Chagdud Gonpa Foundation / Riwo Sangchod Incense, Unsurpassable Healing Incense (P’hul-Jung Men-Po)

April 8, 2024 at 8:10 am (Agarwood / Aloeswood / Eaglewood, Artemisia (Mugwort, Wormwood), Betel Nut, Cardamom, Cedar, Chagdud Gonpa Foundation, Frankincense, Ginger, Incense, Jasmine, Juniper, Licorice, Magnolia, Mike, Musk, Myrobalan, Nepal, Olive, Red Sandalwood, Rhododendron, Saffron, Sandalwood, Spice (Cinnamon Clove Nutmeg etc.), Spikenard / Jatamansi, Valerian / Sugandhabal)

It has been a really long time since I did new reviews of Nepali or Tibetan-style Indian incenses. In the current era I don’t know if there is one dominant shopping point for these types of incenses like there was when Essence of the Ages was active, although Hither & Yon in Hawaii is a good source for lines like Dhoop Factory and you can usually find a lot of the more common Nepali incenses through places like Incense Warehouse. The problem, which is something I don’t think you find in actual Tibetan incenses, is there are a lot of poor Nepali incenses. When I explored them back in the 00s I ended up getting rid of a great deal of them because they were basically just unpleasant and cheap woody incenses without much in the way of aroma. The worst felt like bad perfumes on junk sawdust. But of course this isn’t true of all of them (several of the Dhoop Factory incenses are upper echelon Tibetan-style incenses in my book). Nowadays there are a number of smaller shops on the internet and across Etsy that actually show there are multiple traditions (or maybe exporters) of these sorts of incenses. I even dug up what appears to be a rather interesting line of perfumed Tibetan-style incenses sources in India. So I got busy and have ordered quite a few Nepali incenses, just mostly going on intuition to pick things out. Along the way I’ve also rediscovered sources for things I reviewed way back and will update those accordingly. The first two here are incenses handmade in Nepal for California’s Chagdud Gonpa Foundation. Both of these can be found at the Tibetan Treasures online shop.

Riwo Sangchod reminds me most of the Tashi Lhunpo Shing Kham Kun Khyab red stick I reviewed almost 16 years ago, although since it’s been that long I would imagine this one isn’t quite as deluxe. It’s possibly the Nepali equivalent of a Bhutani red stick (there are two Riwo Sangchod incenses from Bhutan in the Tibetan Treasures catalog as well) but obviously having a completely different scent profile. It has an impressive list of more than ninety ingredients, including sandalwood, betel nut, aloeswood, juniper, musk, frankincense, wormwood, cedar, rhododendron, spikenard, wild ginger, magnolia, valerian, myrobalan, seashell, jasmine, cloves, cardamom, saffron, olive, licorice, gold, silver, turquoise, amber, and silk brocade. And as you can imagine, with such an impressive list of ingredients (I think this is my first with turquoise or silk brocade!), everything has been blended down to a completely composite aroma, one that is friendly and sweet on top while still having quite a bit of complexity swirling around beneath. Like in Bhutanese incenses, this has characteristics I’d describe as woody and berry-like all at once, it’s clearly not a Tibetan secret to pair these aspects together as they’re always a really friendly match. This isn’t a spectacular incense, I wouldn’t even call any of the Bhutanese equivalents spectacular either, but what they are is light and really accessible. And at least in this case the ingredients feel up to snuff and not at all watered down. Several sticks of this more or less confirmed my static opinion of this one, but keep in mind what I said about the complexity, some of the subscents churn underneath and show up in different temperatures so this one isn’t being phoned in. The subtle woodiness is quite nice here.

Perhaps even more impressive than the Riwo Sangchod is Chagdud Gonpa Foundations’s Unsurpassable Healing Incense, one of the few Nepali incenses that actually approaches the level of some of the better Tibetan incenses. Thanks to the categories here I found that this was also in Anne’s Top 10 in 2011! It has a similar ingredient profile to the Riwo Sangchod, with juniper, white and red sandalwood, saffron, valerian, magnolia, musk, aloeswood, myrobalan, olive, jasmine, clove, rhododendron, powdered seashell, frankincense, licorice, cuttlefish bone, wild ginger, betel nut, and powdered alabaster, but even though there are some similarities to the berry/woody mix of that incense, the ingredients add up to something a lot more complex. The first thing I get is some top layer of peppery spice. Second the middle with the woods and saffron. There’s definitely some musk in the mix which is almost entirely absent or at least not noticeably present in most Nepali incenses. As the smoke spreads out more of the incense’s floral notes come out a bit more as well as what seems like a bit of an agarwood note. It only remains noticeably Nepalese by the base which, despite all the other ingredients, still seems a bit (too?) high in juniper or some other cheap sawdust content. Also present are some of the notes found in the Riwo Sangchod as if the incense fractalizes at times. Ultimately there is really a lot going on this one and it can be intensely fascinating to realize that it might take some time to see it at as recognizable rather than ever-changing. In fact I really liked Anne’s description of this as an “all rounder,” it’s almost the perfect way to summarize it in a couple of words. Recommended for the patient.

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Ling Long Monastery Incense

April 3, 2024 at 7:44 pm (Cardamom, Frankincense, Incense, Ling Long Monastery, Mike, Spikenard / Jatamansi, Tibet Autonomous Region)

Ling Long Monastery Incense is perhaps the swankiest of the most recent incense-traditions.ca finds, it’s possible one of the closest I’ve tried to the flagship Dzongsar although this is a much drier blend. The only ingredients provided are frankincense, spikenard, and amomum tsaoko (black cardamom), but to my nose only the last is noticeable at a casual sniff. If you get a little closer you can sense the frankincense and spikenard, but they are so overwhelmed by the herbal mix on top that it’s likely to be hard to concentrate on them anyway. Later in the burn I found them to be a little more present, as the area built up with the aroma, but they’re never really the front ingredients.

As far as I can tell some sense of artemisia or wormwood is likely causing what a lot of Westerners might find a funky note, but unlike Dzongsar Monastery this doesn’t go funky on a deeper level due to the dryness. This means that whatever central woods are at work, likely the usual, say, red and white sandalwood, are also fairly drowned out here and you’re largely left with an herbal blast more similar to cooking than aromatics. The dryness is sort of more in the grass to hay range as well, which ekes out a little different territory to other contiguous Tibetans. There is no big musk hit or deep spiciness and absolutely no escape from the major herbal presence, and it does have that strange feel of some expensive and challenging gourmand cheese cooking in a brick oven on a pizza. There are very few Tibetans that I find actively difficult, unfortunately this is probably one of them as I’ve never gotten used to this particular herbal presence.

