" Wolf " (Rayhaan)

I deferred to my fiancée on this one. Azzaro’s The Most Wanted EDP Intense came out in 2021, and around then I was gifted a 30 mL flacon that I never wear. Nothing is wrong with it; it’s a decent fragrance that smells good. But with its Batman bottle and ridiculous name, it is as “basic butch” as it gets. That’s right: Basic BUTCH. Clout-chaser clubbing juice.

It doesn’t get more basic. Intense bubblegum orange blossom opens the fragrance, with just enough cardamom to add a woody-spicy dimension. Next comes a toasted-sugar interlude that Azzaro calls “toffee” but that smells like more grapey bubblegum, all resting on an unabashedly synthetic, vanilla-soapy “amberwoods” base that drums along like the Energizer Bunny for hours. It’s less a fragrance than an olfactory texture: smooth.

But smooth gets boring, and the human brain, ever in search of meaning, starts combing that near-featureless landscape for anything that breaks the monotony. By hour six, the cheap chems Azzaro smudged together are jangling in your nasal canal like Marley’s chains on Christmas Eve.

For some ungodly reason, Rayhaan decided to clone it. Why? Who the fuck knows. A large bottle of the Azzaro runs about $70 if you apply yourself. That’s not cheap, but it’s hardly Creedy, I-blew-this-month’s-rent niche pricing. If I can hop on eBay and get it for the price of a discounted Montale, and it smells good (which it does), I’m solid . . . right?

Well . . . Rayhaan may have done the rarest of rare things and created a clone that is effectively superior. They aimed low and somehow bullseyed it. The fragrance has no printed name, only the striking relief of a wild canine on both box and bottle. It’s easily the most gorgeous bottle in my collection, and it deserves some sort of award. If I found it in a stranger’s luggage, I’d be slightly unnerved; it’s a container fit for Victorian vampires. Yes, the graphics are A.I., and yes, that kinda sucks, but it just works. It looks badass.

The fragrance? Basic Butch. It’s 99% Azzaro, minus the cardamom and with a more distinct toffee note in the heart. Without the cool spice, it’s smoother, more balanced, and warmer than its template. The top is little more than concentrated orange blossom and that same toasted sugar: sweet, a bit grapey, a bit floral. Expensive chewing gum.

My fiancée, who has a great sense of smell, called the Rayhaan “rounder,” “softer,” and, interestingly, “more complex.” She almost favored the Azzaro but found it too loud and piercing, and said she’d prefer it toned down. To her, the cardamom was indistinct yet detectable, a spice that enlivened things. The Rayhaan struck her as sweeter, more vanillic, and warmer, while the Azzaro, despite its spice, smelled cooler. She found that counterintuitive until I explained that cardamom is considered a “cool” spice. Her verdict: too close to call. The Azzaro is fresher and less sweet; the Rayhaan is richer, with a more resolute candy thing going on and a smoothness that never relents.

Here’s what Rayhaan figured out. When smoothness goads the brain into picking a fragrance apart, an unlikely spice like cardamom eventually addles that brain into submission. Keep it sweet all around, and the dissection becomes sensory quicksand. The more you fumble for something solid to grab onto, the deeper you sink into the sugary morass, only to realize that dying a smooth death is sweeter than living a spicy life.

The cardamom in the Azzaro is an interesting note, but because my brain seeks it out, it becomes THE note. Removing it leaves a simple chord of grape bubblegum, butter toffee, and woody amber that is truly coherent, the olfactory equivalent of a T-shirt and ballcap. I feel weird wearing it, since I don’t drive a tricked-out Subaru and I don’t call everyone “Bro.” But I still like it. It might just be the perfect clone.

Club de Nuit Iconic (Armaf)

Bergamot, Tobacco, Ginger, & Vetiver

I went into this one expecting a Creed clone, and I wasn’t disappointed. Club de Nuit Iconic (2022) hit YouTube and TikTok as a supposed Bleu de Chanel clone. Countless broccoli heads and fragbros made the comparison not because they believed it, but because everyone else did.

