Maison Francis Kurkdjian Pour Le Soir was a lovely revelation – warm, cuddly, easy to wear. So when MFK released Absolue Pour Le Soir, my first thought was – More yummy!!!!
Sweet Cuminy Moses! This is a sweaty body-fest that makes my eyes water. Notes of benzoin from Siam, cumin, ylang-ylang, Bulgarian and Iranian rose honey, incense absolute, Atlas cedarwood and sandalwood. In other words, cumin, cumin, cumin and more cumin, amped up by some incense to make sure you don’t miss the cumin.
All I can do is stare at my hand and wonder how in the world I could ever wear that out in public without people commenting on how nice it was for “that jezebel” to appear in public right after being freshly fu exercised.
To be fair, it does settle down a bit after the open, moving from a 18.7 on the Skank Projection Scale (out of a possible 15) to a 15.4.
You’ve been warned, and I’ll share!!!! Two lucky (?!) commenters will win a small sample of this, appropriately enclosed in a double baggie so your mailman or children won’t get hurt.
What’s the scariest skank you’ve ever whiffed? Love it, hate it? I remember smelling MKK for the first time and recoiling, but now I think of it as a wonderful, soft skin scent because that open is so brief, and the rest of it is so gorgeous.
Please put my name in the hat! Maybe I will find out once and for all if I am anosmic to some kinds of musk – I finally tried MKK and I thought it was soft and beautiful, not at all off-putting. However, Bal A Versailles, that’s a whole new story, skankalicious to the max!
My vintage Tabu is right up there too. I can’t even wear it out of the house, not that there is ever an occasion for which it might be suitable anyway. ;-)
There is is pretty-poo jasmine and, well, I’ll avoid the obvious and just say not-nice jasmine. No examples, but one day I hope to smell a jasmine that is just right.
I have to say I get zero skank from Absolue pour le soir. A ton of a honey and sandlewood with a touch of rose and benzoin. Very wearable. I get many positive comments when I wear it. Men seem to love it on me. I’m a man. They are even bold enough ot ask what I’m wearing and where to purchase.
hmmm… don’t know if I can identify skank, yet. Dzing! smells like the zebra cage at Como Park (not sure how this is happens to be a fragrance favorite). I do love Bal a Versailles, Femme and Arpege. Maybe I’m a skankette in the making!
I’m new to the perfumed life and haven’t come across a “skank” scent ….yet. Please enter me in your drawing – I’ll try anything once.
Old tabu and my sin.
Oh you probably won’t believe this BUT Alien smells like really awful BO on me :-( Who woudda thunk?
Please enter me in this draw. :-)
What was that oudh…came out last year…L’Artisan…oh yeah! Al-Oudh. That one scared me. I think lots of ouds smell like the crotch of underpants you’ve been wearing all day. Recently I had ordered a decant of Montale’s “Amber & Spice” or something like that which was, of course, full of that oud they put in everything. I gave it to a friend who liked the Black Oud decant of theirs I had once. She said “It smells like P*ssy!” and, actually, she was right!
Man, I LOVE this stuff! I don’t get the wallop of cumin I did with Huitieme Art Fareb or, more to the point, Diptyque L’Autre. The composition here is more seamless to my nose. With the exception of the boozy opening, the perfume unravels its notes in small choruses rather than in solos.
Of course, I find Bella Bellissima Perfect Night equally easy to wear. Guess I don’t scare easy, Ma’am.
I don’t believe there is any cumin in Fareb. It’s immortelle that you don’t like. I love Fareb, but of course I love immortelle.
Has anyone mentioned Serge Noire yet? Apocalyptic B.O. Unwashed bodies, and unwashed hair…set on FIRE. But YMMV.
No need to put me in the draw.
This is one of those incidents of YMMV (for me at least). I find Theo Fennell Scent and SL El Attarine beautiful but unwearable out of the house for reasons of cumin amplification. When I first sniffed Absolue pour le Soir I giggled, it smellt SO post coital. Then I tried it on skin and whoa, it’s a fabulous cosy honeyed incense! Cumin tamed by whatever else is in there, at least on me. I adore it and wear it out of the house with no qualms whatsoever. No need to enter my name in the drawing – once my decant is all used up I’m buying a bottle!