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Epika Earth / Celebration of Life (stick), Gentle Beast, Sacred Amber, Stormfire Tea, and some thoughts on a few backflow cones

February 23, 2024 at 10:30 am (Agarwood / Aloeswood / Eaglewood, Amber, Benzoin (Loban), Bergamot, Birch, Calendula, Cedar, Cistus (Rock Rose), Coconut, Cones, Copal, Cypress, Dragon's Blood, Epika Earth, Frankincense, Helichrysum, Incense, Jasmine, Juniper, Lavender, Mike, Musk, Myrrh, Oakmoss (Lichen), Palo Santo, Patchouli, Pepper, Pink Pepper, Rhubarb, Rose, Sandalwood, Spice (Cinnamon Clove Nutmeg etc.), Styrax Liquidambar, Tea, Tonka, United States, Vetivert / Khus)

Epika Earth / Rare Terra
Epika Earth / Artisan

This is the final installment for the most recent batch of Epika Earth incenses I received in my most recent Etsy order. They have so, so many more sticks and other goodies at their actual website and I am absolutely sure I liked most of their offerings enough to go for another order again in the future. There is something really warm and comforting about a lot of them. Perhaps its because so many of their incenses are essential oil mixes, but I like how these often create almost mythical libations, like you’re holding some amazing drink in your hand. The last group of these incenses are a couple that look like they are part of a Sacred line, a couple that are not part of any line and look like standards, and then a few backflow cones were also sent which are a bit more difficult to talk about as I don’t like the format while on the other hand these would likely be tremendously good cones if they weren’t.

So first of all we have the Celebration of Life stick (part of the Sacred line), which is different but obviously related in an aromatic way to the Celebration of Life dhoop that I discussed in the previous installment. The stick, naturally, is a much simpler blend but what I really love about it is it’s almost like some sort of mystical root beer or sarsaparilla in scent. Or add in cream soda, ginger ale or a plain old “suicide.” It’s a concoction reminiscent of all these things and maybe none of them. So maybe just mystical soda. However, when I looked this up to link on the Etsy site it was gone, and seemingly “replaced” by a 1 year aged version of the same blend. So while I don’t have the ingredients list on the original, I would imagine they would be like the aged version: frankincense, myrrh, cistus, benzoin resinoid, styrax resinoid, cinnamon, rose petals, helichrysum flowers, golden copal, white copal, Rose Bulgaria, agarwood, and sandalwood. And like in previous incenses you can see the styrax and copal which have often helped to give Epika Earth incenses this concoction like feel. I would imagine aging this would work in a similar way to the Cocoa Pods incense in the line, which certainly broadens the complexity of their incense, so it’s not hard to imagine this would improve and it’s already good thing. In the original I also got touches of chocolate, the rose and some apricot (which had me leaning more towards jasmine until I look at the contents). It wasn’t as spicy as the dhoop but they both share the wonderful brown sugar note that helps sweeten up the “soda.”

Gentle Beast appears to be one of Epika Earth’s standard line (or perhaps Artisan) and an incense a bit closer to those I usually associate with the dipped style, although we’re still not in territory where inferior or synthetic oils are used thankfully. However, this does appear to be a mix of a lot of different things, it’s both somewhat amber-like, herbal and having a noticeable vanilla note (see the tonka bean below), all of which is blended with a strong fruity mix that at different times smells like berries, apples, pineapple, mango or pears (seriously, all in my notes!) Among this mix are somewhat combinate reminders of anything from sage to patchouli and agave cactus. One of the reasons I mention all of these things is that the ingredients list looks a lot different (the incense was sent as an addition to my order from the company). Those are listed as: organic calendula, organic lavender, white copal, styrax resin, golden copal, dragon’s blood, sweet coconut milk, bergamot, pink pepper, cinnamon leaf, jasmine, tonka bean, blue cypress, cedarwood atlas and musk. I was considering a different incense the morning I typed this, in the sense that lavender can often be a bit of a sneak ingredient in all sorts of sticks as it can vary in intensity or style, but fronting resins isn’t an unknown method to get a fruity effect. I’d imagine the bergamot and other resins probably don’t hurt (I’m reminded of the apple in dragon’s blood sticks as well) either. Anyway, as you might imagine you might have a bit of fun trying to pick things out from what is basically an herbal-laced fruit concoction. And this is better than a lot of those, if perhaps as lacking in distinction as other fruity dipped mixes, although the herbal feel prevents that from going too far. [Note that the page I linked to describes this as a Rare Terra incense, so this may a case similar to the Celebration of Life where there’s a formula upgrade, but I ended up with an original. So keep this in mind with the link.]

The Sacred Amber is a quiet but familiar amber incense. It still has the concoction-like mix of most of the incenses in the Epika Earth catalog I have tried. The issue of course is that I would not normally describe amber in the context of essential oils in at least that so many amber incenses or notes often could be considered dry, powdery or otherwise (often even if perfumes are reaching for this). But with that said this does have a noticeable amber note. I wondered if this might have been an older stock as there is a slight charcoal note that peaks through that must be from the base. And hey when you look at the ingredients (rock rose extract, patchouli, vetiver, sandalwood, frankincense, myrrh, liquidamber, cedarwood, amber resin, black pepper) you can see that the amber scents do lean in the concoction direction. The positives of this one is that it’s a very gentle scent but I think that allows some of the ingredients to maybe push away from the amber a bit. All of that is OK, it’s more saying that while this is a nice incense, I’d describe it more as an amber variant, than something purer than that. But we’re still talking about a scent pretty close to familiar dipped incenses rather than the more breathtaking experiments we’ve discussed previously.

Stormfire Tea has the concoction idea right at the forefront. It is sort of in the same direction as the Shoyeido Xiang-Do (red) Tea, although this does not have the same sort of tea leaf resolution that the Shoyeido stick has. In some ways it’s not all that far from the Sacred Amber. The reddish color hints more at an herbal spiced tea and like the Sacred Amber it has a mild spicy middle to it. Interestingly, the ingredients include organic lavender flowers, organic white tea, cedar, birch tar resinoid, golden copal, styrax and sandalwood, and so the incense’s spicy notes don’t seem to come from the usual suspects as much, although I’d guess the woods probably provide some of these things. The cedar is pretty obvious in the mix, providing something of a southwestern note to the incense and the copal and styrax obviously help with pushing this over to an actual tea scent. It’s probably not my favorite of the Epika Earth incenses that remind me of drinks, but they still always do a good job with them and this will likely be found comforting and warming.

Epika Earth were also kind enough to send no less than three different kinds of backflow cones. As I offered to review their incenses prior to their seeing the information on our website, I thought I’d use this opportunity to talk about these types of cones first as they’ve grown in popularity since they started showing up however many years back. The simple idea for a backflow cone is a hole is drilled down the center and “something” is added to the mix in order to make the smoke heavy enough to come down through the hole and drift slowly down any number of artistically designed backflow holders. It’s absolutely understandable why people would think this is cool, as smoke pouring from a ceramic chimney or dragon’s mouth is a neat effect. I even bought a cool dragon backflow holder which I managed to break in the middle of these reviews, chipping off just the right spot (one of the dragon wings) that should have held the smoke in. But the thing is, even in practice you have to do a lot of shifting and have a lot of patience for the smoke of a burning backflow cone to make it all the way down to the bottom of a cascade. For me the smoke never got farther than the first slide after the dragon’s mouth and I think I got one cone to get all the way down to the bottom once.

