Cool Black

I don't know why my mind is tripping right now. Whenever this scent dries down, there is a big fraction similarity to YSL's Bleu Electrique.

Mandarina Duck Cool Black Men EDT opes with a moderate projection of sweet, citrus, woody, spicy, and soft floral notes. The opening is fragrant, fresh, and pleasant. The bergamot and lemon peel are prominent opening notes and give the fragrance a fresh touch; the black pepper is very soft, just a spicy touch; the hyssop and violet add a faint floral, airy, breeze and delicate note. The cedar is the fresh woody note, noticeable, balanced with the moss which brings a soft mossy, forest floor-like touch. The elemi picks up the initial citrus accord and brings it into the dry-down along with piney and resinous touches. The musk is a projection accord, but the note isn’t prominent. The most important opening to dry-down changes is the very sharp and citrus opening, which changes to a more fresh, woody, and resinous dry-down. One Mandarina Duck Cool Black Men EDT has reached its full dry-down, it can be summarized as a moderate projection, sweet, resinous (elemi), woody (cedar, moss), and airy floral (hyssop, violet) fragrance with soft spicy and citrus accords. The fragrance feels airy, breeze, casual, common, fresh, gentle, masculine, mild, modern, playful, resinous, refreshing, sweet, versatile, woody, and pleasant. BATCH REVIEWED: 2020. WOW RATING: 3/10. A pleasant fresh sweet woody fragrance, common, but unimpressive. DISLIKE RATING: 0/10. The fragrance contains no offensive notes. UNIQUENESS: 2/10. The notes in this fragrance and the resulting scent are very common. MASS APPEAL: 10/10. This is a fragrance that people will enjoy. PROJECTION: 2/10. Low, about 2 feet around the wearer. SILLAGE: 2/10. Low, about 2 feet behind the wearer. APPLICATION: 4 or more atomizations. LONGEVITY: 3/10. Low, about 3 hours with less than 1 hour of moderate projection. SEASONS: Spring, summer, fall. OCCASIONS: Outdoor gatherings, gym, office, casual, holidays, romantic, dating. This is an office-friendly fragrance. VERSATILITY: 7/10. Good, a fragrance suited for the mild or hot days. GENDER: Masculine but not for much. AGES: Any. RECOMMENDATION: Mandarina Duck Cool Black Men EDT can be found for about $20, it is a pleasant, sweet, woody and slightly citrusy fragrance, but it lacks any uniqueness, it feels common, and its performance is very low. It is a nice-to-have but not a must-have. BLIND-BUY: Yes, but consider its poor performance and lack of uniqueness. SIMILAR: These are examples of fragrances in the same genre. Armaf El Cielo Men EDP is a sweet, citrus, spicy, and woody scent; Yves Saint Laurent Y Live Intense is a great very sweet, spicy, citrus and woody scent; Mandarina Duck Black is a mandarin and tonka bean delicious fragrance; Baldessarini Nautic Spirit is a sweet, passion fruit, mango, and spicy fragrance; Zadig & Voltaire This Is Him, is a sweet, vanilla, sandalwood, and incense fragrance, but lacks performance; Mandarina Duck Cool Black Men EDT is a pleasant but short-lived sweet, resinous, woody, and airy floral fragrance. SUMMARY: A moderate projection, sweet, resinous (elemi), woody (cedar, moss), and airy floral (hyssop, violet) fragrance with soft spicy and citrus accords. The fragrance feels airy, breeze, casual, common, fresh, gentle, masculine, mild, modern, playful, resinous, refreshing, sweet, versatile, woody, and pleasant.

Mandarina Duck Cool Black was a weird fragrance sugestion for me. I never tried any of the other Mandarina Duck Black fragrances so I don't know if it is a flanker in smell or not. I did however initially heard of it being a Versace Dylan Blue with some JPG Le Male Eau Fraiche to it. A weird mix if you ask me. Does it live up, not really to the Dylan Blue side, but it surprisingly does for Le Male Eau Fraiche and dare I say, it isn't as cloying. Cool Black is a weird scent. It really don't have much of a similar note mostly because there isn't a spicy neroli note, the cotton candy like aldehyde and mint combo or ambroxan and vanilla notes. In a way, those notes are overdone and a little played out. Instead you get a spicy citrus open that actually lasts and goes in a resinous direction with some florals in the hysup and violet. The base is a mix of cedar and musk. It is weird how this is similar to the Eau Fraiche Le Male flankers. Cool Black is pretty versatile in use and performance as oppose to Le Male Eau Fraiche. Performance is slighter and more subdue which is a better thing as I thought Eau Fraiche is a little too powerful and cloying (though I am not sure if that is a chicken or the egg situation.) Cool Black lasts about an hour and a half on initial projection, yet lasts a total of six hours. Use wise as it is lessened from Eau Fraiche though depending how hot it is when you wear it, it may get cloying. It works for work, dates and I guess clubs, if it is sprayed heavily. I would say it works spring, summer and in Indian summer fall days. Mandarina Duck Cool Black feels like it is a best kept secret. It is a nice spicy yet sweet scent. I find it is everything that most find Le Male Eau Fraiche good to me. I rate it a 7.3 out of 10 due to slight issues with being cloying if the heat is too much unlike Eau Fraiche that is pretty easily.

So I loved Pure Black by this designer and I was hoping that the previous reviews held true, that this was lighter and brighter. I blind bought this and I am undecided about it. It projects well (like Pure Black), it's floral (like Pure Black). It's warm (like Pure Black) but less so. It's a little woody, like Pure Black and soft and sweet. I don't find it as spicy, or as charismatic. This one lacks the magic of Pure Black for me. The cinnamon, blood orangey woody floral composition that is Pure Black is something I love. It was what I needed to become a fan of the One Million scents. A little more mature and romantic. Cool Black is very lavendar to me, so much so that it reminds me of cross between Sexual by Michel Germain, and Burberry Touch with some one million thrown in. I like it, and I might have liked it more had I not been so seduced by Pure Black. I might have to pass on this. decent 7/10 if I was to rate it with Pure black an easy 8 for my style. This is a little bit better suited to spring/fall daytime wear while Pure Black is great for fall/winter and chilly spring day/night. Sure this is more versatile but not by much. Pure Black has magic, and that's unforgettable to wear; but this might be better for the someone else smelling you, I'll test that next. :) Edit: After 5 wearings, this is addictive and confirmed, more versatile than regular Pure Black. As a standalone review, the floral elements of this fragrance are masculined out by the slightly aquatic/fresh elements included in the fragrance. It's uplifting with silliage and projection performing above average. It's almost giving me the impression of a office-friendly Desire by Dunhill (original red). Don't like giving number ratings but my 7/10 prior definitely moves to an 8.

I've tested it now. Fits the name, it's just a fresh version of Black. I'm tired to see fresh, sport or cool flankers wich hasn't nothing in common with the original fragrances. Cool Black is like Black with toned down warm notes, and the fresh notes were toned up. No more, no less. But this could be a double edged weapon too. Would I buy it having the original? I don't know. Don't get me wrong, this is better than thousand of fresh fragrances, it's not generic, not synthetic at all, but... While the original is great, this is just very nice. The sweetness remains in Cool Black, but with less vanilla & tonka and more citrus & woods. It's like the the top notes of the original with some citrus. However after 12 hours, they smell almost the same but a little bit muskier on this. If you like the original Pure Black, it's 90% sure you'll like this, and probably you'll be found yourself in my same situation (i don't know if buy it). If you haven't the original but you like it, this could be a nice buy for this summer. It lasts as Pure Black, but the sillage here is a little (only a little) lower.