Scent Notes: Velouria is an ode to an ode to mythical beauty

During my formative years as a teenager who was obsessed with indie rock, played in bands and loved hanging out at the record store, it was only a matter of time before I heard the Pixies and fell head-over-heels in love.

My favorite album was always Surfer Rosa (and still is until this day) as I think that was the peak of creativity, viewing pop music through the shattered, art-rock lens of Black Francis, Kim Deal, Joey Santiago and David Lovering. However, there was something about the surf-rock shift of direction in Bossanova that was super intriguing. The album shows the height of intertwined vocals of Francis and Deal, two voices that could soar in similar registers, shifting above and below each other, like two birds in flight.

The best use of this on the album was in “Velouria,” a song that had shimmering, legato vocal melodies over crunchy, fuzz-laden guitar riffs and David Lovering’s solid beats with underrated and supremely tasteful flourishes (I love his trademark tom fills at the end of bars).

This is also the period where Black Francis became more obsessed with the supernatural than he ever had before. “Velouria” is the tale of a romance across time with an ancient citizen of the lost civilization of Lemuria, who legend has it currently live inside Mount Shasta. It’s a semi-melancholy tale of love across time, space and planes of existence, perfectly matched to the vocal melodies.

In order to reflect this contrast of styles (hauntingly beautiful vocal melodies over distorted electric guitar crunch), I composed a fragrance with notes of candied violet, orris, blueberry, frankincense frerena, Indian and Javanese vetiver, and musk.

Candied Violet, Orris and Blueberry

These three notes are an accord unto themselves, the sweet, soaring vocal melodies of the song. It hinges around the ionones that feed all the accords as well as methyl anthranilate, a sweet note (purple if you’re that type of synesthesate) found amongst florals, it was used in both creating a violet note as well as the blueberry note. I also used an orris root tincture to give all of these a more grounded feeling, as well as the fruitier Hedione HC in addition to bergamot essential oil, plus the standard benzyl acetate and beta damascone. Additionally, I used raspberry ketone to enhance the fruity aspect, jasmine sambac absolute, some spice in the form of cinnamaldehyde and caryophyllene beta, and finally some floral notes in Doremox and phenyl ethyl alcohol as well as the more green Isoraldeine and clary sage absolute.

Vetiver, Incense and Musk

The texture of vetiver, to me, is the quintessential fuzz pedal note, especially the Indian (very rooty) and Javanese (kinda smokey and rich) types of vetiver. These play with a Velvione musk and firascone to really play up the texture of a saturated guitar riff plus some Bicyclononalactone, a coumarin-type material, to smooth it out a touch. These combine with musks that rain from animalic (we are talking about Lemuria after all) to clean, including Traesolide, Ethylene Brassylate, Cosmone, Ambrettolide, Civettone (a cruelty-free civet replacement), Cetalox.

Finally, the incense notes come from frankincense (the fuzzier Frerena variety) as well as a frankincense absolute, a little bit more sweet and sticky (enhanced by a touch of labdanum absolute). It added the final touch, the David Lovering drum fill, if you will, to the entire composition.

Velouria Eau de Parfum is available now at MaherOlfactive.com, so grab a bottle or head to American Perfumer (very soon) to grab a sample!