Monk (2005)
by Michael Storer

Monk starts out with dusty frankincense, bitter green notes, and very dry woods, in an austere, musty, old cloister accord redolent at once of weathered stone, parchment, and snuffed out candles. I detect nothing sweet, nothing warm, nothing citric, and nothing floral amidst all this ashen monochromatism. After about an hour of unrelieved gray, and just when I’m ready to write it off as “nice, dry frankincense, nothing special” and shelve it next to Heeley’s Cardinal, Bond's Silver Factory, and Durbano’s Rock Crystal, Monk pulls its massive sucker punch. The friar shimmies off his robes, pops a curly blond wig over his tonsure, and sashays out of his cell in fishnet stockings, pumps, leather skirt and a biker’s jacket he’s been hiding under the ecclesiastic trappings all along.

In olfactory terms, Monk abruptly softens and sweetens, draping its stark incense in mild florals and its bitter greens in sweet tobacco, soft leather, powder, and tonka bean - in short, Habit Rouge with incense! I’ll take Storer’s word for it that there’s civet in the formula as well, though it does not register as a distinct note. Instead it contributes to the warm mantle that embraces Monk during its more comfortable second phase.

Scent that transform as quickly and radically as Monk often do so to collapse from sublime to ordinary (Aziyadé, Fire Island), if not decompose, fast-forward, into a smoking heap of refuse on the skin. (Aoud Ambre, Serge Noire.) Once in a great while though, a scent will undergo a metamorphosis from grub to winged adult. Monk is just such a scent. Neat trick!

EDP formulation.

Monk is an odd fragrance, I know I'm smelling cocoa butter but yet it doesn't conjure up feminine associations. Though the smokiness is difficult to discern there's just enough there to mould the cocoa butter in a masculine smell. Within an hour vanilla starts to dominate and I'm afraid vanilla is just not my thing.

When all is said and done my wife likes this, and because I don’t dislike it and as I'm a bit of a tart I'd wear this just to impress her. A 'Thumbs Up' but barely.

Michael Storer Monk

Over the last few years there have been a number of artisanal perfumers who have sprung up. One common thread to all of them is they present a distinct view of what they think perfume should be and then go about making perfumes that live up to those ideals. Michael Storer is one of this breed of artisanal perfumers and his creations are challenging olfactory fever dreams. His 2005 creation Monk is the scent that would seem to work best on me, as a lover of incense and birch tar, and with those notes at the top of his ingredients; Monk should be just what I'm looking for. With a name like Monk it is sure to conjure up images of European monasteries over a 1,000 years old and the top of Monk surely does that. At the top Monk smells like a musty hallway in an ancient stone edifice redolent of smoke and aged parchment, with only faint hits of incense. This beginning comes off a lot like CB I Hate Perfume In The Library but with the addition of smoke. I have to say this beginning is challenging for me as I appreciate the stage it sets for what is to come but it lasts almost too long on me before developing further. The heart of this is where Mr. Storer really does make things come alive because apparently his band of merry monks like cocoa. This is the dry cocoa powder accord I like so much from Chanel Coromandel and Serge Lutens Borneo 1834 and here it signals a shift in tone as the smoke and mustiness is left behind and the rich tones of cocoa take over. The base is a well-balanced animalic mix of civet and musk. Mr. Storer does a great job here of balancing two very strong notes and using them to bring out the best in each other. Monk is a very long-lasting scent with very good sillage. I find the first 30-45 minutes of Monk to be almost too much of an effort, for me, but the remaining 12 hours are well worth the investment of my time.

EDP review:

The only half-decent men's release from Storer but it still fails to fully convince or inspire me. I don’t get much incense from this at all – more of a musty smell you associate with an old decrepit building. Like Ava Luxe, there’s something amateurish and muddy about his creations that I, unfortunately, am unable to appreciate.

[Original submission date: 05 July 2008]

EDP review... have yet to try the EDT but will edit when necessary

What a strange and clever little guy... comes out of the bottle smelling of freshly poured cement, frankincense (right off the bat?), and a very subtle floral. I get absolutely no bergamot or other acidic citrus at all. There definately is a bit of a cocoa note in the top, but it is drowned out in the dry smokiness that permeates the transition from top to heart. The viscosity on the skin reinforces the fact that this is an EDP, but the arrid nature quells its ability to push major sillage, although I can already tell that the longevity is going to be HUGE. As the beast matures on the skin into the heart notes the floral is gone, making room for a very interesting stage. The smoky residuals coupled with the echoing sweetness of tobacco bring to mind standing twenty five feet above a roaring fire of oil soaked logs on a brick base. The effect is almost ethereal in nature, as you don't smell the actual smoke... you only smell the transparent wash of soot that has lifted up in the air, landing sporadic and sparse yet still full of aroma. I am almost tempted to call this a "gothic" scent, because it does conjure images of extemely old architecture built on top of dry bones in deep earth, but the airyness and transparency in the middle and base keeps it from smelling like a tomb. This is the first and only Michael Storer I have tested (or bought) due to the apparent global dissatisfaction he has garnered in this community, but I am enamoured of this vision, and think that I'll probably be keeping the bottle around awhile longer to fully understand this fragrance.

EdP review:

I didn't care for the EdT version of Monk; I found it thin and wanting. The EdP version, though, is another matter altogether. Easily Storer's best work yet. (I'm not usually a Storer fan, by the bye.)

This is some serious tobacco territory, so I'll warn ahead of time those of you who don't care for Polo, Tabac Blond, The Dreamer and other tobacco-heavy fragrances. The tobacco stays strong throughout this frag's development, although it does eventually let frankincense come in and do its liturgical duty. Nevertheless, be advised that both the tobacco and the civet here render Monk EdP a somewhat "dirty" scent. I can understand why some compare Monk to the smell of unwashed clothes, as I get much of the same dirty, smoky vibe here as in Mitsouko (only with tobacco here -- and lots of it).

There's also a warm, pleasant gourmand feeling here, but it (thanks to a dry cocoa) is never cloying. The ambrette warms the cocoa up quite a bit as well.

I personally won't spend the dough to buy Monk EdP, no. I might take a bottle in a swap, though.

Thumbs up, but only with all of the info above taken into account beforehand.