Whatever is the case, information on backflow cones seems pretty confusing on the internet. There are lots of claims of these types of cones that they don’t use any chemicals and yet there has to be a difference between smoke that rises and smoke that sinks (and usually stinks). I would imagine this is just chemistry and physics. There also has to be some sort of reasoning for the abominable smells during and left after the burning of some of these cones on a backflow burner. The ones that came with my burner were absolutely awful and I even tried a Tibetan backflow cone which had the exact same issue. And then you can read on internet, recipes for these cones that are made no differently from a regular cone, at least as far as I can tell. My experience with backflow cones is not widespread but I can tell you I’ve never smelled one that didn’t have some sort of additive, whatever it may be.

And that’s no different for these three Epika Earth cones, although I will say I didn’t notice the same sort of foulness left from them that I did with the burner samples or the Tibetan incense I mentioned above. What I felt was disappointed simply because the mixes were actually really nice on these, but there seemed to be something in the mix that I associated with the sort of alcohol scent you can get with some of the oils except quite a bit stronger. For like the tip of the cone you’re good but then once it gets, I assume, to where the drilled hole goes down each cone, it started to get a bit too much for my tastes. Now I’ll be fair I’ve had this happen with a lot of non-backflow cones as well. I’ve never thought the cone was a satisfying format for an incense and it often felt this way perhaps because you need more makko or binder so the cone keeps its shape, or at least nearly every cone I’ve used gets irritating by the time it’s wide and down to the base. So I am probably not a cone’s intended audience.

And so reviewing three or four cones of these is not fully possible, both because there is a strength here that overwhelms any subtleties but also because that strength overwhelms me as well (and let me remind you I am usually OK with some of the loudest Indian incenses on the market). It is a strange experience going from wow that’s a really lovely scent to throat irritation and stinging eyes all in one cone burn, but that’s what each one of these does. The Angel Blood (dragon’s blood, styrax and patchouli) cones were first and I honestly absolutely loved the sort of dragon’s blood and styrax sweet “candy” mixed with some earthier patchouli. At first I was like wow someone made a backflow cone I really like, but then it ended at the first dragon slide and I got overwhelmed. I then broke the burner and had to sample the Rhubarb Berry and Oakmoss cone on one of my ash burners. Again at first I was really impressed, as all three (?) scents (the aroma profile is described as agave covered berries, rhubarb and black plum with highlights of fir needle and oakmoss) in a wonderful mix were really clear. Perhaps burning it away from a backflow burner helped mitigate the strength as it wound down but I was still sensing a lot of heavy alcohol and some sort of unknown scent towards the end that wasn’t agreeing with me. Saved for last since I don’t normally go for palo santo was the Winter Juniper & Palo Santo cone. This aroma profile is described as palo santo wood and juniper berries freshly thawed after a winter freeze. Triple coated with palo santo wood powder, sandalwood powder, golden copal resin and sweet myrrh. Strangely though on this one I don’t really get juniper or palo santo at all, which struck me as odd as the ingredients list on an Epika Earth incense can usually easily be identified. But again it started quite pleasant and was literally stinging my eyes by the end of it.

So to sum this up, these last three cones are obviously for people who love backflow cones and in that context they’re certainly better than nearly every other cone I’ve tried in the style, they’re clearly artisan and made with love. And of course I’d reiterate that I really enjoyed nearly every stick and dhoop I reviewed in all three installments, enough that I made an exception to my no dipped incense reviews rule. Epika Earth have certainly carved out a unique space in the incense community and I look forward to trying more of their scents. If you have tried any other of their incenses and wish to contribute, please post in the thread below!

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Epika Earth / Artisan / Ataraxia, Celestial Opium, Jaz Mocha, Celebration of Life (dhoop)

February 14, 2024 at 8:29 am (Agarwood / Aloeswood / Eaglewood, Agave, Balsam, Benzoin (Loban), Birch, Cedar, Chocolate, Coffee, Copal, Cream, Epika Earth, Frankincense, Guaic, Helichrysum, Incense, Jasmine, Labdanum, Mike, Myrrh, Oakmoss (Lichen), Orange Blossom, Patchouli, Rock Rose, Rose, Sandalwood, Spice (Cinnamon Clove Nutmeg etc.), Styrax Liquidambar, United States, Vanilla)

Epika Earth / Rare Terra

The second installment of Epika Earth incenses are a group of incenses labelled Artisan, three sticks and one incense in “dhoop” form. Based on a different incense on the line, Epika Earth describe these: “Our artisan blends are made entirely with natural ingredients that include essential oils, extracts, resinoids, woods and herbs. While creating the extracts, essential oils and crafting our artisan blends we use our own proprietary methods to protect and maximize the aroma of the ingredients in order to bring you the pure scents of earth in incense form.”

Ataraxia makes me consider how I may have received it without first trying some of the other sticks in the Epika Earth catalog to compare it to as it has some of the same ingredients and smells a bit similar to the Bacchus I reviewed last installment. However, I haven’t really start noticing the complexities of these incenses until the third or fourth stick so it’s fairly essential to give them a bit of time. Ataraxia includes birch, styrax, labdanum, benzoin, golden copal, white copal, sandalwood, aloeswood, myrrh, patchouli, agave and beet juice (for color). The description of notes on the Ataraxia page also describe the aroma of the incense as the “Complex and continuously evolving scent of amber, woody, fruity, dry musk, leathery, sweet, birch, slight ozone and animalic.” I definitely don’t have too much issue with this description as all of these notes revolve out of the burn, and what you pick up depends on what you’re paying attention to at any given moment during the burn. It should be noted that while this incense includes several ingredients that really gave a concoction-like feel to Bacchus (something that is fairly common when most of the ingredients are coming from oils), Ataraxia feels like a somewhat drier blend even though you can still sense the resinous mix of styrax, labdanum, copal and myrrh as it moves to what I’d call the fruity note (perhaps more fruit than fruit juice maybe). But there’s certainly a woody layer where the sandalwood and aloeswood live, and I’d imagine that’s where some of the dryness comes from, although I have to note that I’m not always getting these during the burn. The patchouli for example, can come out pretty strongly at times and even the agave is pretty noticeable. So overall it’s a really interesting and dynamic incense. I would imagine if you were shopping that you might not need both Ataraxia and Bacchus as they both hit similar sort of autumnal or harvest qualities, but either one of them is a good pick.

Celestial Opium is described as a “sweet mix of coffee, vanilla, cream, orange blossom, cedarwood, and patchouli.” With that description and thinking of previous opium themed incenses, it’s hard to tell if the name is supposed to be evoking poppies, perfumes or if it’s something of a metaphor, but I might put it closer to the perfume. The incense base reminds me a little of the Blue Ice Pine, and although the top note is obviously quite a bit different, I’m wondering if they share a base that’s taking up some of the aromatic range, or if it’s perhaps a lighter cedarwood oil that’s creating the similarity. Perhaps part of the fun of these incenses is being given the notes and trying to pick them out because there’s never one I don’t sense in there, although the coffee seems quite a background and not as forefront while I get the patchouli and orange blossom a lot more in front. Sometimes the pitfall of oils mixes like this is they can combine in a way that can negate the distinctions of the ingredients. The vanilla and the cream, for example, are there but often you have to really get close to the stick to sense them and both seem to weave in and out of the blend. There’s also an effect similar to incenses like Nippon Kodo’s Aqua which I usually attribute to cyclamen, it’s a sort of watery sort of floral, but as it’s not in the ingredients list it’s hard to estimate where this is coming from. All of these elements give this as a sort of composite feel which rarely resolves to a whole, but when it does it’s perhaps at its most impressive.

