• Tom Ford Musk Pure EDP Perfume Review

    Date: 2010.08.03 | Category: fragrance | Tags: ,,,,,,,,,,,

    Musk Pure is a clean white musk. It kind of reminds me of musk mixed with fabric softener. When I first tried this I thought, “this is Chanel No 5 EDT mixed with Dolce & Gabbana Sicily EDP”. After trying it many times, I still think of Musk Pure as this mix. This is a very powdery and clean musk fragrance. It is unisex and reminds me of old-fashioned aldehyde and vanillic fragrance. This is charming and all and pleasant to wear but this is why I own a bottle of Chanel No 5 EDT. And when I want a clean and powdery citrus, I reach for Dolce & Gabbana Sicily EDP.

    The top notes are tart and slightly spicy. It really reminds me of the top notes of Dolce & Gabbana Sicily, another clean musk fragrance. On the top, I definitely get lots of powdery orris white musk mixed with carnation like spice and bergamot citrus. Something about this also reminds me of Chanel No. 5 EDT. I think they call this sharp burst “tanginess”. It’s tart. Musk Pure has a lot of bitterness and is tangy. It’s spicy and somehow sour. Aldehydes? This is why I see this fragrance wearing so nicely on men, the sharp notes. This mellows out and you get more of the powdery orris root clean musk. The dry-down is sweet, warm, and luscious. It’s creamy vanilla with white musk. I want to eat it.

    This isn’t a bad fragrance. I like how it wears on my skin. It is long-wearing. I know I can get something very similar to it for much less. Saying that, I can say that this is a bit of a boring fragrance and it almost feels like a Frankenstein’s monster of top-middle-base of popular fragrances . It lacks any “wow”. It exists to be a Bauhaus type of interpretation of Chanel No. 5. Throughout the wear of this fragrance I’m always sniffing it and going “Hey, it’s D&G Sicily, no wait, it’s Chanel No.5! Oh, here we are at the Donna Karan Cashmere base! Hmm…is this what Coty Vanilla Musk smells like? I forgot.” It’s stripped down modernism of a powdery-floral aldehyde with a rich creamy vanillic base. And this comes across as an extremely familiar and generic fragrance. And because it is familiar, it is easy to wear. I can see people liking this because it is well, boring. It’s really simplified. It’s modern minimalist.

    Notes listed include: ylang opur, white pepper, bergamot, jasmine, lily-of-the-valley, orris absolute, tonka, beeswax, and musk.

    An 1.7 oz. bottle retails for $180 at Nordstrom. UK readers, Tom Ford White Musk Collection is available at Selfridges. And I’d like to add that a 1.7 oz. EDT of Chanel No.5 and a 1.7 oz EDP of D&G Sicily retail for $65.

    Bauhaus pic from Wikipedia

    More of my Tom Ford White Musk Collection reviews: Jasmine Musk

    Want more reviews? Try…

    Perfume Posse (totally agree about this being a “Clean” brand like fragrance)

    1000 Fragrances (also compares it to Chanel No 5)

    Now Smell This

    *Post contains affiliate links.

    Product picture is from Nordstrom. Bauhaus from Wikipedia