Having owned and worn Creed’s Tabaróme Millésime (2000), I saw Iconic in a different light. Tabaróme Millésime was important to the fragrance zeitgeist of the 2010s, arguably in Aventus’s league, yet nobody recognizes it as such, because it’s understated, pallid, and overlooked even among Creed fans. It’s also simple: bergamot, ginger, tobacco, and vetiver over Ambroxan, tied together by a watery melon à la Millésime Impérial. Bleu de Chanel (2010) is more complex, with pink pepper, nutmeg, mint, ginger, jasmine, grapefruit, labdanum, incense, patchouli, and synthetic sandalwood. It smells beefier, mintier, and far more woody-floral, with a flinty whiff of smoke from the incense. Vintage Bleu was Aqua Velva on steroids.

Weirdly, Tabaróme Millésime smells like a simplified Bleu. Whether it’s the interplay of bergamot, ginger, and slightly sweet tobacco leaf, or the way the nutty vetiver plays off the aromatics, it reads to me as a precursor to Polge’s Chanel. Likewise, Club de Nuit Iconic smells virtually identical to vintage Tabaróme Millésime, making it yet another Creed clone by Armaf, and a damn good one. It offers crisp lemon and bergamot, ginger root, light and grassy Virginia tobacco (tea-like in nature), and vetiver, with a restrained (for Armaf) Ambroxan and white musk in the base. It isn’t heavy or dense, and it’s just as watery and indistinct as Tabaróme Millésime. A nondescript melon note flutters somewhere in the heart, but it feels like a molecule and never resolves into a definite fruit.

Does it smell like Bleu? Only as much as Tabaróme Millésime does, so yes, sort of: a weaker, simpler, proto-Bleu de Chanel. The blue bottle makes everyone assume a Chanel clone, but I think it’s a successful misdirection by Armaf. Market it as a Tabaróme Millésime clone and fewer guys will bite. Make them think it’s cloning Bleu, and social media lights up as if Fragrantica’s review section were Kevin McCallister’s house.

Femme, 1989 (Rochas)

Femme has a long and storied history as Edmond Roudnitska's breakthrough chypre. According to legend, it was created in a dusty old warehouse that doubled as a lab in war-torn Paris, 1943. One imagines perfumer's alcohol being stored in used bottles of Vichy water, but I digress—one spray, and my first thought was, Mitsouko!

Except it's Mitsouko with warmth and carnality. Instead of Guerlain's laser-focused bergamot, I get cumin, fistfuls of cumin. There are conflicting accounts of how the cumin accord came to pass. Some sources claim that Olivier Cresp of Quest International singlehandedly added the cumin when Femme was reformulated and reissued in 1989, which led to Roudnitska crying, "They stole my Femme!" Other accounts suggest that Cresp worked closely with Roudnitska on the '89 formula, and that the Master Perfumer asked him to utilize a cumin accord similar to what Roudnitska had formulated decades earlier for Eau d'Hermès. I tend to think that this story makes more sense. Roudnitska was still working in the late '80s, and there's no reason why Cresp wouldn't have deferred to him. The cumin is both skanky and fresh; the citrus, bergamot and mandarin, smells rich and perfectly rounded, offsetting the sweaty spice just enough to keep the top of Femme smelling subversively French. Think freshly washed vagina in perfume form. 

Armchair historians also claim the cumin was never in the original formula of Femme, but I'm not entirely sure that's accurate, either. There is no definitive description of the formula for Roudnitska's Femme, and given that he explored cumin as a "fresh" note, I wouldn't be surprised if 1940s bottles contained some. Perspectives on vintage Femme are somewhat indirect and inconclusive, and anything is possible. Once the superlatively spicy top begins to evaporate and melt into the aldehydes c-14, c-18, and the Prunol base, Femme gets very vintage Guerlain in vibe, and a familiar (and rudimentary) chypre accord emerges and dominates. Yet, where Mitsouko feels cold and aloof, Femme feels warm and personable. Mitsouko is a marble mausoleum in the misty woods of a forgotten cemetery; Femme is a hunter's blind at midnight in the same woods, with a roaring campfire illuminating a russet chiaroscuro of reds and browns and burnt greens. The chypre forest of Guerlain is haunted and silent, save for a subdued peach light from deep in the gloaming; the woods of Femme glow creamy and sweet, and are redolent of a post-summer harvest. 