Jaz Mocha is an aged incense, apparently two years in a climate-controlled room, no less, and was started in September 2020. The ingredients include dark chocolate, honey jasmine sambac, sandalwood, guaicwood, oakmoss, tolu balsam and copal. Similarly with Cocoa Pods, the chocolate scent can take a bit to come out of an Epika Earth incense but when it does it’s really worth it. Aging also seems to do this incense favors, at the very least it really crystallizes most of the listed ingredients to where they can come out in the mix quite succinctly. This combination feels quite a bit different to the incenses I’ve reviewed so far and I think the presence of honey jasmine sambac and the balsam in particular move this off into a pretty original realm. It’s not a mocha scent in the most literal fashion, it’s more dressed up to smell even more delicious and possibly more like a tribute to both a setting and the drink (the floral quality in particular moves this out of the range of the name really). One thing I really noticed with this one is it smells different depending on where you are in the room and if you walk out and back in it can be incredibly arresting. Similarly to the Ataraxia and Bacchus, there’s some overlapping territory with Jaz Mocha and Cocoa Pods, but in this case the ingredients used in Jaz Mocha push the scent into different areas. The wood oils give it a sense of dryness and an almost solemn like regality to it that continuously reminds me of the southwest, even when the ingredients aren’t quite in that milieu. The sandalwood actually occasionally pops out at you which is wonderful. I might even recommend this as an example of essential oil blendings skills as it feels so carefully concocted.

Celebration of Life is a name used on both a stick and on a dhoop but I’m just going to tackle the dhoop version of this incense on this installment, after all it was these special sort of non-dipped blends that got my attention first (they are thematically similar, but have some differences). So Epika Earth originally forgot to put this in my original order. This happens sometimes and they fulfilled it immediately, and I wouldn’t mention it except that it was sent separately and the dhoops are so damp and fragile that they just didn’t really survive the trip in the sort of condition you can see in the Epika Earth picture even when padded up for protection (and they not only crumbled for this picture but once again over my own handling after this picture). So keep that in mind, it’s not the sort of thing that really bothers me when said dhoop is putting out enough smoke that burning a full length of one of these is probably a bit of an overkill unless you’re scenting a large space. So this is very much a situation like the Inspirecense last installment where it turns out that a small piece and heating is probably the preferable method, although I think the Celebration of Life burns a bit better/smoother when lit, so the difference is much smaller. The ingredients are explained as “We started with the finest sandalwood and agarwood; then we layer in high quality resins (frankincense, myrrh), resinoids (rock rose, styrax, etc), essential oils (Epika Sacred Sandalwood blend) and infuse with organic cinnamon, organic rose pedals and organic helichrysum flowers with gold copal woven in between.” Talk about winning you over with a description! This is yet another complex wonder full of woodiness and spiciness, with a real earthiness to the blend. It is a bit sweeter and richer on a heater – I got a ton of brown sugar and cinnamon on the heat which is the kind of mix that wins me over every time. It reminds me a little of a sweet and spicy oatmeal with some fruit mixed in. The dhoops are very soft and easily crumbled into the type of foil containers used with the Golden Lotus heater, so in the end the fragility doesn’t matter all too much, and I’d imagine burning one at its original length would be quite smoky. In the end this one’s merits outlive the caveats.

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Dhe-Tsang Monastery / Dhe-Tsang Golden Essence

February 8, 2024 at 7:20 am (Agarwood / Aloeswood / Eaglewood, Dhe-Tsang Monastery, Frankincense, Incense, Mike, Rhododendron, Spice (Cinnamon Clove Nutmeg etc.), Tibet Autonomous Region)

I consider Tibetan incenses that reach the $20 mark or go over to usually consist of ingredients that denote a more premium incense and certainly more so if the box is half the size of a usual roll as is the case with Dhe-Tsang Golden Essence. This, I believe, is the third imported incense from this monastery, after the flagship Dhe-Tsang Monastery Incense and the Dhe-Tsang Sacred Mountains Incense.

The Golden Essence comes in a very nice box, something that says premium from the get-go, especially with inner gold colored foil wrapper, which is quite a change from the containerless Sacred Mountains roll. The notes here are “frankincense, nutmeg, agarwood, rhododendron and other precious ingredients.” While the frankincense is not particularly obvious in the mix at first, it absolutely blends in to create a very different vibe from the usual incenses with nutmeg and agarwood. The base does smell like there may be some sandalwood in there mixed in with the agarwood, but on top of the wood the frankincense seems to intensify the herbal and spice mix – it comes off a bit tangy and a touch brassy. It wasn’t until my fourth stick that I actually started feeling like the agarwood in this was pretty good and actually contributing to the quality of the aroma rather than being a milder base wood. It is absolutely a vital part of the scent.

I do notice quite a middle to the incense although this may change with the temperature, it seems a bit more apparent when it’s warmer. On my current stick, I noticed that right before the heater came back on from the thermostat that I sort of lost this middle. Of course, there’s also a pretty big musk hit, a fairly ubiquitous note in most monastery incenses. Overall Golden Essence keeps you guessing in the way any finer Tibetan incense does. This was the first incense I attempted to review that had just come in (just about all the previous reviews were incenses I had sat with over months in 2023) and it took about a half dozen sticks before some of the gentle subtleties started to make themselves known. Some of this is just that this is a bit of a different formulation to other Tibetan sticks. You find frankincense in a lot of Tibetan incenses but it’s a much stronger note in this one than in the usual and it kind of pulls everything else together in different ways than I expected. But it’s also an incense with a high-quality wood presence, maybe working closer to the level of the Agarwood Heart of Shamballa. As always don’t expect a Japanese agarwood incense here, but this is about as close as Tibetans get to some low to mid ends. It’s likely an incense a connoisseur will want to check out.

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Mermade Magickal Arts / Demeter’s Bakery, Pomander, Winter Wreath + Espirit de la Nature / The Light Mothers

January 3, 2024 at 2:49 pm (Anise, Artemisia (Mugwort, Wormwood), Balsam, Benzoin (Loban), Bitter Orange (Neroli), Black Currant, Camphor, Borneol, Canada, Carnation, Cedar, Copal, Esprit de la Nature, Fir, Frankincense, Galbanum, Hay, Incense, Juniper, Labdanum, Larch, Massoia Bark, Mastic, Mermade Magickal Arts, Mike, Myrrh, Orange, Ornifolia, Pine / Pinon, Sandalwood, Spice (Cinnamon Clove Nutmeg etc.), Styrax Liquidambar, Sweetgrass, United States, Vanilla)

So first of all, Happy New Year to all, this is the first review of 2024. I am happy to report that I got a lot of review work done and so expect to see reviews every third day until sometime in February. Thanks also to Katlyn Breene of Mermade Magickal Arts who has always been a big supporter of ORS, this will hopefully be the first of two reviews of her recent incenses, which are as good as they always are, if not better.

