Born Screaming

TW!!! not speaking from experience, toskovat’s born screaming smells like sitting on a plastic couch in a red light district club. a stranger donning but a black shiny latex bodysuit and a plastic hot pink wig is twerking on you but you’re zooted as fuck on whatever you just snorted off the table and everything is dark except for the strobing neon lights, so you don’t know what the hell is going on. you don’t even like maraschino cherries but there’s a couple in your drink anyway. there are medicine-y flavoured condoms in your pocket, where did those come from? did you even give consent to a lap dance?? you don’t remember anything— oh, god. fentanyl kills. what the hell did you just snort? god knows, because youre probably on the verge of ODing, right now vegetating inside the oblivion that separates life and death... why are you here anyway?? to forget your name and forget your life and escape to a hot and sweaty, sexy fever dream? a night of meaningless erotic fun and hedonism, even if a bit dangerous, beats suicide, you suppose. aka, nothing matters anymore, so what the hell? we’ve fully lost our ability to care, our need to self-preserve. everything is plastic, from the couch, to the tacky club furnishings, to the ass in your face. everything is hedonistic, from the cheap plastic everything, to the deafening music, drugs, drinks, and omnipresent erotica. whenever i see those japanese love hotels i feel miserable, gross, and uncanny, like their artificial ass rooms immerse you in a weird sexy fantasy far away from reality. it’s all but a hazy distraction, a high to chase time and time again. i imagine feeling miserable enough to having to go to one (no shade to people who go to japanese love hotels for fun). well done toskovat for evoking that sex affiliated misery from within me. well done toskovat for managing to fill me with misery, every fragrance you come out with. edit: two days after i initially smelled the scent strip and wrote the above, i decided to check on it again to see how it aged from then. following the vignette i imagined upon first spritz, the fragrance boils down to an intoxicating, even hypnotic muted cherry haze. the flashiness tames to a trance in which the chaos surrounding you dulls and you truly reach the brink of death by snorting a mysterious, possibly fentanyl-containing substance off a dirty sex club coffee table... the world collapses one sense at a time: the neon strobing lights begin to blur, the sound of the dance music, chatter, and clinking of glasses become distant and mute, blending in the background. it all numbs, reduces to a thumping bass that lulls you into an eventual nothingness. you can’t speak to let the person in drag twerking on you know that somethings up and you don’t feel so good, can’t manage to pierce the thin membrane that separates this fantasy from reality with your fingernails; you’re far too deep now into the former. so you let it take you. you savour the last of the ecstasy before you cannot grasp it anymore, knowing you’ll wake up either in hell or in a hospital, unsure of which is better. either way, you waste away in this feverish, cherry-hued, cherry-reeking bacchanalia, feeling a bit sorry for the gentle(man/woman) who now twerks upon a soulless corpse. born screaming is a disturbing piece of art, just like every other toskovat fragrance. it’s artificial, plastic, and shiny, ruby red. there is a nihilistic and simultaneously erotic beauty to it. and something about that so deeply morbid (this perfume honestly just freaks me out. too uncanny for me. love but would never buy)

this one tells me such a story : you’re a young asian woman, specifically japanese. you come from a rich yet loving family it’s your 18th birthday. just the other day you were a little kid playing with your toys and dolls, watching cartoons on dvd, smelling those disk cases. you still sleep with your teddy bear and use a childish cherry perfume from a convenience store which reminisces of a scented car charm in your daddy’s lexus. it’s springtime now and the trees are starting to blossom, even though it’s still cool outside. you woke up to your mom bringing you a big bouquet of fresh tender flowers, and you’re gonna spend this day hanging out with your friends and the boyfriend you keep in secret from your family, cuz they wouldn’t like him much. you’re into a baaad bad boy, and yall are so excited that you’ve become a major now. to your parents, you remained an innocent good girl, so decently you cover the stench of your cigarettes with a herbal mint gum. early evening, it feels like time doesn’t exist anymore. after putting some pretty hair clips in your modest hairdo, you get into the car and he drives you to karaoke club. the reserved room is adorned with balloons, a hospitable waitress brings you fruits (peaches) and flavored alcohol drinks (didn’t know they import an ukrainian cherry drink Revo alco energy to Japan??). turns out that some of the balloons are those you inhale to get high. your party gets wilder with every second and you enjoy it. the animalistic notes waft off of your dancing bodies. someone ODed, maybe the cherry on top of your birthday cake was soaked in formalin. a private ambulance doctor in latex gloves puts in an IV, everything will be fine. the party goes on. you get really naughty with your boyfriend. saliva splashes from your kisses, so will you in that faux leather chair just in a moment, after he puts handcuffs on you right in front of everyone... when sobriety sets in, you find yourself in a cozy big house, y’all burn incense and giggle about what was happening some hours before. you don’t have anything to worry about. you’re young, free and beautiful. 9/10 only because the cherry is so prominent it can get a headache