Vivienne Westwood’s Boudoir (or as I call it, Gusset). That one is pretty much pure lady-parts. Also, McQueen Kingdom. And what was that Diptyque cumin bomb called?
But I don’t mind those. Cumin doesn’t smell like dirty sweat to me, it smells like the sweat of, well, someone who’s eaten cumin.
Indole is another matter. If the jasmine is so indolic I start to look around for the person with terrible halitosis, it’s too indolic for me!
MKK, for the first 15 minutes, is attraction/repellent (loved that!) on me then turns into the White Musk from Body Shop on my skin! I was sooooo sad when it went ‘flat’!
Still on the search for skanky that stays skanky on me :)
Sniffed FM Portrait of a lady yesterday and it made me think of cat wee :( and not in a good way. Maybe my nose was having an off day?
the new agent p ‘L’Agent’ smells really really close to Coco on dry down.
pretty please enter me in the draw
My very first purchase from the Perfumed Court included a sample of vintage Bal and MKK. I found MKK to be cozy and lovely, but Bal really knocked my socks off with the skank. A sample of APLS is the only one I was distressed at the thought of it running out. It’s so yummy on me I want to gnaw my arm off when I wear it. I hope the giveaway sample is a spray; I wonder if my reaction would change if I weren’t just dabbing the stuff on.
I noticed someone mentioned vintage Arpege. Now I have that and it is nothing in comparison to Fendi, Madame Rochas and Cabochard on me. A young male friend commented upon Cawell Massey’s Sandalwood. I happen to remember how vintage Shalimar in parfum form smelled. Deep and delicious. Obsession, Opium. These are the closest to skankfest that my noob self has come and on the right day in the right mood, they are all delicious.
I would love to check out skank.
I’ve thought about buying Rochas Femme or even Bal a Versialles, but I’ve been a little afraid. I adore Samsara and Dolce and Gabbana Feminine? The one with the red cap.
I should really take the plunge.
Y’know, people describe Joy as a skankfest, I don’t find it to be. Songes clobbered me over the head, but that was just sexy.
With Joy, it really depends on the concentration. To my nose, it’s only the edp that is the indole monster.
I get no skank from Bal at all, but I have never tried the vintage. I haven’t tried Femme yet, either, and I’m curious; you hear so much about it! I laugh every time I read the comments regarding her.
The one I Just Don’t Get is MKK…it just makes me think of a pile of dirty washing/oily scalp…I dunno; it must be some sort of musk aromachem they use I’m anosmic to or perhaps costus or beaver or something? My favorite dirty sweet musk is L Air du Rein. I enjoy Musc Ravegeur and Keils but have to be in the right mood or I get ‘too mannish’ from it as well. But then I’m old enough to have cut my teeth on what were probably real musks, or at least the bright sweet nitros in most ‘fumes…for instance a couple of weeks ago I had to do a surgical removal on a vintage Capricci extrait, spilling a bit on a cotton skirt. This old thing, which I used to treat as a happy rather white daytime summer floral, has a seriously deep skank. I sat there watching TV thinking about exactly the old real skank and this new contructed skank issue. I do not read cumin as dirty, I just get a rich spice. I see grapefuit a la Pampelune as sulphur-citric. I read this Kurdijan (sp?) as a sort of really enjoyable counterpoint of honey and sour spice as someone mentioned.The problem with possible anosmia is…well, just what is it????