I can’t really imagine a holiday/Winter Solstice season without the incenses of Mermade Magickal Arts,, Katlyn’s wintery blends have been among my favorite heatable incenses for the last decade or two, in fact if you look at the reviews index you’ll see a whole lot of them have gone by. Some like Wild Wood are now perennials, if not classics. While you can get greenness in stick incense, I’m not sure you can ever get it in the sort of resolution where different kinds of evergreens – pine, spruce, fir, juniper etc – actually contour the whole palette of an incense. And even beyond these green wonders, Katlyn has experimented nearly every year coming up with all sorts of treats in the winter tradition. And like with my review on Dimension 5, I really should mention that I don’t think Mermade has steered off of making great incenses ever since I first discovered them, before I even started ORS, so if you’re picking up a bias, then yeah I will gladly own it, in fact I’d suggest if you’ve tried any of her incenses you may have also picked it up too. Katlyn is the premiere artist of these sorts of incenses in the US and this group is another bunch of quality scents. In fact what really impressed me this time was how long lasting they were. I accidentally left my heater on high with Winter Wreath sitting on it overnight and I swear it was still emitting a great scent the next morning, so these are also incredibly long-lasting scents.

But before we get to the winter incenses, let’s pop back to the autumn for Mermade’s Demeter’s Bakery. As soon as I had this heating, I started getting a sense of nostalgia about the scent. Over time I realized that it was reminding me in some sense of an old Nu Essence blend that I think was the Pluto. I scrambled back through our archives and realized Ross had reviewed this one many moons ago; however, I think I only matched up the benzoin as being overlapping. But the thing is, the longer you heat Demeter’s Bakery, the more it sort of transforms and modulates over time and so it even began to move past this later in the heat. The incense has a huge, yummy list of goodies in it: Omani black frankincense, Kua myrrh, Yemeni myrrh, ornifolia resin, massoia bark, anise seeds, Saigon cinnamon, benzoin, hay absolute, vanilla, Peru balsam, and black currant absolute. Once I gave this a second heat at the suggested temperature of about 230C, I noticed once again that similarity to Pluto, but where it felt like that aroma was created a bit by the sandalwood and bitter almond, here it’s much harder to call except that this is very much like a heated bakery good all the way through with that bit of yeast to get the bread to rise. Of course part of this is all the spices and the vanilla, but it seems almost facile to just talk about the cinnamon when there is so much going on at the spice level here, it’s like a rainbow of scent. But that sugar spice smell is right at the center of this and makes it oh so friendly. It’s funny with incense I often don’t even think of how important baked good are to our olfactory senses, how important cooking memories are to our olfactory experience. What’s clever about this one is it seems to start with those memories but then runs in a whole new direction with them. The second phase of the heat, feels like some of the moistness of the scent gives way to a more austere dry quality almost as if your baked good is finishing up. I think some of this is dependent on how much resin is in the heater cup and much later in the heat when its exhausted, some of the frankincense and myrrh remains give it a different quality as well. All in all this is some really fine work and somewhat different for Mermade as well.

I have probably brought this up before (I seem to remember doing so recently with the Temple of Incense Festive Kiss which is certainly in the same spirit) but one of my early memories was a recipe my mom made called “spiced tea.” It was a very 70s sort of thing with Tang powder, Lipton tea and spices. It had loads of sugar and smelled amazing so of course I loved it. Mermade’s Pomander is an almost 100% accurate representation of how I remember it smelling so this one moved pretty quickly to one of my very favorite incenses this year. In an environment where the most prized scents are rare woods or ingredients it’s always good to know that something a lot more conventional can do the trick as well. However the trick to this is that it’s not created conventionally but with a whole lot of artistic skill to make sure this is a real delight. If I have the list right, I read the ingredients as Carmel benzoin; labdanum absolute; Peru balsam; aromatic winter spices; Saigon cinnamon; clove; carnation absolute; bitter orange essential oil and orange zest; green, honey and silver frankincense; kua crimson; Yemeni myrrh; Mysore sandalwood; styrax liquidambar; and vanilla. What I love about all of this is just how it all coalesces into a simple but powerful spiced orange incense. It is just utterly perfect and I can’t recommend it more highly.

Winter Wreath is another classic winter green mix, Katlyn has gotten so good at these over the last couple of decades that I don’t expect anything less than top notch. This mix seems to have a bit of an herbal component to it that mixes it up a bit (it may just be some of the cedar touches), but it just ends up enhancing the increasingly high resolution mix of the usual wonderful ingredients: fir balsam resin and needles, Aleppo and Sweet Pinon pine, arbor vitae (Thuja cedar) and red cedar – you can nearly pick each one out in the mix, an amazing thing with evergreens all this close in family. These scents are all magnified by the resin mix of copal blanco, Oman frankincense sacra, and kua myrrh in the usual manner, giving that real depth to the top green scents. One thing I love about this resin mix is a lot of lime is coming out of the bottom which I assume is probably the quality of the copal blanco in the mix. It makes me think back to some of the older winter blends in the sense that this quality has shown up before, but this is probably one of the first times I’ve really noticed it, it’s such a powerful note that I’m reminded of key lime pie. It blends absolutely perfectly with all the wonderful evergreen notes as well. The myrrh seems to be more in the mix later in the heat, transmuting the blend into something different, almost wistful and poignant. It’s hard to say more, if you’re a long time customer of Katlyn’s then you probably know this kind of thing very well and if you aren’t it’s a perfect way in. Like I mentioned earlier, this a blend that heats for ages too, I can imagine getting at least 12 hours of a heat if you fill a foil container about half full or so.

And not terribly far from Winter Wreath is the Espirit de la Nature offering The Light Mothers, an incense offered as a pair with The Dark Mothers, both presenting different winter energies for the season. Unfortunately these two sold out right before I posted this, but I’m leaving the review for posterity (and a reminder that EdlN incenses often go really fast at Mermade!) This incense has a really sizeable list of ingredients including balsam fir resin, larch wood, juniper berries, cedarwood, larch needles, balsam fir needles, cedarwood, mugwort, sweetgrass, tree mosses, pinyon pine resin, pinus sylvestris resin, mastic resin, galbanum resin, camphor flakes, amanita muscaria mushrooms, as well as extracts of balsam fir, juniper berry, and cedar. As you can tell in the picture these come as pieces, although it looks like the mushrooms are in there as larger chunks. Those versed in Bonnie’s intensely personalized style of incense will be familiar with her careful and gentle approach. But while all of her creations are really subtle and widely resonant, this one is a bit louder in the mix, which is good for my oversaturated olfactory organs. While this incense shares some ingredients with Winter Wreath, it definitely goes in a different direction without that resinous backdrop, creating a similar aromatic depth with the extracts. To the fore are the larch ingredients and this might be only something I got by trying a couple of EdlN’s earlier blends with this magic scent involved, but it’s an unforgettable scent, one I almost immediately purchase anything with it in it. As always even this wide variety of ingredients can usually be detected with some guided sniffing, I’m always impressed with the way Bonnie puts so many voices together until it feels steered by one greater entity. Utterly brilliant work.

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Reting Monastery Incense

December 1, 2023 at 8:00 am (Cardamom, Cedar, Frankincense, Incense, Mike, Red Sandalwood, Reting Monatery, Sandalwood, Spice (Cinnamon Clove Nutmeg etc.))

