Kourindo / Jyakourin Musk, Kodaikourin Aloeswood, Jinkourin Aloeswood, Ichiikourin Aloeswood, Saikourin Aloeswood + KorindaiKyara (notes)

September 21, 2021 at 6:54 am (Agarwood / Aloeswood / Eaglewood, Incense, Japan, Kourindo, Kyara, Mike, Musk)

It is a truly wonderful thing to see that Japan incense is now carrying the greater Kourindo line. There is perhaps no greater pleasure then to see a new, traditional Japanese line available in the US and it really can never be said enough of the efforts of Kotaro and Jay in increasing the visibility and availability of Japanese incense here. And not only does this mean there are 11 new Kourindo incenses to choose from but Japan Incense has gone one step further and provided this handy sampler as a starter kit. It’s where I started and I’m sure many readers here will do the same. But it should be said that there’s really not a bad incense in this bunch, they are all magnificent scents across the broad price range. Today I am essentially going to tackle the priciest 6 of the 11 (I hope to do the other 5 some time in October or so). I will have boxes of all but the high end kyara incense, but for that one I will be going off the one stick in the sampler and just providing some (surprisingly longwinded) initial impressions. For the rest of these I’ve tried to break into the box a little and spend some time with them first. Please note that one feature of the Kourindo line is that these sticks are just a little bit thicker than the usual Japanese stick and so it might be worth considering that in the stick to dollar ratio if you’re adding things up that way.

In most high end ranges you will be used to seeing aloeswood incenses, but I think rarely do you see one that advertises the musk first. Don’t get me wrong, Jyakourin Musk is definitely still an aloeswood, but its green color and highly noticeable musk hit are the big attractions here. In fact if you really want a stick that gives you a very obvious and profound taste of what musk actually smells like you can really do no better than checking this one out, it is not only a beautiful stick but it will be educational in pointing it out in other incenses. For example, think of Shunkohdo Ranjatai or Kykuyodo Musashino as two incenses with a noticeable presence of its sweetness. The greenness of the overall scent is also somewhat reminiscent of the green incenses in the Kunmeido line as well, although I would imagine the musk content in those is much smaller. I can not confirm whether this is animal or vegetal musk, but I suspect the former or at least a mix of both. But overall what you’re getting here is the musk up front, sweet and present, on top of what is a complimentary aloeswood base. And it is the mix of these things that makes this the great incense that it is. In fact I am so used to traditional aloeswoods at this point that this was the immediate standout in the line. It’s just a stone classic, with the musk and aloeswood mix giving the profile a great deal of complexity and warmth. It’s quite frankly a masterpiece and even though we’re about to move up the price scale, I think Jyakourin sits right next to anything in the line.

Kodaikourin Aloeswood is then already the sixth aloeswood in the series going from the most expensive up the chain and if you count the Jyakourin. It’s only a touch more expensive than the Jyakourin overall. I’ve most recently taken a few shots at incenses in this price range in terms of their aloeswood content, but rest assured the profile is wild and excellent on this one, in fact I might even argue that it’s actually fairly superb at this price range, with the kind of balanced bitter and resinous notes you tend to find in something like the Shunkohdo Ranjatai or Kida Jinseido Ikuhohkoh. Which actually makes sense as with both of these where you might be paying 1 1/2 to twice the price you’re also getting about the same hike in the number of sticks. But the similarities are fairly apparent because there’s some level of sweetness in Kodaikourin that provides something of a caramel note and there may be a bit of musk in there as well although certainly not at the level of the Jyakourin. But overall what you’re experiencing here is a stick meant to balance a decent level of wood with a lot of friendlier notes. If you’re someone who doesn’t want any sweet with their woods, this might not be to your taste but if you don’t mind it while not shirking some excellent aloeswood notes, I think this is a superb stick. Overall it’s actually not unlike Shoyeido Muromachi or perhaps more of what it was like when the wood content used to be higher. But here the wood definitely cuts through and keeps it satisfying.

So, now, strip away some of that sweet, caramel decadence, not all of it, maybe more the density of it than the presence, but back to the point where it becomes something of an equal subnote with something new. Tone down the bitterness a bit as well, into something that is a bit more of a glossier wood front. Jinkourin Aloeswood is something of a different grade where the woods seem a bit more dialed up and the recipe to compliment the woods created to highlight a bit more of a drier affair. You can feel like there’s something like a very faint touch of floral playing around the edges of this one, perhaps something faint from a spice cabinet in a more masala-like fashion (is that coriander?). This is the sort of Japanese incense that tends to fall into the aristocratic or noble styles. What’s interesting is that the woods feel a lot more polished here and it almost gives the trick of making it feel like the aloeswood in the Kodaikourin is a bit richer. It really feels like more of a shift in order to highlight the real subtle tendencies of a higher grade wood instead, almost as if all the other materials act like a foil. As a result there’s less of wilder feel to it, but it manages to highlight the aloeswood in a fairly unique way and at times the spices really pack a punch. And then wow that resin hit, almost like it was hiding at first. It’s like the Kodaikourin is a fantastic incense, but this one’s more of a work of art and likely to pay back greater listening. You might get the Kodaikourin right away but this is more of an interesting puzzle and you almost have tease the notes out. But wow when you do, it’s hard to believe this is priced so low. I keep having a similar conversation with several incense aficionados over the relevant merits of kyara. But seriously if you can get a box of aloeswood incense like this for under $70 who really needs it? It is literally shocking how good this one is.

