Happy Hardcore

I was so incredibly excited to receive my discovery set from Binaurale, which contains their six current fragrances. For each fragrance, I have done a blind smell test, only after thoroughly taking in the scent and determining a true and thoughtful opinion, I will review the notes. After this test, I have worn each scent for a full day, one by one, all on their own. No layering. This is the first one I wore, There is something so nostalgic about this scent to me, it's one of those scents you get a whiff of passing by, something you can detect for only a moment, it takes you back, the memories flooding through your own perspective, then it is gone. You chase that high, wondering where the time has gone. The fact I have finally found a bottled up version of this emotion, is almost overstimulating, but I mean it when I say it is a high you will continue to chase for the rest of your life. All of their scents definitely awaken the senses, I will definitely be purchasing the full size bottles. The pepper and saffron blend so well together, along with the fruity guava I get after the dry down, this scent truly sits well on my skin, even after a few hours the scent is prominent and bursting with a new like aroma, this one slightly more sweet, and subtle. Most of their scents give me "liminal space" vibes, so glad Instagram practically harassed me into buying it. 9.4/10.

I LOVE this. Like, I aggressively love it. It's spicy and sweet and each note is perfect. It smells like nothing else out there right now. It's not the perfume in the set I was interested in buying, but it's the one I WILL buy. Edited to add: I did buy this, and there's a fleeting but absolutely noticeable gasoline note which isn't listed. I love it, but you may not.

Absolutely lovely. It's full of VERY polarizing notes. Rose, patchouli, jammy notes. But someone all of them come together and make a very comforting accord. I get the comparison that it smells like a shopping mall. Which is why I love it. The rose is familiar. But the note around it make it extremely unique.

I really like this mellow, happy scent. It reminds me of an intoxicating Yankee Christmas Candle.

Got the chance to smell this and all I could think of was Dedcool Blonde 03 perfume. If you like Happy Hardcore—give Blonde (cheaper!!!!!) a try, but equally as much if you don’t like Happy Hardcore because of its vulgarity mixing guava jelly with saffron... you might like Blonde for mixing it with juniper and fresh pomelo. They have the same makeup, Blonde just puts it more delicately. Maybe not a direct exchange, but there is an undeniable likeness.

Smells exactly like an elevator. Not much more to it. I like it, but the name is too embarrassing for me to wanna tell anyone what I'm wearing.

Fuzzy, ambiguous fruity-floral. I came for the saffron and guava, but sadly couldn’t clock either. The most salient notes I can get are: 1) a powdery rose, like a bouquet of silk flowers. 2) the staticky potpourri of a craft store holiday section, during Easter. 3) an aseptic bubblegum, like you’re at a paediatric dentist. Nothing tropical or juicy about her, but if you’re looking for something buzzy and pink, she’ll fit the bill. Mental Snapshot: Oh. Wait. Now I know where I’m getting this olfactory déjà vu. This smells like the strawberry nitrous oxide I was given when I got all my recalcitrant baby teeth pulled in sixth grade. The dentist let me take home the nasal mask and I huffed the pink perfumed rubber until the scent evaporated. tl;dr: kidz whippets 🐽🌷

I am absolutely perplexed by the reviews. I have tried this fragrance many times and never pick up on a single note mentioned- it just smells like an earthy leather. I would never believe this had a guava jelly note, and am even more shocked to see it mentioned so often. This fragrance (on me) sprays out smelling exactly like leather and then stays like that for an hour. There’s the tiniest hint of earth in it after a while but zero fruit. This is a strong, manly, forest and leather “new car” smell that I’d prefer as a car freshener. My husband gets to keep this one but I won’t be wearing it. Not a huge fan!

I second the leather or gasoline notes from previous reviews. It's not an awful overall scent but it's definitely not for me. I feel like something called happy hardcore should give a candy feel to it, something joyful and loud. As a fan of the music genre I cannot relate the masculine pepper vibes here to a genre of music that is intentionally childlike whimsy. I find no detectable guava jelly through the whole performance. They're mis-marketing to a y2k techno crowd when this scent could be for a more sophisticated man. Give me my kandi raver perfume experience!

smells like going to a underground happy hardcore rave under a freeway overpass, mainly the patchouli reminds me of that. 4/10 not a safe blind buy, if anyone wants a barely used bottle, shiohri_ (on discord) and we'll chat.