Kingdom=taco meat YES! Elisa, I think you nailed that one. Taco meat with sandalwood, though. I’m really rather fond of Kingdom, I keep getting thhe little samples at Parfums Raffy. I had a small sample of APLS, and it’s gone– I took a hit off it every night til I couldn’t take it any more and then passed it on. My skankiest fume is my little bottle of Pucci Zadig–it’s a nice, sweaty disco-y old love bomb which takes me straight back in time to my 21st birthday at Chippendale’s and the waiter who handed me my gin and tonic then kissed me on the ear . . .those were the days:)>-
Hello, I would love to be entered in this comp if you think it would ship ok to the UK without causing a diplomatic incident. I’m a perfume newbie and so keen to dip my toe into this mysterious thing you call skank … and MFK sounds perfect for a beginner, no?!
Johanna
I haven’t smelled anything *YET* that was too skanky for me to wear. MKK, Rose Poivree and Eau de Joy all cracked me up the first time I tried them. I got: sweaty armpit, salami, and SEX. I like them all a lot, the RP especially, and they are less shocking on subsequent wears.
I grew up in El Paso, and like Disteza above, *too* much cumin does read to me as taco meat rather than skank.
Anyway, would love to try this!
Rose Poivree? I’ve never figured out what people are smelling who describe that as being skanky or infernal or what have you. To me it’s the most beautiful herbal un-sweet rose in the world, and my main sadness is that it vanishes off my skin like water in a hot skillet.
Yeah, I’ve heard people describe it totally differently. Some get major skank, some just get roses. I don’t know if it’s due to a reformulation, or some material that a lot of people are anosmic to. I didn’t smell it till this year, though, and I get BIG TIME salami.
Salami? Now, that’s interesting.
love this one! it smells like sex on paper even more than on skin. the skank doesn’t last – it just goes golden in that golden elixir way that MKK does. really delish. but i have it, so please leave me out of the drawing.
no one bats an eye when i wear this, btw – it just gets “you smell really good” comments. wear it proudly!!
The single nastiest thing I’ve put on my skin is a pure oud oil from Assam … it smelled strongly of a manure pile at the circus. Seriously. I had to scrub my wrist over and over to get rid of the stench. There are one or two Chinese ouds I’ve tried that were similarly animalic, but nothing like the Assam. The second nastiest thing I’ve tried was Art of Perfumery #2 (a niche perfumer that as far as I know is no longer around) – to me it reeked of citrus, rancid butter, and rotten teeth. Notes are listed as bergamot, lavender, basil, clary sage, nutmeg, and patchouli, so god only knows where the stench came from.
I will always love MKK, but never find it as skanky as most find it. The worst i have ever smelled was a very small bottle of pure civet oil that i bought for some perfume experiments… Now there was a 1000 yr old dirty kitty litter box if I ever found one. Not even 1 drop could be diluted enough that it wasn’t pure cat pee. Please enter me in the draw.
I don’t fear the skank – in fact, I love it! Bal a Versailles, Bandit, Femme – bring on the civet, the dirty musks, not to mention the cumin!
I love me some skank, and since one of my hidden super powers is de-skanking perfumes, I’m quite content to go out on a hot day wearing things like MKK and L’Air du Rien, although I found out the hard way that in 100+ degrees with equal humidity the Marquis de Sade is rather sadistically true to its namesake. Also being a cumin amplifier, Kingdom was !TOO MUCH! I could have flavored a taco stand with a single spritz. Anyway, I’ve tried the cologne version of Pour le Soir (love!), and would welcome the chance to smell the absolue.
Hidden super powers, that is too funny!
You had me at jezebel! I would love to have just a little taste….
I love musky skank-fests -including Unititled No. 8 by Brent Leonesio. I was shocked that I didn’t take to Absolue Pour le Soir like I expected (with the love-fest it was given by everyone last year).
No need to enter me in the draw.
Geordan
I should also say that the notes in AplS are very “compartmentalized” to/on me. It seems like sniffing separate vials from an apothecary chest.
I love Absolue Pour le Soir and most other skanky perfumes (Courtesan by Worth). However, the one skank monster that I couldn’t wear was Ava Luxe Rasa Extreme. I have the regular Rasa and love it but cannot wear the Extreme version. I would love to be in the drawing.
