Joop Homme: fragrance review

When King Kong punches his pectorals in wild dominance, you know there's an ominous threat of being squished into pulp any minute now. When Joop! Homme approaches, thundering like the bass off a distant Jeep with the speakers in full volume, you know you're in trouble. This thing is (or rather used to be) HUGE.

It shouldn't come as a surprise being conceived by perfumer Michel Almairac in the decade of excess, the 1980s, but it always comes into my mind with a chuckle when I consider that Joop! Homme is just 3 years senior to the perfume that needs to be applied with a Q-tip shaken before one's self to apply, i.e. Angel.

Much like that other Godzilla of perfumery it is a sweet perfume. And it's a deep pink; it's an ingenious counterpoint of a male fragrance being tinted in the color of Barbies and kids' cough syrup, and of a female fragrance (Angel) tinted in the hues of male childhood since at least Edwardian times!

The clustering of vanilla, coumarin (described as tonka beans), and heliotrope in Joop! Homme accounts for a furry-embrace experience from a King Kong in amorous disposition. And when you think your favorite primate is doing all the love motions known to primates since time immemorial, and drowning everything out with a welcome splash of Coca Cola, a beautiful, clean orange blossom note emerges like the corolla of a blossom. And then gets engulfed with fluffy notes like cherry pipe tobacco.

If "you beast!" is the desirable moan off the lips of a potential partner doing the down and dirty, Joop! Homme is a mighty fine choice. The Newland Archers of this world might find it crude though, be warned.