I get pretty thrilled when Incense Traditions brings in a new monastery (or nunnery) incense, most of them are just amazing aromatic experiences and so few of them are repetitive or boring. It’s even nicer when it’s a wonderful new monastery incense with a low price on it. Reting Monastery Incense is a very Western friendly incense containing “white and red sandalwoods, frankincense, black cardamom, nutmeg, cedar and 20 others.”

Reting Monastery incense just has really deep spices to it, they’re as latent as the woods or resins in the mix, but they rise all the way up to the top without feeling adulterated. As someone who loves deep cinnamon/nutmeg/clove sorts of mixes, I was very impressed with how powerful these notes are in this incense, and I think it’s easy to catch the black cardamom in this as well (my initial notes show that I found the nutmeg to be really in front as well). However, the spice profile isn’t say like a spiced cookie or particularly sweet, but in this case it takes all that in a really fresh direction. Where a lot of monastery incenses might go in a deeply tangy direction, you get that as a sub-note underneath all the spicy glory of this beauty. It is actually astonishing at times what spirals off of the smoke and it’s a testament that so many of these incenses really need a deep dive first as it’s hard to catch everything with just a stick or two. I believe I bought this earlier in the year and did like it but when I sat down to review this in the morning, it really clicked with me. If I was to compare it to other incenses, it is similar in some base-like fashion to some of the therapeutic and relaxation category on the IT website, for instance there is a bit of that like pistachio-like aroma you find in the Holy Lands. The musk feels even more latent in this incense, at times I don’t even notice it because of the spices, but then it just kind of wallops you. An absolutely outstanding incense and a tremendous find, it’s just a cavalcade of multiple sub-notes and surprises.

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Asayu / Patchouli, Frankincense, Hinoki, Agarwood (low smoke), Sandalwood (low smoke)

November 16, 2023 at 11:19 am (Agarwood / Aloeswood / Eaglewood, Asayu, Cypress, Frankincense, Incense, Japan, Less / Low Smoke, Mike, Patchouli, Sandalwood)

As introduced in my previous review, Asayu is a new Japanese company who are managing to do rather well with a sleek and polished modern incense line that is growing over time. I think of their incense to be similar to the types of scents Shoyeido or Nippon Kodo do with single ingredient blends aimed at a larger market, but Asayu’s scents are a bit more upscale than that and tend to be much better incenses than the ones you find in the Overtones or Morning Star lines (they are also correspondingly priced). None of them have struck me as being anything but a really careful and elegant approach to a particular scent. In a market today where expensive woods are starting to really disappear, it’s not a surprise Asayu don’t cater to that market (although I would love to see it), but I have yet to see an incense blend they do that isn’t legitimate. So I’m happy to get some samples from them to review some more incenses. I also want to remind readers of the coupon posted here, it will help you get 15% off of their incenses through December. The code to use is ORSHOLIDAY15.

Asayu’s Patchouli really pops off the fresh stick just from opening the box and it’s a somewhat refined but familiar patchouli aroma you’ll recognize from essential oils and other Japanese sticks (Indian patchoulis go in all sorts of directions of which this particular scent might be merely one). But some of the baseline patchoulis in, say, the Shoyeido catalog tend to have some sweetening going on. Asayu’s patchouli is unapologetic in giving you a patchouli aroma as is, without any noticeable adulteration outside of the base, although it actually is somewhat reminiscent of the patchouli notes in some of Shoyeido’s daily blends. The oil really sort of presents the aroma more like the leaves of the herb when it burns and so the aroma is very authentic and very autumnal in a way that is really quite striking. It’s neither a hippy patchouli nor a new age one, it is very aligned with Japanese traditional incense. Once again I am always struck by the balance of Asayu’s blends, they never feel like they’re tilting in the wrong direction. Even the finality of the burn leaves a fresh and clean feeling, nothing is cloying or overwhelming. Patchouli is an interesting aroma in that it is general popular enough in the West to be common in incense lines, but despite that it isn’t always to every user’s taste. It’s less an ingredient of depth than of breadth. In Asayu’s case I think it hits both the leaf and some sense of the oil, and it would also be a good introduction to the scent if you’re not sure what the herb smells like.

The next four scents for review come from a handsome sampler Asayu provided. This sampler has five aromas (eight sticks each) and I already covered one of the incenses in the previous installment (Sandalwood and White Sage). The remaining aromas are two traditionals and two low smoke incenses. I have a theory about reviewing things, which is basically something like don’t poorly review a country album because it’s not rock and roll. This is something I usually apply to low smoke incenses, I not only don’t seek them out with intent but offer fair warning to companies who want to provide them for review (I’ll be fair, but not enthusiastic if that makes sense). With that said a great deal of the Japanese modern market would not be selling them if there wasn’t some level of popularity, so I just wanted to provide these comments before I provide my thoughts a couple paragraphs down in case it feels like I’m putting the finger on the balance. And occasionally I absolutely do come across an occasional low smoke stick that I like, it is not impossible (Baieido’s Hinoki comes to mind right away).

But let’s start with the two traditionals. One is a Frankincense. I think originally frankincense was not always a common aroma in Japanese traditionals but I know some of them over the last decade or so have been tailored for western audiences. We have covered Tennendo Frankincense and Minorien Frankincense in the past that were quite good, not to mention Shoyeido’s Incense Road Frankincense is a modern treat (but not strictly frankincense in a purer sense). Those in the above-mentioned Overtones and Morning Star (not reviewed) lines were not to my taste though, the former struck me as too sweet and the base in the basic Morning Star line is usually problematic. Across Indian and Japanese scents, frankincense can differ quite widely in approach. Asayu’s stick actually does smell like a quality Catholic church resin blend in a traditional Japanese base, so it actually differs from a lot of the other ones I mentioned that are more stylized (it’s probably closest to the Minorien, but it’s a little more polished). I’ve gone on the record that it’s tough to beat something like a good hougary frankincense on a heater, but you do need a set up to do that (if this sounds intriguing Mermade can take you in this direction). But as a stick incense, Asayu avoid going too sweet, a classy step which really puts this blend up with the others mentioned. I’d suspect some of this aroma comes from a reasonable essential oil or absolute but if I was told some resin was in this I’d believe it. It flourishes in slightly colder temperatures, for me it felt like the resin breathed a lot more in the morning. It is an idiosyncrasy of my own tastes that I’ve heard from a lot of readers who prize Japanese frankincense sticks more than I do, so keep that in mind checking this one out in case you think I’m underselling it. Asayu’s entry is very nicely done and of course in a sampler like this one you can check it out before stocking the 40g box, but note the 40g boxes contain a LOT of incense). I absolutely think fans of Japanese frankincense sticks will warm to this right away.