I own several mondo skanky scents, including Bal, a decant of vintage Femme, l’Air de Rien, PR La Nuit, Avon vintage Occur!, a sample of old ES Shocking that smells like grandma’s panties, and some vintage Arpege that’s a civet fest.
The skankiest scent I own, bar none, however, is a bottle of 50-year-old Intimate (Revlon?) whose top notes are bad-bad-bad. The top notes die fast, though, and the drydown consists of the most animalic ancient nitromusks you could find anywhere.
The best part? Tee-hee, I sent Musette some as an extra in a swap. I don’t remember if I drew a skull and crossbones on the label, but I did warn her…
Anyway, I’ve been dying to try APLS, so please enter me in the draw.
Cumin doesn’t strike me as sweaty so much– i like how it can really brighten and lift a heavy composition. But I tire of it quickly if it’s around too long….
I like layering vintage Revlon Intimate– it’s all furry, animal muskiness!
You can throw me in for the draw– thanks, Patty!
I would love to try it!
The skankiest thing I have ever smelled was Scent by Theo Fennel-LT gives it 5 stars in the Guide,to me it smells like pure parfum version of MKK
xxx
Great review and entertaining comments! skank is not my thing – I like musc, but it’s a timid sort of longing from afar sort of like. As in Narciso Rodriguez Musc Intense. A kinder, gentler musc. A wimp, that’s what I am. And since the sample would likely be unappreciated, Patty, please pass it on to someone else if my name comes up.
I have a hard time, like Sherrie M., interpreting “skank” in a scent. I got out a wee sample of Bal a Versailles parfum, and on my skin, it smells soft, rich and complex, like AG Huere Exquise. I understand, intellectually, that they fall into a category of “animalic,” but I don’t get it. I love that smell.
On the other hand, I have a real hard time standing grapefruit scents, because to me, grapefruit = sweat.
Haven’t sniffed a lot of cumin-y scents so far, so I can’t speak to that. But knowing my sensitivity to B.O. smells, I’m going to guess that I wouldn’t like it.
I’m with you… grapefruit smells like sour sweat on me, whereas the skank turns warm and cuddly.. Bal, MKK, etc., all do it.
Dinner by Bobo. Maybe the only perfume that ever actually, literally nauseated me. But I’d love to smell this one.
I don’t mind cumin so much- it reads “food” instead of “sweat” for me.
Obviously the skankiest thing I have every smelled was Secretions Magnifique, which I keep double bagged. It smells like an alien with really bad hygiene.
OMG Secretions Magnifique. One of the ONLY times I have wanted to vom 10 minutes after sniffing a perfume. That stuff HAUNTS, like a scent tattoo.
I can’t ever be near it again. I think I would cry.
All the same, I want to meet someone who wears it! :)
So Absolue pour le Soir is skanky? I had no idea. LOL :D
I tried it a month ago and I loved it. On my skin it was beautiful.
I usually don’t like skank on my perfumes, but this one is gorgeous!
The skankiest perfume I have ever smelt is a sample of an Ajmal oud. It smelt like roquefort cheese!
Please, enter me in the draw. Thanks!
Hmm…My biggest problem was with Andy Tauer’s Orris. Bad, bad, bad. It was a disappointment, too, unlike ElDO Secretions because that was supposed to stink and smell provocative. I’ve tried Kingdom and I didn’t love it, but it wasn’t because of the cumin. So, I’d give this one a try.
Amazingly, the skankiest in the world on me was 4711 Splash when I was a teenager. I didn’t really get what the problem was but remember telling my mom that I couldn’t wear it, because it “smells like old dirty nightgowns!” Ja just never know . . . .
Dirty nightgowns! Funny. (I don’t like 4711 either, but it’s the citrus for me…)
I mean, I don’t care much for citrus.
TIE: MKK and Kingdom. I wish I could say that I’ve discovered an “after glow” in MKK, something that comes beyond that assault of an opening, but nope. Of course, it is possible I’ve not hung around long enough to find it–perfumes tend to play out very slowly on me. Kingdom just never ends. This I know.
