Reviews of One Man Show (1980)
by Jacques Bogart

An interesting curio from a bygone era that somehow managed to survive. As one of the first widely (more or less) available Western fragrance products to pierce the Iron Curtain, OMS had been a bit of a cult and a status symbol in Russia in the years of primary capital accumulation, worn by a motley crowd of students, factory directors, the fledgling office plankton, petty entrepreneurs and hard-eyed boys with baseball bats practicing the fine art of bad debt collection. Walking down the streets of Moscow or riding the subway in those days, you'd think OMS was the official smell endorsed by the City of Moscow. Since then, its image has reverted to that of a dated budget smell for middle-aged nerds. But I digress. Its nostalgic value aside, OMS is a real viper of a scent, on par with Puig's Quorum in terms of brutal macho force (if not as complex) and equally difficult to wear if you are socially conscious. Whatever the intended notes (and there are quite a few) and progression, what I mostly get is a solid wall of something dry, leathery, harsh and bitter, a smell that has always reminded me of leafing through dusty pages in a second-hand book shop - not a bad connotation in my book, as a matter of fact. I keep a bottle at home for that note alone, but never venture outside wearing this beast.

At the beginning of perestroika One Man Show was probably the most popular cologne in Russia, my native country. Probably that's because it was one of the few upscale fragrances that were readily available in the stores back in that time. So much popular it was that it got its own nickname - Vanka (from "One" and the Russian name Ivan). The smell of One Man Show often transports me to that late 80's time, which wasn't the merriest one.