I own two bottles of Femme, both nearly identical to the version pictured above, with the only major differences being that mine have black caps, and their liquid is much darker. More of a reddish-brown than a golden amber. There is no oakmoss in either bottle, and I detect that a patchouli accord was used to compensate for its absence. My bottles are the 1989 formula, and the cumin is dirty, but good dirty, evocative of how women smell on an intimate level. Were Cresp and Roudnitska attempting to replicate the natural perfume of a young woman's loins? Seems like a "yes" to me. Having had my fair share of sensual encounters, I recognize, with some amusement, that the first 30 minutes of Femme nails her deep musk. Then Prunol steps forward, and the fruitiness of the composition explodes on skin, a veritable basket of plum, prune, peach, and apricot, with the zest of mandarin still whispering in the wings. The edibles are joined by flowers: of chief importance are Bulgarian rose, jasmine, ylang, and immortelle. The immortelle lends the heart a curried sweetness, not unlike raw honey. And, of course, there's labdanum. 

In lieu of oakmossy powder, the base instead hews into cedarwood and birchwood, with a faint smoky angle from the birch, a brightness from the cedar, and that dollop of patchouli to smudge everything together. Benzoin and a dash of vanilla further cement the chypre structure, and Femme endures as a woody-sweet glow for well over 20 hours. This is a classic of French perfumery, ideal for cool autumn days and evenings. It's so good that if, like me, you are loath to replace your bottle of Mitsouko when it's finished, there is no cause for worry, for Femme is the sexier, friendlier, and more complex chypre.

La Petite Robe Noire Black Perfecto EDP (Guerlain)

This is a short review because there's really only one thing I can say about Black Perfecto that doesn't bear much in descriptive excess. I think you know where I'm going with this. For everyone out there who likes Creed's original 2008 Love in Black (LiB), but can't afford it, well, here's your fragrance. Guerlain's 2017 release in the seemingly endless La Petite Robe Noire (LPRN) line is very affordable these days at roughly $45 per 50 mL bottle, and it is 99.9% Love in Black. And, like '08 LiB, it's discontinued. 

The only difference between the Creed and the Guerlain is in the choice of fruit. Love in Black contains a somewhat abstract blackcurrant and cranberry accord that doesn't quite elucidate either fruit. Guerlain opts for a black cherry accord that smells perhaps a tick sweeter and a few ticks clearer, but which basically does the same thing. The rest? Virtually identical to LiB. I mean, these two are really, really close to each other. But the kicker is that Black Perfecto actually smells more natural, and thus feels a bit more luxe, and I can't believe I'm writing this, but I actually prefer it. 

The niche for this scent profile is hard to pin down. Guerlain's PR pushes Black Perfecto as the LPRN line's "rock chick" flanker, with supposedly clear accents of leather. I don't really get any leather. Instead, I get violet, iris—a ton of iris—and that dry, powdery, gothic gloaming of wilted roses and cedar chests. A haunted mansion somewhere in the hills, with a gorgeous widow forever grieving, still wearing the funeral dress from when her beloved died 140 years ago. Her dress, her hair, and her breath, all reek. 

But her perfume? To die for.

La Petite Robe Noire Eau de Parfum Absolue (Guerlain)

At the age of 44, I've finally developed a full appreciation for Guerlain. It took a while. For many years there, I wasn't convinced of the supposed quality behind their perfumes and was perhaps a bit blinded by the outrageous quality of 2000s vintage Creeds. We can't expect people to spend ungodly amounts of time macerating micro-batches, nor can we demand that they spend insane amounts of money on unnecessarily premium materials to make said micro-batches, so a little maturing on my part was in order.

I came around to the La Petite Robe Noire (LPRN) line when I realized that my bottle of Love in Black (LiB) was running low and I didn't feel like coughing up $140 for another one. If you're familiar with LiB, you know that it's a gloriously synthetic concoction of cheap-smelling violet ionones and all the sweet musks required to achieve an intense violet/iris accord, and that this unmitigated trashiness is the appeal. It's so cartoonishly "goth" and dark in its brooding floral sweetness that it works perfectly on a guy. No Guerlains promise that exact vibe . . . but a few come pretty close. La Petite Robe Noire Eau de Parfum Absolue, released in 2023, is one such Guerlain. (There's another that actually comes even closer to LiB, but that one is for a future review.)