Kourindo have three more scents above the masterpiece that is Jinkourin, which is quite frankly hard to believe given the high level of goods still under $100 a roll. But there’s a jump into that territory with the Ichiikourin Aloeswood. I had burned several sticks of all of these before launching into my writing, but once you really sit and listen to these it’s almost like trying them again brand new, and I could barely wait to get into this one. It’s worth noting while all the previous three incenses had approximately 40 sticks to a box, once you jump to this one, it’s not just the price but the stick count appears to go down to approximately 30, if somewhat thicker sticks, based on the info at Japan Incense. However it seems to me my box went over a few and this may be true for many of these boxes. Anyway this incense, after the Jinkourin, seems like a very similar jump to the Kodaikourin to Jinkourin. This is an even less caramel (if still there on some level), and more woody incense and it feels at this point that a lot of the additives from the previous incenses are becoming thinner on the ground so you’re getting a lot more wood presence. Not to mention the floral and spice like notes in the previous incense aren’t really in this. Seems like this one might have mixed in a little high quality sandalwood as well. Like with the Jinkourin there’s some level of waiting to see where the latent deep aloeswood note will hit. It doesn’t feel quite as polished as the Jinkourin but the aloeswood strength is closer to eye-watering. But it feels a bit more straight forward than the Jinkourin. If there was no Jinkourin then I might not be so hesitant in my recommendation, since this is a wonderful aloeswood incense, but given the differences in price and stick count I’m not sure you’re getting that much of a leap forward from the Jinkourin. I’d just underline that the profile of this incense and the previous two aren’t super different, almost as if they work on a similar theme with the wood being the main difference. But overall starting with the Jinkourin still seems like the best bet on a number of levels.

Saikourin Aloeswood shakes up the line’s profile by moving to a square cut stick. There’s a much more noticeable difference with this incense compared to the previous two. It reminds me a little of the difference of the scent profiles between the old Baieido Ogurayama and Hakusui woods, where the former leans a bit to a sweeter wood and the latter to something spicier. So Saikourin off the bat is a much tangier and spicier aloeswood stick. If there was caramel throughout the previous three sticks it’s fairly well buried here. But conversely you don’t miss it at all because this has such a unique presence of its own. You don’t really have to hunt for the resin as its fairly well in front of the burn and the whole thing just sings of high level wild wood. In fact coming back around to what I’ve said about kyara, this level of high end spicy wood is generally just as satisfying to me. It’s powerful, brash and has all of the elements of a deep wood that you’d want. It has the multi-note complexity of all the best aloeswoods, plenty of space to sink into and muse over. It’s interesting as well if you compare this price to the kyaras in this range, two of the Yamadamatsu Firebirds or the Seikado Kyara Koh Hien. If you’re going for something without all the additional sweetness, you’d certainly have to go with the Saikourin.

Because if you want to go with the Kourindo kyara option, KorindaiKyara, you triple the price point and nearly quadruple it if you count a slightly lower stick count (my guess is a stick is something like half or more of the cost of the sampler). These logarithmic jumps in quality are something I’ve considered quite a bit in my incense journey. I think nearly anyone who explores kyara incense wants to know how much kyara is in them, whether it’s worth the price. There’s legitimate anxiety to be found in an environment where you don’t know if the expensive incense you just bought is going to be up to what you hear or read about. I can say this about the Kourindos up to this point and that all of them still have wild aloeswood profiles commensurate with what you would hope to expect at these price points, and quite a few of them even perform above these prices. But $600 for KorindaiKyara is a gigantic leap, it’s essentially something like Shoyeido or Seijudo level pricing. All the Minorien kyaras, the Kunmeidos, the Shunkohdos, etc all of these are cheaper incenses. So one would assume that there is some level of real kyara in this stick, that it’s not just the magnification of a good thing. I set my high level kyara bar somewhere near the chip provided in the Baieido Rikkoku set or the gold standard Baieido Kyara Kokoh. OK enough already, Mike, tell us.

It’s an impressive stick, the kyara is right up front and the difference between this stick and all the others in the range is immediately obvious. It feels like Kourindo have gone the route of not making this a sweeter kyara but a peppier or spicier one. But leave no doubt at all that there’s a high level of rare wood in this, that there isn’t perfume artistry making up for the materials and that’s largely why you’d be shelling out such a large cost. It is the kind of stick that demonstrates to no uncertainty why this wood is as prized as it. There is that intense note that only this fine wood can bring, something almost like a floral mixed evergreen note and while this doesn’t lean as heavy to the green note as the Baieido kyaras do (or used to), this does indeed have the complexity you want to see at this price range. It’s probably closest in range to something like the Yamadamatsu Shuju Kyara in style and while it approaches the Baieido Kyara Kokoh, it’s maybe not quite there. But to experience the wood mixed in with this different range of spices is kind of a treat in itself because it’s not duplicative of other kyara incenses. And what a great kyara always does, so annoyingly, like the most painful of siren calls, is to make you start looking at all of those dollars you saved in a bank. And like these incenses I’ve compared it to, because this incense is materials first it’s likely to last you a long time if you take it out on special occasions and not decay very quickly. And that makes it a lot more superior to the perfume-based kyaras. If I ever do get some sort of windfall that makes me grabby for a full box, I may circle around again because I really doubt the half to 2/3 of the sample stick I burned probably does it the justice it deserves for such an insanely complex incense, but hopefully I’ve given potential buyers some heads up to what they’d experience. Coming round to what I said at the beginning, you can always grab a sampler too. In the end, bravo Kourindo, you are among the finest houses in incense and these are all deep treasures, among the best in Japanese incense.