Which makes it all the more funny about Absolue pour le Soir…it is also a powerhouse of an opening, perhaps a notch more intense than Kingdom, not as much animal options all in one as MKK…but since I had my lazy day accident of not scrubbing, I found the drydown. Or at least, the next act. Took about half an hour to get there, but man was it scrumptious (without being gourmand). I am generally skank-phobic, but am trying to figure out how to make room for this one in my life.
So, don’t enter me in the draw; I have a sample. But please, if you win, take it from She Who Adores Things Like L’Eau d’Hiver…you really should wait for it. Because if you find it, I think you’ll love it.
If you don’t find it, hunt me down. I’ll make a pot of tea and apologize. :)
I should clarify: Kingdom is entirely about the cumin on me, and the skank of APLS is cuminy, too. But MKK? When I said “all the animal options in one,” I mean sweat of an unclean person with plenty of hints of all the things that might be clinging to an unwashed hard worked animal, an animal whose identity as biped or quadraped is somewhat irrelevant at that particular point in time.
Hope that helps sort things. ;)
Yea, Shelley! Your experience sounds much like mine. I can’t take most cumin or animalic scents, but there’s just something extraordinary about this one. And I’ll be glad to help you console via a pot of tea. :)
See? Two support staff on the cumin-skank-support sidelines, ready to cheer you through the long race and greet you with tea afterwards… :)
And yeah, Ann, just what is it about this one that gives it a “bye” as far as the usual problems go? I see Isa (below) and you (above) are saying the same things…hmmmm….love the dense rich velveteen and satin comforter you describe; with you on that.
are you finally ‘in’ for Kingdom? I’m always confused – you have such a Forbidden Love thing going with that – and I feel your pain…I know you soooo want to love it! … 😕
xoxo >-)
ps. wearing Charmes y Leaves today – in honor of the windchimes losing their minds in the galeforce winds….I have you to thank for intro’ing me to this love…^:)^
Charmes came by way of Shelley? I LOVE it. I sent the wind to blow you off your porch:)
::waves:: :)
thanks for the wind! It was 65F here today!!! and the wind was just lovely!!!
Yes, Mistress Shelley was the yenta for me and CyL. I didn’t even know it existed…we were at Barneys…she spritzed. I was done. LOVE!
xoxo >-)
No, no; go back to the first paragraph. It ties with MKK for scariest skank. Kingdom and I are still tangoing from opposite corners. When I bother to even acknowledge its existence. Blasted cumin nightmare, and by cumin I mean panty cumin, not cooking cumin. (Yes, it can read one way or the other to me, depending on the perfume. Usually it heads for the gusset and not the dinner plate.)
Charmes and Leaves, on the other hand…never offensive. :)
The Nice n Easy ad prevents me from reading the whole post, but I’ve gotten most of it…I find Bandit pretty skanky; I love MKK; so please enter me. It’s okay if it isn’t double wrapped. Let’s scare my mailman!
Thanks for the chance. :-)
I’ve never met a fragrance yet that had too much “skank” for me. My top skank fumes: NM Midnight Tryst and MKK. Please enter me in the drawing, as I’d love to see if anything could actually make me say, “Wow! That *is* skanky!” and perhaps find another fragrance to love.
Lovin’ this post and all the comments.
The main skanks I have and love are Bal a Versailles and Femme (new). Jicky is fab and I never think of it as skank.
Would love to try this one, so please enter me in the draw.
I’m not sure what I think of this scent. I had a small decant and I wore it a few times. As HemlockSillage mentioned above, I’m not sure that it really registered as “classic skank” to me. But it was certainly strong, strange and a bit of a bully. It was like incense on steroids with a highly animalic presence. I kept thinking what an odd incense it was.
As for “classic skank”? I love old vintage scents that are fairly dripping with civet and other goodies. I have a large sample of vintage Visa parfum that’s just off the skank-o-meter charts. A drop or two and it positively blooms on skin. Trolling ebay for a bottle only disappoints. Tiny little bottles that sell for ridiculous prices….
