Incense Rosé (2008)
by Tauer

screechy cedar infused with a liberal dose of Frankincense and powdery Rose absolute. it is very clearly derived from L'Air. what i mean is, it has some similar accords and the use of ingredients too are common. anyone who has tested L'Air would be able to tell this is a Tauer creation in no time.
One other scent that it reminded me of is Guerlains Heritage Edt. Maybe the use of cedar is giving of that hint. Tauer scores another beauty with this. easily a must have for me.

Amazing, a carbonated perfume. Don't laugh, I get a "fizzy" sensation from it (must be the CO2-extracted incense :-), actually a bit like what you get when you squeeze a clementine peel and the essential oil squirts out. This has a generally high-pitched feel to it and seems rather one-dimensional compared to L'Air. It's lankey and somewhat spry and could use some buxom olfactory curves on the drydown. Instead I just get some dusty wood from the myrrh and cedar. Neither the rose nor the incense note satisfy me. I do wonder whether making such a marvel as L'Air du Désert Marocain early in your career isn't something of a curse. While it put Tauer on the map, I can't help but measure his later releases against it, unfair as that may be, and have found every one of them lacking in comparison. They're Paul McCartney/Wings albums vying with "Revolver."

Lush, fiery, and intriguing.

The rose in Incense Rose is intriguing: it isn’t where one thinks it should be, and keeps appearing in different guises. The rose combines with the Clementine to provide a lush and slightly sharp tone at the beginning: combines with the wood and resins to create a deep substantial tone; and combines with the patchouli towards the end to create an earthy and wet tone. The rose is everywhere and nowhere, and is a bunch of different roses rather than one singular rose. Waiting to see where and how the rose will next appear is such a pleasure.

Incense Rose manages to be lush and fiery at the same time. I have never experienced an opening with such a balanced combination of lush fruit and flowers and spicy wood and resins. The balance between light and dark speaks of Andy Tauer’s immense talent.

The incense is bright: a combination of pale smoke and glowing embers. It never becomes dark or acrid. This lends the fragrance an aromatic tone something like Caron Yatagan, but without the starkness or aridness that make Yatagan too much for some people. The ambergris takes Incense Rose from the aromatic to the animalic, which provides the final incarnation for the rose: a fleshy rose.

I’m not sure that Incense Rose will replace Montale Black Aoud as the rose fragrance I reach for first, but I have purchased a bottle after finishing my decant.

Tauer’s earlier L’Air du Desert Marocain was a masterful exercise on the theme of incense, and it raised high expectations for any new Tauer scent with “Incense” in the title. Incense Rosé smells primarily like dry frankincense and just a touch of myrrh, wed to peculiar and off-putting sour note. It lacks L’Air’s smoky depth and spice-fueled sense of mystery, and speaks instead in the kind of shrill, irritating tone that just makes you want to ignore it. I suspect that this was meant as a “luminous” or “transparent” incense composition, but it winds up brittle and impoverished. Stick with the Moroccan desert.

After the disappointing Incense Extreme, I had great expectations for Incense Rose.

In some respects, this has satisfied some of my expectations (i.e. its sillage and longevity is up to the usual Tauer standard). The clementine opening is juicy, enticing and lasts throughout most of the scent’s development (which is just as pleasing as the menthol note in Incense Extreme). However, on the other hand, I got a lot of déjà vu (especially with YSL’s Opium PH EDP). There are also moments when it has an almost pot-pourri vibe from the rose – not a good thing, nor something you’d expect from the (now) experienced perfumer who also created the majestic L'Air du Desert Marocain.

Incense Rose lacks the degree of sensuality that I normally look for in fragrances, and I’m still not sure if it’s bottle-worthy. However, it’s definitely a significant improvement on Incense Extrême.

[Original submission date: 11 July 2008]

I had to test Incense Rosé a few times before I could begin to wrap my brain around it. The first time I tested it, I got no incense, no myrrh, no ambergris – nothing resinous. What I got was aromatics… the cedarwood without the wood. There was a relatively solid rose / floral (Clementine?), and an earthy sweet that I couldn’t account for from the pyramid. The total olfactory image of what I experienced was a smooth, very smooth sweet aromatic floral that was very pleasant to experience, but, except for the florals, seemed a bit away from the natural: It was synthetic but in an extremely smooth, pleasant way. Thankfully, subsequent testings have provided much better performance from this excellent fragrance. I am now presented with all the resinousness that I could desire: the incense, ambergris, and myrrh notes have become rich and full, while the solid wood / labdanum with rose and orris in the background fill in the olfactory spectrum to perfection. For the entire run of the fragrance, the balance of notes IS perfection as far as I’m concerned. Woods, florals, resins, join in a harmony that is seldom seen. I love this scent.