2025
I shared these musings over on Patreon last summer, and because I have nothing lined up to post here on the blog while I am traveling this week, I thought I could share them here, too. Incidentally, over on Patreon today, I shared the perfumes that I am traveling with!
Along with sentiments and quotes from books and cinema, I often squirrel away observations and ideas from my rambling internal dialogues to include in future perfume reviews. I have pages and pages of notebooks with “inspired” scribblings like “a putrid effluvium of hatred, distrust, and malaise,” or “aggressively piquant, like Kali-Ma with a necklace of peppers and chilis,” or “the moldy salmon scrapings of the inner rind of the pumpkin.”
I was thinking today of how back in 2017 or so, I started listening to the TANIS podcast. I was a bit late to the party; I was convinced I didn’t care for podcasts, so I had never listened to any at that point, but a friend had talked up how creepy it was, and I was intrigued. I’m not going to be that patronizing guy who gives you a whole rundown of what this podcast is about, other than to tell you it’s a mystery pseudo-documentary type-thing. Everyone has already heard it by now, so you don’t need me to fill you in. (Also, I listened to maybe 20 episodes back then, and even so, I still couldn’t tell you what it was about.)
I never got very far into it and I suspect it’s because I made the amateur move of listening to it at 5am during my early morning walks, where the streets were all dark and the houses unlit, the entire neighborhood was sleeping, and I felt like the only person in the world…and those were the mornings when I was NOT listening to an extremely unsettling story. TANIS, on top of that, made me feel like I was having a heart attack every morning. I don’t even know if it was actually that scary, but situationally speaking, it was scary as hell.
Anyway, I was thinking about it today for some reason or another, and it occurred to me…hey! I’d like to have a perfume that reminds me of listening to creepy-ass episodes of TANIS at 5am in the morning, alone in the dark. WOULDN’T THAT BE FUN, RIGHT?!
I’ve narrowed down the elements I would like to see included in this fragrance…what do you think?
Mystery:
-A deep, shadowy base note that’s hard to identify. Perhaps something like vetiver or patchouli, but altered to feel unfamiliar.
-A faint, elusive note that appears and disappears, like wisps of fog in the pre-dawn light.
Tension:
-A sharp, almost metallic middle note that creates a sense of alertness, like adrenaline coursing through your veins.
-A hint of ozone, reminiscent of the charged air before a storm, keeping you on edge.
Unease:
-A slightly sour or bitter undertone, just enough to create discomfort without being overwhelming.
-A cold, damp note like rain on concrete, evoking empty suburban streets.
Low thrumming dread:
-A deep, resonant base note that you feel more than smell, like the vibration of distant machinery.
-Perhaps a very subtle animalic note, hinting at unseen predators.
Prickling, hair-raised sensation:
-A tingling, almost electric top note that creates a physical sensation of alertness.
-Maybe a hint of mint or eucalyptus, but twisted to feel unsettling rather than refreshing.
Empty world atmosphere:
-A hollow, airy quality to the overall scent, suggesting vast empty spaces.
-Faint traces of familiar human scents (skin musk? coffee?) that are more ghostly memories than present realities.
The overall composition could be described as a scent that starts cold and sharp, slowly unfurling into something deeper and more ominous. It should create a feeling of being acutely aware of your surroundings while also sensing that something is not quite right with the world. Also the feeling like you’re the only person awake in a world that’s holding its breath, waiting for something to happen.
If you enjoy posts like these or if you have ever enjoyed or been inspired by something I have written, and you would like to support this blog, consider buying the author a coffee?
