Le Joker

Tom Ford's Oud Minérale is my favorite fragrance, and this is the closest thing I've smelled to it. That being said, this is not a clone of OM. It opens with the same calone and pepper accord, which gives a piquant fresh-aquatic impression. The calone here is strong, perhaps even stronger than in OM. It's so powerful and concentrated that it becomes highly reminiscent of honeydew melon or sweet cucumber. It also shares this note with Les Liquides Imaginaires Abyssis, another woody marine scent (and another one of my favorites) by the nose who created OM, Shyamala Maisondieu. Yet another fragrance featuring this accord is the now-discontinued Whispered Myths from Imaginary Authors, where it comes across more like cantaloupe and is blended into a different note structure. Beyond the aquatic opening, Oud Minérale is extraordinarily salty, briney, dark, and aggressive, while Le Joker veers in a slightly different direction. There is no oceanic salty aggression here. Instead, we begin to detect a sappy and fresh sweet resin of conifers. It's a heart / base of cedar, and very freshly cut cedar wood, still green and living. Not the spicy greenness of cedar boughs, but the vanillic balsam of true Pacific Northwest cambium. This sweet cedar-balsam accord is supported by some other vaguely incensey notes, and more notably by earthy-camphorous kitchen spices and herbs: star anise and licorice root. The resinous wood balsam at the heart of Le Joker is very different from the driftwood oud accord found in Oud Minérale. Interestingly, this part of its composition resembles another (third!) Shyamala Maisondieu perfume: Tom Ford's Bois Marocain, an extraordinarily cool, sappy, balsam, and aromatic envoy of the Cupressaceae. And, that's about it for Le Joker. There may be some other well-blended notes mingled in below my threshold of detection, but overall that's the message here: a huge opening of calone and pepper, followed by a heart of deep, rich, warm cedar balsam. It's not the most complex mixture; it doesn't stand up to OM, but nonetheless it's a winning formula. The fact that it's less aggressive makes this appealing almost in the sense of feeling like a lighter OM flanker: Eau de Oud Minérale? Either way, it's nice. By the standards of my personal taste, 93%.

This is a masculine scent on me, I smell a lot of tobacco and leather... the animal smell is spot on! I dont have any trace of pepper, and actually when it's too warm it smells a bit like E45 on me! (which I'm not sure I like at all...!) Having said that, but I do notice when it's much cooler, the animal notes fade and it smells a lot more marine-like. The sillage and longevity is not strong or long on me, but its intriguing enough to keep me fascinated... I'll wear it for a few more days and see if my opinion changes! Update: a month after wearing this - I LOVE IT! I can’t say when or how it happened, but after a while it just morphs with your natural scent and becomes amazing!

Wow, received a small sample of this with an order from an online retailer. It reminds me of oud minerale, but I think I like this WAY WAY more. It has very common accords, but perhaps seems to indulge them a little more than oud minerale. Additionally, it has some woods that I do not find in oud minerale. Really intrigued!

I think this fragrance does the modern Joker character proud. The contrasting elements evoke an aloof air, yet beckon you to draw closer. As a woman, I appreciate the bright citrus nuances in the opening of the fragrance, which initially gave me the confidence to wear this scent on a summer day. However, the dry down carries more of the woody masculine notes, so I feel a man could wear this in an office/work setting, whereas it may wear more appropriately on a female in the evening hours (when things are getting... crazier).

Le Joker smells like an expensive restaurant on the beach. It’s the end of the summer, the air is thick with food that has spent too much time in a smoker; the sound of a dry martini pouring into a chilled glass; shell fish served on open platters; fancy people lounging in the open air. Le Joker has a lot going on but it all retains a natural, relaxed feel. This smells like money, and it’s oddly appealing. I like it though I’m not compelled to make an addition to my collection.