At first, I was extremely disappointed with Happy Hardcore. As a life long raver and dedicated underground electronic music fan, I was immediately captured by the IG ad depicting this fragrance as hedonism in a bottle. Long nights of indulgence and ecstatic peace, love, unity, and yada yada yada. As soon as I received my decant, the promise of forever nights and eternal youth were vaporized. Smells extremely cheap and flimsy. It reminds me closely of dollar store smell-wells distant aunts and uncles would gift pre-teen me on a holiday. I was ready write this fragrance off fully but the more I pondered about the scent, its namesake, and the promise of both, it is amazingly accurate. For those who don't know, happy hardcore is a genre of UK dance music that was spun out of the death of traditional UK hardcore and jungle around 1994. Both UK hardcore and jungle were moving in a more dark and deep direction while those who wanted to stay in chemical PLUR (unsure if this term made it to the Isles/Europe) lala land. As the name suggests the "happy" focus of happy hardcore indicated pitched vocals, uplifting lyrics, and major piano stabs. This was all in the face of changing mood and focus of global dance music that was moving past youth rebellion culture and was starting to buckle down. Techno, house, jungle, etc were becoming widely-accepted art forms with a need to solidify as such. Happy hardcore wanted to stay forever young. With the genre in mind, the fragrance is deadly accurate. True believers in the radical rave youth spirit will revel in the triumph. Those who have day jobs will move to more serious and complex offerings by Binaurale.

The listed notes sound wonderful, and my wife likes it. But unfortunately for myself I’m immediately transported back to cleaning bathrooms for my first job in school. Smells nearly identical to a cleaner my work used for tile floors. Fun bottle, seems like a good scent for those that don’t have that unfortunate association.

I don't know how anyone got reminded of the Boy Smells perfume, they smell totally different to me and on me. This almost smells like a weird rubbery smell. I almost feel like my sample isn't this, because I smell none of the notes listed.

Headachey, ambrox-overloaded Sephora-style fruitchouli. It's a chop.

burning dust and pencil shavings, it barely lasts on me

Happy Hardcore sounded incredibly promising on paper with guava jelly, saffron, black pepper, rose, and jasmine sambac, but on my skin the fragrance quickly collapsed into a sharp, synthetic “perfumey” haze that completely buried the more interesting notes. The opening is dominated almost immediately by saffron, but not in a warm or luxurious way. Instead, it comes across plasticky, dirty, and aggressively diffusive. I kept waiting for the guava jelly accord to emerge or for the black pepper to add sparkle and contrast, but neither really materialized in a meaningful way. As the fragrance developed, it became increasingly sharp and headache-inducing. The jasmine sambac never turned indolic, creamy, or sensual; instead, it smelled thin, sharp, and abstract. Eventually the perfume lost almost all distinct character and simply became a loud musky synthetic cloud with traces of saffron lingering underneath. What disappointed me most is that the fragrance never truly smelled like guava, jelly, rose, or even pepper for very long. The composition feels dominated by strong projection materials and hidden synthetic musks rather than by the notes advertised in the pyramid. Even hours later, after the projection softened, the scent remained sharp and unpleasant up close. This was ultimately less of a “fragrance experience” and more of a generic sharp perfumey musk with a saffron-heavy opening. I’m very glad I only purchased a sample before committing to a full bottle.

This perfume makes me nauseous. Something about the strong, overwhelming nature of guava mixed with a bouquet of spices that don’t go with guava. Smells like a trash can filled with cleaning supplies and fruit/veggie scraps.

This whole lineup is a synthetic headache-inducing mess.

I've had this sample for a couple months now and was hesitant to review it because my mind kept changing. Overall I think this is nice but quite basic for a niche house that brands itself as left of center. The floral and fruity notes blend nicely but I can't really pinpoint the guava, saffron, or rose; mostly it just smells sweet and pleasantly powdery. On the dry down it smells exactly like the perfume ads I used to tear out of magazines in middle school-a bit chemically with a strong gluey/pulpy base. I don't hate this but the others it the discovery set were definitely more unique and fun.

BIG fan of this one!! Tried all of Binurale's fragrances and this is the one that I had to immediately buy a bottle of. My experience seems to be different than everyone else's but to me this smells like going to the mall and entering a high-end home decor store. Fresh floral and woody, not soapy at all. Somewhat nostalgic as well if you traveled frequently growing up. Easy to wear in any occasion, not challenging at all.

This fragrance is spicy, sweet, fruity goodness! The guava jelly is a very prominent note, but the spice adds an additional dimension. I agree with the copy that was written for Happy Hardcore. I can see it in the middle of the dance floor with strobing lights until 4am. This is not a demure scent! It’s fun, free, and in your face. A photo of Diana Ross dancing at Studio 54 comes to mind.

This is a nice earthy rose scent. I’m not sure I’d wear it though. It reminds me of a shopping mall for some reason. It has this materialistic vibe to it. I have no idea why. It smells like shopping!

Smells like a much lighter Boadicea Blue Sapphire to me. Not exactly the same, but similar and more wearable too, imo.