available in the US, and is only in French (which isn't a problem, but...) I enjoyed the perfumery bits a bit more, but that makes sense, does it not? The science is perfectly lucid and not over one's head, I should add.My favorite passage was about rot, and how cultures react to it, in a style very dry and witty, which somehow seamlessly segued into a purple fantasy of great compositions of music and perfumes:
"Époisses... you smell it about three rooms away, and one that is even more rare and heavenly and makes the Époisses positively spartan by comparison: Soumaintrain, from Bourgogne, specifically from Saint-Florentin, near Auxerre. When they smell that, Americains think, 'Good God!' The Japanese think, 'I must now commit suicide.' The French think, 'Where's the bread?' Why? The quality of decomposition: amines, short-chain aliphatic volatile fatty acids, the typical products of organic decomposition...
Look at beer, which is a very interesting cultural product. Beer smells like a burp. Gases from someone's stomach. Lovely. Again, a product of fermentation, which is to say decay. Decay enhances smells and flavors, yet we have a sharp ability to ID decay, because decaying things will kill you. Bacterial and yeast decomposition. Which can give 'I wouldn't touch that in a million years' and, at the same time and in the same culture, mind you, 'I will pay great sums to consume Rodenbach,' which is a miracle of a beer from Belgium. A miraculous powdery apple flavor. Those Rodenbach yeast have an IQ of at least two hundred. Fucking genius yeast...
There's a vibrational fifth in esters, you know. I've always thought that esters, fruity, are Mozart. The melon notes—helional, for example—strike me as the watery Debussy harmonies, the fourths. Beethoven in his angrier moments is quinolines, which get in green peppers. Thus Bandit, a dark, angular Beethoven string quartet. There's a lot of perfumery that smells like Philip Glass's minimalism, a deceptive simplicity. Mitsouko I think is pure Brahms, the string sextets, extremely intricate but rather monochrome. Tommy Girl gives you Prokofiev's First Symphony."
There are four things that pop into my head. One, I seem to like the taste of decomposition (cheeses, wines, beers, a good strong loaf, my enjoyment of game (confit du canard, is, essentially, decomposed)... and one of my favorite things is plain Greek yogurt, which is yeastfully strong) albeit sweetened.
Two, it suddenly makes sense to me, why Guerlain fragrances won't work for me, as much as I appreciate them as the masterpieces they are (not a single one, though I'm eager to try Après L'Ondée, Mitsouko, Vol de Nuit, or Jicky). "Call-girl chic", he calls Guerlain, for "cocottes", in comparison to the Carons, which were for "duchesses". And that explains why the lush perfection of Shalimar, was something I instinctually spilled onto cleavage. Have I done that with any other perfume before? No. Caron Parfum Sacré, I spray very discreetly, slightingly, onto my neck. It seems right, there, as Shalimar seemed right in its opulent vulgarity. Not that there's anything wrong with that. But I'm a prissy, austere sort of lady, and the Caron seemed right while the Guerlain didn't. It, somehow, illogically, made sense. And this was after the fact. But then, I love Givenchy, which are more brazen and sexual and certainly more vulgar. I figure it's like the question of the high heel: is it something that confines you, and makes you a slave to feminine strictures, or a force you use of your own will and pleasure? A statement of—"I may be on precarious footing, but NOTHING else about me is!"—if you will? I will, for one, choose the latter, because both Indécence and Hot Couture are indeed as old as the stilletto. A gesture of combative and aggressive intellect and sexuality, on entirely feminine terms. Eh. Both smell delicious... [shrugs] Aesthetics is all about what you like, anyway... hang the theories.
Three, wow... I had better get my greedy paws on some of these! On my list to sniff: Guerlain Après L'Ondé (which I am sort of yearning for with a sort of hopeless, unreciprocated adoration), Estée Lauder Beyond Paradise (for men and women both... I've actually sniffed the men's, but was chased off by a predatory SA in Saks who must have sprayed me with everything), Guerlain Mitsouko (for three reasons: Nancy says it reminds her of me without having ever met me in the flesh (compelling enough reason), someone at Perfume Isle described it as "sploosh" from Holes, and Turin admits to Mitsouko as "infinitely chic"), YSL Rive Gauche (and incidentally, Paris, while I'm there, though I'm perfectly satisfied with Parfum Sacré, not being one for roses), Bandit (also something I've smelled before, I like it, but fear it as too strong), Tommy Girl, Chanel (though Chanels are frankly... not good... on me), L'Artisan Dzing! (though L'Artisan turns really funny on me, sour sour sour), Fendi Theorema (recommended to me, already, by an enthusiast of Indécence, who turned me onto Balenciaga Cristobal and Givenchy Hot Couture both), Guerlain Jicky, Joy and Sublime by Jean Patou, Estée Lauder White Linen, Clinique Aromatics Elixer, Gucci Rush (which was the first thing I loved, when I was naïve and seventeen... [wicked grin] I smelled on the tour guide at Amherst College, and was consequently and utterly disenchanted, I no longer wanted Rush or Amherst, and settled on Indécence and Yale instead), Rochas Tocade, and Serge Lutens in general. I should just hunt down a copy of Parfums: Le Guide and end my misery there. I don't expect to like some of them, but want a good draught to sniff, just for education's sake.
Four, both Burr and Turin describe Thierry Mugler's Angel as genre-defying, a fearless of offering of powerful notes in unexpected edible-inedible combination. A tour de force. Or, perhaps Turin's own words are best: "a transvestite, a gorgeous blonde with a five o'clock shadow and a wicked laugh". It smells like urine on me. [shrugs] Intensely. Like I have animal piss emanating from my being. It does that on some people (I'll try it again, stubbornly, soon enough). And then, it struck me. Angel was the olfactory equivalent of MAC O lipstick. Uncategorical, brilliant, and sickeningly ugly on a few.
Picture courtesy amazon.com.
Labels: beauty notes, perfume
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