Hinoki (Cypress) incenses are actually very difficult not to do well, even the inexpensive Nippon Kodo Ka Fuh Hinoki is quite good. Asayu present what I’d classify as a fairly woody Hinoki, and while the resinous qualities of the cypress are distinguishable, they do not get quite as loud as either Baieido’s Hinoki or the Nippon Kodo Ka Fuh. When it comes to cypress I’ve always liked the loud and proud Bosen Pythoncidere, but this is not an incense ready for Japanese tea ceremonies, it’s pretty much a resin hammer. Asayu’s Hinoki reminds me more of the Hinoki in Kunjudo’s Kozanmai assortment although I think this is an improvement on a similar approach. So, with this map established, it’s basically my instinct to seek out the green resin or oil in a hinoki or cypress incenses. In the end it is actually there in the Asayu Hinoki, it sort of sits almost cooly underneath the woodier notes rather than on top of them and I don’t think this is an accident, it’s more like an intentional choice of Asayu’s incense creators. It’s kind of a reminder that the company has a level of vision that becomes a bit more apparent with each new incense they release. Overall, the Asayu Hinoki is really one of the milder versions of a cypress that you can find, it’s very elegant and much more about a woody take than resinous one. And of course the more you use it the more you’ll discover that it’s quite well crafted and holds some secrets for repeated uses.

So, part of my struggle with low smoke incenses is they can be hard to pick up in my smoke saturated environment or maybe my nose struggles to pick up something this quiet. The Asayu Agarwood Low Smoke is kind of fascinating in the sense that there really is a solid attempt to not just foist off something average under the imprint. As I tried to absorb this, I noticed all sorts of charry and darker notes, aspects I would absolutely not expect from either a low smoke aloeswood or even an inexpensive traditional. I mean there is something of a tiny sweetness down there, but this is still a Japanese incense and the thought of heating or burning aloeswood so its resin releases is still a governing factor of what scent this is trying to achieve. But even with all my considerations, it’s a scent that is not only faint, but surprisingly diverse, I had to pick up the stick and wave it forward to catch all that I did (literally everything from charrier notes, to varying aloeswood contours, occasionally something like what a barbeque smells like – possibly the charcoal – and even occasionally some surprisingly good sub-notes). I’d also have to be within sitting distance to even notice I had incense on. Would it vary for you? I would think it would for casual users, in many ways low smoke incenses are more for homes that don’t usually use it, to provide an aroma without the smoke after-effects. I would be hard pressed going on record saying you can get a legit agarwood incense in this format, but in a field where approximation and imitation is just going to continue to grow as rarer and more expensive ingredients become impossible to use, I was at least happy to see the scent of the wood respected rather than be given something more reminiscent of a low-end Nippon Kodo approximation. Will it be popular? Probably out of my ability to predict. I would only add that the charcoal base (visible in the picture) usually used in low smoke incenses is also a presence one can’t actually get entirely around, it is part of the aroma. On the other hand, casual users are likely to get the casual effect they were looking for, I found I enjoyed this most lighting a stick when I was busy and then occasionally noticing it as I sat or walked near the burning stick.

What about the Sandalwood Low Smoke? Well it’s similar in volume, but where the Agarwood Low Smoke felt like there had to be a pitch of some sort (in the sense that agarwood aromas can vary so much that you still have to sort of aim at one), the Sandalwood gets surprisingly close to intimating the more quality end of the wood. This would be of course in the Japanese sense of the usage, where the oils aren’t turned up to deafening and the more crystalline aspects of the resin are more accentuated. The base, as previously, stated, fights against this a bit (that barbeque like subnote does indeed seem to come from the charcoal), but overall this is a reasonable attempt at the format and scent, within the prescribed limitations of course. I’m assuming Asayu were able to do this as charcoals normally base oils, but the faint aroma still feels nicely authentic, even aiming at qualities I would describe only in Mysore sandalwoods. I would only add that it feels like there have been some friendly adjustments as well, an increase in the spicy, cinnamon-adjacent notes for example. It’s a tribute to the creators that they’ve managed to bring something with some personality out of such a small scent and I would imagine this would definitely be a pleasant sandalwood incense for those preferring low smoke.

I do wonder if perhaps the charcoal sub-notes might not be as noticeable if they weren’t paired with wood notes (they don’t tend to work in florals for me either, but in herbal or spicier blends perhaps)? One of the reasons I considered this is because charcoal is prominent in most incenses today at least across the Indian and Japanese markets and I often question why they can interfere in one incense while being almost unnoticeable in another. Perhaps with low smoke incenses there just isn’t enough volume to get over that hump or perhaps it’s the difference in low smoke charcoal. But even with my impressions, the format never disappears and seems to do well as, perhaps, an alternate to candle oils or air fresheners. In this sense both of these seem to hit their marks.

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Bhagwan Incense / Balsamic Amber, Frank & Rose, Garden of Eden, Oudh Majestic, Woody Champa + notes on other fragrances

November 10, 2023 at 11:28 am (Amber, Balsam, Beeswax, Bhagwan Incense, Champa / Durbar, Champa Flower, Floral, Frankincense, Halmaddi / Mattipal, Honey, Incense, India, Meena Perfumery Industries, Oud, Propolis, Resins, Rose, Uncategorized, Vanilla)

Bhagwan Incense is a relatively new incense company operating out of the EEU by Ukranian Eugene Andruschenko out of Paris, France and Bucharest, Romania. Bhagwan Incense is a label that fronts several Indian exports including both the familiar and the unfamiliar, in extremely beautiful packaging with mandala, paisley and other patterning that should be smart and attractive at the get-go. Also, Bhagwan “…do not sell coal-based, synthetic or perfume-dipped incense, only premium masala incense made using pure halmaddi, sandalwood powder, natural oils and attars (oils) produced with age-old methods for perfume distillation.” So in this sense they sell the sorts of incenses that will be of interest to ORS readers.

However, I am going to mention that this review is basically provisional in the sense that there has been an agreement to drop some of the Bhagwan line that overlapped another seller. While I really do feel like, to the best of my knowledge, that Bhagwan has managed to find some really good incenses that I have not seen sourced anywhere before (which I will share in these and upcoming reviews), I think some lines were crossed with some items in the catalog and nor do I think this is entirely the fault of Bhagwan. I’m not trying to stir up controversy and definitely not discussion, I’m just noting this here because I really hope I’ll be able to share more good news in the future that came out of the resolution of this. If this seems a little vague, it’s just that some of it is not my news to share and it will need some time to settle out.

The following will be reviews of some of the newly imported incenses Eugene sent for review as well as some quick stops in familiar territory (Madhavadas and Meena to name two) that I’ll include with the other reviews. Generally speaking, well-versed incense enthusiasts are likely going to find some things they know in this catalog, but I will be concentrating the most on the things I don’t recognize. There are probably roughly 15 scents in the catalog I want to get to (with some notes on others), and I’m going to start with a few real highlights.

Balsamic Amber just absolutely impressed immediately, it’s an instant hall of famer. It’s interesting but when we talk about good incenses we can spend so much time in areas (usually the woods) where resources are precious and rewards only given to the expensive, so Balsamic Amber reminds me that you can still create something excellent without having to go there. First of all it’s super rich with a lot of breadth, second it’s not hard at all to get the really wonderful balsamic quality and how it helps get an almost honeycomb-like amber in the center. Honey-like undoubtedly due to the inclusion of propolis and beeswax in the aroma. It’s wonderfully topped off with this expansive foresty vibe and a lot of cinnamon spiciness. I will admit that something like this is naturally in my wheelhouse but I am not sure I’ve ever smelled an Indian incense that does this so well. It’s one of those invigorating incenses that is perfect for a colder morning. I hope Bhagwan are able to keep this stocked a long as possible, it’s an absolute must.