LPRN EDP Absolue is "rich college chick" juice. She's 20 years old. She's working toward her psych major. Gorgeous, not because of any inherent qualities, but because rich people can afford to be genetically choosy. And she bathes in LPRN fragrances. The EDP Absolue is just her latest love, and she gushes about it to all her girlfriends and wears it to class religiously. But here's the thing: this fragrance is complex and really well made. Like LiB, it uses the Biolandes orris extract to render its slightly bready iris accord. But unlike LiB, it elicits a wide array of comments from people around the wearer, ranging from "a nice fruity smell" to "smells like pancakes and syrup."

I even had someone tell me it smells like Axe body spray. This speaks to the loudness of the fragrance more than to any deficits it may have. While I wouldn't call it "top tier" Guerlain, Absolue inhabits the Made-for-American-Girls category of dumb-reach fruity-florals that influencers can correctly characterize as "elevated." Yes, it's just another casual mall juice, something best worn for weekend errands. Yet Guerlain manages to infuse it with a level of material quality and blending that puts it in femme Creed territory. You'll get the same mileage out of this as you'd get out of Love in Black. It opens with bright, juicy cherry. Smells stunning. Laced through the juiciness is violet, which balances the tanginess with some floral sharpness. I also get the orris and a pleasant pink rose that doesn't smack you over the head. It slides like fine silk along steampunk sugared-cherry curves, a floral texture more than a living bloom.

There's a freshness that lifts the composition into another hemisphere, and that freshness is black tea. It's a touch tannic and smoky, even a little aquatic, in a freshwater way. There are subtle hints of licorice and not-so-subtle hints of marzipan, but then the heliotropin takes over, and a slightly leathery cherry-almond heliotrope accord carries the fragrance through the rest of the day. While not quite as pitch-black as Love in Black, Absolue feels sophisticated and sexually moody, sort of the way an indie French film from the '90s starring Juliette Binoche feels. Men can manage this fragrance thanks to its eerie aloofness, but wear with caution—this stuff fills large rooms.

Spectre Wraith Eau de Parfum (French Avenue)

A shot . . . of Espresso

Luca Turin once bluntly said, "Coffee fragrances don't work." This was after a year or two of waxing poetic about several fairly expensive coffee fragrances. It left me wondering if he'd been overly enthusiastic about the advent of coffee perfumes, only to realize with some chagrin that most of them smelled outré, chemical, unwearable. Thierry Mugler's A*Men was the world's first and only mainstream coffee frag, a mid-nineties attempt at saturnine gourmand accords that today reads as a bit harsh and crude, but back then was exotic and undeniably artistic. Its saving grace was an intentionally chemical interlude between its minty-bright opening accord and mocha-bean patchouli base, which manifested as a "tar" note of indescribably macabre weirdness. 

French Avenue, which is really just the label name for a company called Fragrance World Perfumes, operates out of the United Arab Emirates and has a small niche line of "clone" fragrances under the Spectre moniker. These include Spectre and Spectre Ghost (both 2023). While Spectre gets some cult love for its rendition of Matière Première's Falcon Leather, and Spectre Ghost gets oodles of heart emoji for being a damned close chromo of Ani, Nishane's brown study in wet oils, Spectre Wraith (2024) straddles the midline in popularity, garnering faithful adherents on one side, and dismissive regrets on the other. Ostensibly a copy of By Kilian's Black Phantom, Wraith aims to be a sultry coffee-based gourmand. I will say that its bottling presentation is one of the most creative I've ever seen. Wraith's matte black bottle, "shot" by a bullet that retained its casing, is striking. 

The fragrance matches. Wraith opens with a semisweet cherry cordial accord, rather like one of those pricy dark chocolates with the even darker fruit filling, and in those first five minutes, Wraith smells quite mesmerizing. It's like Wayne Szalinski shrunk me down to the size of an ant, took a bite from just such a choco-cherry confection, and dropped a glob of it on my head. It surrounds me in a rich haze of mellow sweetness, and I have to admit, it's pretty amazing. If it stopped there, I'd say it's merely a unique but linear crowdpleaser, but it doesn't stop there. The whole things morphs into an esoteric niche frag of black coffee with buttercream, and smells like a smoother and more refined version of A*Men's tar. This is something that will appeal to a relatively small subset of fragrance aficionados, and it should—it's abstruse but beautifully made, and perfect for cold autumn and winter evenings. This coffee fragrance does work.