Oh and I don’t need to be entered in the drawing!
I think MKK has nothing on this one.
I would love a sample! I tried at a shop in Hamburg (on paper), and it was exactly what I imagined it would be after reading about it on Grain de Musc. It is amazing! I would love to give it a try. (At home.) It’s wonderful that Francis K put this out.
Absolue way out ran my skank-o-meter. I enjoy many cumin scents, and they certainly read as “B.O.” to me-but the Absolue was pretty vile on my skin. Butt, as described above, piss, and all sorts of lesser body fluids. Y’ll enjoy!
I’d love to try this. I’m a newly-blooming skank whore. I found a mini of very vintage Tabu! and want to roll around in it. Ditto vintage -or any, really- Jicky. MKK and APLS are on my to-try list along with the other skankies mentioned.
I’m always so intrigued by these conversations. I just don’t understand skank; I love that cumin smell but always just interpret it as “salt” or “spice”. My impressions of AplS are the same as Ann’s–dense, heavy burgundy comforter. To me it was alot like Attrape Coeur with added cumin and smoke, and the cumin, I thought, cut the richness of the composition.
And as for indoles, I just don’t get it…can one be anosmic to them? I get the mothball smell sometimes with white florals, but never any kind of fecal smell. Once my husband made a comment on A La Nuit, but all I got was a nice jasmine.
Anways, no need to enter me in the draw. I already have (and love) a sample of Absolue. For my worst “skank” experience, I’ll have to say Guerlain Pampelune–eau de unchanged litter box on me–I’ll take unwashed humans over spraying tomcat anyday!
Sherri, an excellent description of it! I normally run screaming from cumin, but in this case, you’re right on the money in saying that it cuts the scent’s richness. Thanks!
FINALLY – I’ve come across another person like me!
What a revelation.
I could have written this post by Sherri M. because my experiences are the same as hers — even her reaction to Guerlain Pamplelune (definitely Pipi de Chat on my skin, Ewwww….)
I am fascinated by the “skank” and “indoles” issues with perfumes because they usually don’t exist in my world of smell. I DO wonder if OTHER people smell these on me when I wear certain fragrances – but no one has ever commented about it – not even my nearest and dearest.
Scent is SUCH a mystery, isn’t it?
I’m willing to try a sample of Absolue if I’m lucky enough to get one.
I’ve also wondered if other people can smell certain notes in my perfumes that I’m anosmic to. Most musks, for example, I simply can’t smell. What vibes am I unwittingly sending out to the world via my perfume? :-?
I love retro-skank and would love to enter the drawing. Contempo-skank, not so much. Recoiled at MKK and ELdO’s Secretions.
Ooh, I love skanky perfume – but not so much with cumin. I prefer the Old School type, so Eau d’Hermes, Bal, Shocking, original Femme – and of course Mitsy. I have sniffed the Absolue and liked it but haven’t tried on skin yet. It could actually prove to be one I’d buy as long as the cumin isn’t too…cuminy.
I LOVE Absolue Pour le Soir, and a bottle is on my wish list. But I’m a big fan of both cumin and skank. MKK is just warm, golden and cuddly – like cat fur and slightly dirty hair. Mona di Orio Nuit de Noire isn’t skanky on me either, I think it’s a lovely powdery jasmine with citrus. The scariest skank I’ve ever sniffed? I adore Jicky in EdT and parfum, but the EdP is too skanky for me. It smells like cat butt after an unfortunate accident. But it’s growing on me, so clearly I’m crazy.
E.coli butt is the funniest thing I’ve read in a long time. Thanks for the laugh, tammy!
No need to enter me in the draw, I have a big spray sample of Absolue.
I also get warm and cuddly with MKK. I like skank. A lot. So imagine my surprise when I didn’t get that with MKK. But, I do love it… and Untitled No. 8 does go unwashed body on me, but it’s not “sour, unwashed body”. It’s salty unwashed body that’s been to the beach and is relishing in another… very earthy and yum.