I initially didn't know what to think of this as it isn't, at least on me, anywhere near as cherry-like as people make it out to be - only on the very opening. It does dry down almost instantly to an energy drink type smell, almost like redbull. The latex is super clear! I personally think it adds a great counter, not a balance, to the sweet cherry. On me it's very incense-y and the patchouli and myrrh are both prevalent with the latex. It smells very similar to the recent collab between Black Veil Brides and Cursed fragrances, although I found that to be quite overpowering. Born Screaming is beautiful and balances out really well - I'm not one for incense scents but I genuinely do adore this. Something about it is unsettling, but not in a scary way, just slightly intimidating and I think that is just from the 'substance' notes. It doesn't smell like semen or saliva at all, just a heavier skin note. Honestly, like most Toskovats, I think the inclusion of it is less to actually smell like cum and more to market the idea of sex and nightclubs. I was worried on blind buying that I wouldn't be a huge fan of this, especially after reading some of the reviews, but I've been pleasantly surprised. I've been complimented on it already. I don't get the medicinal opening at all but that might just be me. Overall, I adore Born Screaming. It's a beautiful cherry fragrance, mature but still sexy and playful. I could see this as more of a date or night out fragrance, but someone could easily pull this off as a signature fragrance with the right confidence and character.

The first time I tried this fragrance, I accidentally spilled it on my fingers and I couldn't stop smelling my fingers. I needed more. I decided to put some on my wrists a little while before bed. I fell asleep with my wrists propped next to my nose. This is so gorgeous and bizarre. Obviously there is cherry. It's bright and fresh smelling but up against the plastic and latex smell you can imagine cherry flavored plastics or scented lubricant. It doesn't smell too sweet like a cherry candy. It's relaxing and invigorating to experience. As it dries down I get more of the traditional perfume notes, patchouli and myrrh. During my first wear I could smell the "energy drink" which smells like Red Bull to me. My husband instantly noticed that scent and felt nostalgic about it. He also said it reminded him of cherry medicine and it reminded him of childhood. I'm wearing this for the 2nd time today and it smells a bit different to me. It's morning and this is the first thing I'm smelling. The cherry is more gentle and I can get a hint of like, a fog machine kind of smoky smell, or like you have just blown out a candle and the smoke is lingering. This is the first Toskovat I have tried and I just ordered more samples because I am so intrigued by this. Update: I've worn this in public and have gotten compliments on it. I also have picked up on notes of liquid latex like the kind you use to apply prosthetics. I love this fragrance and cannot wait to get a full bottle.

I'm so glad my very first Toskovat fragrance gets to be born screaming. It's in the most perfect way unlike any cherry. I see many people compare this to Tom Ford's cherry line but they couldn't be any more wrong. The cherry is like the first sip on a bang energy drink. It's bright, loud, and definitely appealing to others. In the first hour the cherry and latex go hand in hand making it so unique and different from any cherry scent out there. When it starts to dry down a little the cherry stays but the floral's and slight smoke accord come to play. After that its pretty straight forward. A cherry floral but with still a lot of character and able to be worn on so many different occasions. I'd recommend for parties, melancholic spring days, and winter afternoons. I absolutely love this fragrance, it falls right into the category of the bomb.com.... Scent 9/10, Sillage 7/10, longevity 7/10.