Voyage d'Hermès and Jean-Claude Ellena

Jean-Claude Ellena is, without question, one of the best and most innovative noses working today, and his work for Hermès represents some of the best work he's done. One of the striking aspects of his fragrances is that he is unafraid to return to various themes and permute them in various directions. The peppery top-notes of Cartier Declaration occur, in purified form, as the central element of Poivre Samarcande; the cumin in Declaration makes a strong appearance in Cologne Bigarade, one of three fragrances Ellena created for Frederic Malle; the light vegetal elements found in Kelly Caleche also recur in the Jardin trio; the sparkling grapefruit in Eau de Pamplemousse Rose pops up again in Rose Ikebana, and the rose in those two fragrances grounds Cologne Bigarade; the savory bergamote of Divine Bergamote provides a citric top-note for Eau d'Hiver.

Because of this, Ellena is sometimes (unfairly) accused of plagiarizing himself. These recurrent themes don't represent laziness, but rather a return to the same ideas, a technique followed by many artists with a mature style. Having said this, there are times when certain themes give diminishing returns, and unfortunately this is the case with Voyage d'Hermès. Here, Ellena marries the gin-soaked vegetation of Angeliques Sous la Pluie (another of his fragrances for Frederic Malle) with the sweet ginger base of Declaration. Unfortunately, Angeliques Sous la Pluie wasn't very good the first time around (it smells powerfully of gin, and I don't know why I'd want to smell like that), and although marrying it to a woods-and-ginger accord is an improvement, the result is still a disappointment. This is a perfectly okay fragrance, but I've come to expect more from Ellena.

EDIT: Upon reflection some years later, Angeliques Sous la Pluie is awesome. I was insane when I wrote this.

Iä! Iä! Killian Fthagn!

Here's a fun game. Can you guess which of the following quotations come from actual By Killian press releases?

"I conceived L’Oeuvre Noire with a quasi-Faustian ambience in mind. I wanted to cast a spell, like those that darkened Rimbaud's spirit or conjured the witches in Macbeth. But it also recalls contemporary R&B lyrics like those of 50 Cent, Snoop Dogg or Pharell Williams, all about temptation in the face of urban violence, like Baudelaire before them, as expressed in his prose poetry."

"The black tassel imparts mystery to the fragrance, mystery warding off all sorts of black magic . . . . It's as if the protective shield engraved on the side places the wearer under the protection of a fallen angel. This object is a talisman."

"I am the absolute worst. Please put me down before I write more of this shit."

"The perfume asks the flower:
'who can tell me why I exist?'
Do non loose your heart, dear friend,
in a perfect dawn
you will blend your life
with all the life and at the end
you will know, why you exist."

Hahahahaha! Are they fucking kidding? These are all real quotes, except for the one which obviously isn't a real quote, although it should be. Actually, the last quote isn't from By Killian; it can be found on the equally pretentious Profumum website (note the oddly repetitive name of the linked url -- if it's luxury, you gotta say it twice!). Oh wait, my mistake -- that's "Profvmvm;" I shovld have known to vse the correct vowel that signifies skull-crvshing pretentiousness.

Anyhow, this certainly is some overwrought, hilarious garbage. Truly I do feel as though I'm under the protection of a fallen angel (huh??). Please excuse me for a moment while I use a belt sander to remove my face so that I never again have to experience such sweet, sweet, Faustian/Snoop-Doggian brilliance.

So what does this stuff smell like? Let's check out Back to Black. The press notes say: "A tobacco aroma with sweet undertones of honey. A pure aphrodisiac." I must respectfully disagree. This stuff smells like Baudelaire shitting his pants. It is horrifically sickly-sweet, the cloyingly organic smell of outhouses in the hot sun. A dollop of honey can be great -- see, eg, Chanel's fantastic Beige -- but in this nauseating quantity it evokes sickness and the smell of a mortally ill person rotting from the inside out. This is what you smell when you die.

Luckily for you, a 50ml bottle of this will only set you back $225! That's more than a bottle of Carnal Flower or Vetiver Extraordinaire! This stuff costs twice as much as the Hermessences! Since Back to Black seems to be selling, I've begun bottling my vomit; it can be yours for only $310 per 10ml. What a steal!

On the other hand, Prelude to Love is rather good; it's a cologne with a pleasingly dark note, the top-note sparkle of lemon balanced by solemn iris, a combination I haven't seen before. It's actually quite weighty, more like Prelude to Serious Pondering than to Love, which sets it apart from the effervescent sparkle of most other colognes. Should you pay $225 for 50ml of it? God, no. But if you find a bottle for less, you could definitely do worse. After all, 50 Cent and the witches in Macbeth have already written odes to the temptation in the face of urban violence evoked by this fragrance.