I was expecting Frank & Rose to probably be Madhavadas but I’m not sure I’ve ever seen that family do a purple color masala like this one and it definitely has a scent range I haven’t experienced before. And not only that, the squishiness of the stick shows it’s halmaddi based, although I would say it’s not champa-like in any way. I’m on record in several places on ORS about being usually nonplussed by Indian frankincense sticks and in probably even more places about my feelings on a wide variety of rose incenses, but this marriage feels fairly unique to me. While I have not tried a pure Bhagwan frankincense, the Rose I was sent (and will review in a later installment) was incredibly well done and it’s hard to tell if that’s what is in this. The incense is really about the collision between the two, and it is an interesting one because it seems fairly dynamic where you can get the individualities of both while mostly experiencing them interact together. I think that’s a really fine trick in a “two ingredient” incense, where it seems like the relative strengths of both vary during the burn. In fact because I wasn’t sure how this would work, I spent a bit of time with this one. The honey in the mix actually reminds me of what might happen if the Holy Smoke line went for more premium perfume oils. Strangely the way the middle meets is something almost like a confection, with some caramel or even fruit in the mix which shows that the base is as much of a player as the two ingredients listed. Its a long burner as well, and my experience was I liked this more and more with every stick.

Of the five incenses here, I’m not completely sure of the provenance of each, but Garden of Eden strikes me as at least similar to some of the Meena line. Bhagwan repackages Meena Supreme as well and while I’ve come across bootlegs before that don’t quite smell right, not only is their Supreme authentic, it seems to stay fresher in this packaging than it does in the original cardboard box which is a really nice touch. I recently reviewed a few different Meena incenses but don’t immediately notice a match up with Garden of Eden, except to say that it still feels like it has that similar note that ties many of their incenses together while perhaps being even more friendly. Bhagwan describes this as “Young, fresh, light and ethereal summer bouquet, made with the highest quality floral oils from Kerala, honey and halmaddi resin” and it’s hard to disagree with that assessment as it really is a pleasantly light, almost mild incense that you’re not as likely to have tried before. It doesn’t feel all that oil saturated, so either it’s a gentle mix or there’s a bit of wood or something in the middle. There’s also this fleeting quality that reminds me of aromatic ice cream as well, which I’ve never smelled in anything before. Garden of Eden should scratch that something different itch, especially as no other incenses in the line other than the Supreme itself are similar to this one. A really nice find.

It’s been a long time since there was a real contender to the Oud Masala from the Happy Hari family, that nearly perfect blend of masala base and at least an approximation of a decent oud to complement it. There are also a number of charcoal based ouds out there that one might not be able to pick out a specific aroma in a line up. Pure Incense have provided a wide and almost dizzying array of oud and aloeswood incenses from Madhavadas and often the issue is less the top oils than the base. I’m not sure where Oudh Majestic came from but it’s a really good charcoal oudh and has an oil mix on top that seems constructed to display something a bit better than the usual oudh tinged colognes. Mind you we caution anyone expecting real oudh notes in an incense this inexpensive, but the glass half full side of this shows that occasionally there are some really good “will pass fors” out there. I’d guess this may have come from a tincture as it still has some hints of alcohol in it, but they do not overwhelm the excellent scent. If you’re happy with the incenses just named, for sure you want to try this gem. It particularly fared well compared to what seems to be a Madhavadas-sourced Saffron Oudh that seems to have lost its power to overwhelm its base. Perhaps I got the wrong sample here as the brown colored stick looks not a bit like the one in the store photo. But I know, as with Pure Incense, that Madhavadas have different ranks to them and this scent could just be a lower rank where the oil isn’t applied as liberally. The issue with the incenses like this is that with casual use the scent really becomes the base.

Finally, in this group, is the somewhat humble Woody Champa, an incense that actually reminds me a bit of the Blue Pearl champa range both old and new. This isn’t as halmaddi squishy as, say, the Frank & Rose is, but you can definitely smell it on the stick. It does have a bit of a foresty vibe slightly reminiscent of the Balsamic Amber, and certainly the vanilla in the description is detectable, but ultimately the central champaca floral doesn’t get lost in its mildness. As someone who finds the Gold Nag Champa and variations a little bitter in places, I welcome a champa that is missing this element. Like the Garden of Eden this is a mild but pleasant and pretty incense, and one wonders if there are other champas from this exporter.

More to come in the Bhagwan line, but I wanted to start with a few highlights. Keep in mind this is a new and growing, multi-sourced line and as I’ve mentioned, there is some overlap but for now I am hoping any controversy can be avoided in the comments section. These five are at least brand new to my nose and very good and I can wholeheartedly recommend them all.

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Dimension 5 / Voyager (new)

August 23, 2023 at 10:05 am (Agarwood / Aloeswood / Eaglewood, Benzoin (Loban), Camphor, Borneol, Dimension 5, Frankincense, Incense, Mike, Sandalwood, Spice (Cinnamon Clove Nutmeg etc.), United States)

For lack of a better definition, I find it fascinating that “boutique” smaller shop incense creators are not only working on new scents but improving or altering old scents. Voyager was reviewed here in late 2021, but I know Josh Matthews’ incenses can often still be on the lab bench if he feels there’s any possibility of making something better. This incense is essentially a Voyager upgrade, although I am going to review this one before looking at the old notes…

First of all, Josh has explained to me that there’s a choice in the creation between the amount of binder in a stick and the choice of the more intense scent when there is less of this binder. In that sense, this is probably as far over to the intense scent side, leaving the sticks extremely fragile (more so than other comparable D5 sticks). Like just now I lit a fragment and as I held it the top half that was burning fell off! So keep that in mind, although I will say at this level you definitely do not get much in the way, if at all, of binder materials in the aroma. It is de-luxe. This new version of Voyager is thus a very pure scent and it also burns quite fast. First of all what I notice in this is this sort of an apple juice or apple cider type of scent which I think is largely due to the mix of woods as well as the cinnamon in the mix. So even before looking at my old review I am sensing something quite familiar somewhere in my scent memory. Now if I remember correctly, I don’t believe the original has this strength which brings out more of the sort of lacquer like qualities you get in better aloeswood. They are definitely being coaxed out here a bit more. It feels as well like the frankincense and camphor both merge nicely into mix, the camphor is actually on the edges of this in the best way. As the burn deepens, the aloeswood qualities really come out to the fore, giving a richness to the overall aroma. I might add too that I had to step out of my place for ten minutes, when I came back the area around my burner was still quite resonant of the scent of the incense, there’s no question there’s some level of strength going on in this.

My take compared to my previously linked review is that the original largely applies, but it feels like there’s been a substantial agarwood bump, if not in quantity than surely in quality. The resemblances to Japanese frankincense incenses didn’t pop to my mind reviewing it this time, but I definitely find them quite valid still, although this, of course, is in a much more woody and spicy direction. Overall, like all of D5’s incenses, this is still a very high quality, incredibly intense scent blast and recommended. If interested, you contact Josh at dimension5incense@gmail.com for pricing and information, and I will also mention that while Mermade Magickal Arts already carries parts of the line sometimes, they have a tendency to go fast.

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