New Perfume Review Blackbird Zola Jesus Taiga- Snowy Forest

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There haven’t been a lot of Rock & Roll fragrances that have actually really captured the sense of the music within the perfume. When I received my latest set of samples from Seattle-based Blackbird there was one of these collaborations in the package. Perfumer Aaron Way collaborated closely with indie rock singer Zola Jesus to develop a new fragrance to coincide with the release of her fourth album “Taiga”. The new Zola Jesus Taiga perfume is the result.

Zola Jesus is an American indie music artist who composes moody songs which make full use of her unique vocals. The video above for “Dangerous Days” off of “Taiga” is a good example of the kind of influences found throughout her work. This is of course the problem when I am familiar with the artist because I carry some preconceptions of what I think a perfume based on Zola Jesus should smell like. Zola Jesus is quoted in an interview on Nylon that Zola Jesus Taiga smells, “primal, environmental, ancestral, of earth.” I think Mr. Way approached this from the literal meaning of the word taiga as the extreme northern pine forests mainly found in Canada and Russia. Running throughout the fragrance is a swirl of consistent smoke similar to the way woodsmoke hangs in the trees on a cold winter day.

Aaron Way

Aaron Way

Zola Jesus Taiga opens with the smoke of both wood and incense providing a set of complementary smokiness. Frankincense is used in a very pure form and as such it carries that liturgical kind of ritual smoke with it. Mr. Way fashions a woodsmoke accord from Choya Loban and cade. This vies with two sources of frankincense from India and Oman. The latter is a particularly smoky version of frankincense. The frozen forest is represented by a panoply of wood notes as copaiba balsam, cedar, gaiac, oak, and sandalwood provide the arboreal accord in the heart. The base is an oud accord made of nagarmotha which is a much more restrained oud-like presence. It provides its own kind of exotic smoke.

Zola Jesus Taiga has 14-16 hour longevity. It also has very prodigious sillage for 4-6 hours before mellowing out to something more average over the remaining time on my skin.

I am not sure Zola Jesus Taiga captures the Zola Jesus part of the equation as well as it does the taiga part. If you’re looking for an indie rock perfume this still doesn’t fit the bill on that score. If you want a woody smoky perfume that captures a high winter day Zola Jesus Taiga gets that correct.

Disclosure: This review was based on a sample provided by Blackbird.

–Mark Behnke

New Perfume Review Blackbird Broken Glass- The Beauty of Broken Things

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We picked up a ding on our automobile windshield a few weeks ago. At first it was a focused circular bloom of tiny cracks. Over time two of those cracks broke free and began to elongate over the expanse of the entire windshield. I have been morbidly fascinated with this slow process of entropy. I have been so fascinated that Mrs. C had to very sternly remind me to schedule the repair. Looking at the world through a fracture allows me to see things as slightly disjointed. It means things I view through the cracks of the windshield are made into something flawed. Observing the shattered aspects perversely allows me to find an ephemeral beauty in the subject I am observing. For the past month I have been wearing a perfume which provides the same olfactory perspective of cracks within something previously unified. The perfume is Blackbird Broken Glass.

A year ago the Seattle, WA brand Blackbird made a significant shift in the way they make their perfumes. The in-house perfumer Aaron Way went from composing simple linear fragrances to making one of my favorite avant-garde perfumes of 2014 called Triton. I was hoping that Triton was not going to be a singularity. The two new fragrances I received a month ago, of which Broken Glass is one, indicate that this is going to be the Blackbird aesthetic going forward.

Aaron Way

Aaron Way

Very often when I wear a perfume for the first time it tends to be easily categorized in my mental catalog. What I enjoyed so much about Triton last year and now Broken Glass is Mr. Way is working on keeping the wearer off-balance. Just as I think I know where the perfume is going the development heads off in a different direction. Just like those ever elongating cracks on my windshield.

Mr. Way opens Broken Glass with the silvery shine of violet leaves matched with the green rose quality of geranium. At this point I was expecting a path forward into deeper green notes. Instead Mr. Way sends a crack infused with caraway and opoponax as instead of green we get black. Then it takes a ninety degree turn as a fulsome jasmine veritably explodes from within the gathering of the darker notes. The jasmine feels perfectly placed and at the same time out of place. It is the starburst crack at the heart of Broken Glass. Amyris and davana set up a slightly woody accord in the base where Mr. Way layers in cardamom and baie rose. This provides some warmth in contrast to the cooler darker notes in the top as Broken Glass forms its final fractal.

Broken Glass has 10-12 hour longevity and average sillage.

When I call Broken Glass avant-garde this should indicate that this is a perfume that desires the attention of the wearer. Mr. Way has composed a perfume which is always changing as the wearer’s perspective changes. He has made a perfumed version of a world viewed askew. If looking at the world through a cracked lens sounds appealing you should pick this perfume up. Even though my windshield will be repaired in the next couple of days Broken Glass will allow me to continue to find beauty in broken things.

Disclosure: This review was based on a sample provided by Blackbird.

–Mark Behnke