Camel
Zoologist (2017)

Every time a camel meanders through the desert it treads terra incognita. The sands move and shift constantly. The grains on which the camel treads today were not the same ones as yesterday nor will they be the same tomorrow. Don’t expect this to mean that the perfume is something novel. It isn’t. It’s a fruity, spicy, resinous, and animalic amber that we’ve had over and over, but I must say it is done very well. As a camel plods along it’s a complete mystery to me and others unfamiliar how it is that a rider or cargo holder stays balanced on that massive hump - weebly wobbling along up and down and across dunes never seeming to lose the center of balance. This is the perfume’s best characteristic: balance.

Carbonnel’s blend of sweet and dried fruit notes, smokey incense and resins, woody spices, civety animalics, and dark earths is impeccable. Sweet, bitter, sour, umami, light, rich, wet, parched, and all things in between. The prunes and dried figs are treated with elegant frankincense and rose, giving them a rich and dark hue, and lighter but silken textures. The cinnamon forward heart locks hand-in-hand with the incense, adding depth and dimension to the wispy tendrils. Cedar and green myrrh add an aromatic and resinous sourness to give it lift. Hay like florals, a big slug of civet, woods, and tonka relay Oriental amber with an elegant cured pipe tobacco finish and classic French chic musky animalics and leathers.

Camel achieves something that is unfortunately all too rare in this genre of Oriental ambers, namely being very easy and comfortable to wear at any time for any reason (unless you dislike civet/animalics), while still being rich and interesting without feeling too heavy or self-important. The depth, breadth, and balance of this goofy animal is quite mesmerizing and majestic when you take a good long look at it.

There’s a famous delicatessen in Milan by the name of Peck. Established in 1883, it’s a Mecca for food enthusiasts, its shelves stocked with the finest cured meats, cheeses, wines, and truffles of Italy. When I lived nearby, in Bergamo, (in my early twenties), I would often take the train down to Milan at the weekend, and walk through the store, drinking in the unami-rich air. I remember in particular huge glass jars of mostarda – neon-colored orbs of fruit preserved in a clear mustard seed pickling juice. When the afternoon light caught them at the right angle, they glowed like the gaudiest of paste jewelry: emerald, yellow, and orange. The guys behind the counter would goad me into taking a little with my prosciutto and salami snack, and they’d laugh as I gingerly nibbled at the edges, the virgin blandness of an Irish diet having ill-equipped me to deal with the gush of hot, sour, sweet, and savory flavors on my tongue. When I first tried Arabie by Serge Lutens, its dried fruits over a sour asafetida base reminded me immediately of my trips to Peck. But although the association charmed me, Arabie proved too syrup-saturated for regular wear, so I passed it by. I’ll admit that when I read the notes for Zoologist Camel, I thought we were looking at a re-tread of Arabie. But while the dried fruits and dates in the topnotes give a rush of sweetness, Camel is far more sour and savory than it is sweet, and thus reminds me more authentically of Peck and its mostarda than does Arabie.

I think that Victor Wong, as a creative director, is not afraid of a little earthy sourness in the perfumes he commissions. In a sea of sweet niche releases designed to appeal to a mass sweet tooth, he doesn’t mind going sugar-free every now and then. And I like that about him.
Perhaps his bravery with salty-savory flavors comes from an inherent love of unami or the sweet-salty-sour balance in Chinese culinary tradition. I will always remember Victor’s review of M/ Mink for his blog, Sillyage, where he discusses the link between M/Mink’s bleachy opening notes and the smell of Chinese calligraphy ink and dried shellfish. It was the first review of M/Mink that ever made sense to me, because he was able to place it in the context of non-traditionally perfumey things like salt, iodine, and fish. Through his words, I came to understand and finally love that perfume.

Camel has a streak of kimchi running through the dried fruit, amber, and orange blossom, which stops the perfume from tipping into a syrupy cliché of Arabian perfumery. Forget the ad copy about deserts and camels. There is a brief hit of booze, dried fruit, and rose up front, but the frankincense here is limey and tart, and there’s a layer of sealing wax over everything to mute the fervent glow of the fruit. It is rich, but astringent, like a vin jaune from the Alps.

The sourness is given an extra boost in its rather classically French (or so it seems to me) heart of civety jasmine over a pillow of powdery musks. The jasmine is greenish and as fizzy as a vitamin tablet dropped into a glass of water, later developing the leathery profile of sambac jasmine. There is something here that resembles the moist skin under a wristwatch after a long day in the sun. The griminess of the jasmine stands shoulder to shoulder with its gritty, soapy cleanliness, giving the perfume an almost aldehydic buzz.

This tart, soapy, tightly-woven stage of Camel makes me think that Malle’s Superstitious (2016) must indeed have been quite influential on the perfumery scene. There are clear parallels between the Malle and Camel, especially in the acidulated jasmine, the slight raunchiness (without warmth), and its general angularity. Jardin d’Ombre by Ormonde Jayne, which came out in October 2016, the same month as Superstitious, also strikes me as a variation on the theme. In all three perfumes, one might read the notes and think “warmth” or “sweetness”, but the actual scent in each case is of the opposite of lush: astringent, cool-blooded, and definitely more French than oriental in tone.

I admire Superstitious greatly but prefer to gaze upon it from a distance, like watching Joan Crawford rehearse from the safety of a locked wardrobe. Camel, with its pert charm, has fewer pretensions to greatness and is therefore much more approachable. Despite the orientalism of its composition and ad copy, Camel avoids every cliché inherent to the genre, particularly the cheap rosy feel of most modern oriental releases. Its soapy (but dirty) jasmine, musk, and civet combo imbues what might otherwise have been a heavy “souk” amber with weightlessness, as well as a certain French je ne sais quoi. As long as you’re ok with a little salty-sour funk, Camel might be the modern twist on an oriental you’re missing in your collection. Camel is predominantly French in character, but there is perhaps also something a little Chinese or even Peck-ian in its balance between sweet, sour, salty, bitter, and unami.

This scent boasts a well-balanced blend of resins, fruits, and a hint of civet that is masterfully crafted. The woody and lightly musky base adds a touch of elegance without being overly animalistic. The dried fruit accord brings a pleasant sweetness to the myrrh note. While the performance is good, it may not be long-lasting enough for those seeking a nuclear scent. It is a versatile fragrance that would be suitable for every season except for summer.

While I cannot compare it to Arabie by Serge Lutens, it does share the woody DNA common in many of their fragrances. Although a solid scent, the Zoologist price point may seem steep for this composition.

You could search the world over and never find true love. What that statement has to do with cologne is anyone’s guess. What it has to do with this cologne in particular is yet another conundrum that I won’t be helping you solve. I just kinda thought it worth mentioning.

Anyway, as to Camel, it’s a very unusual fragrance that smells of nothing I’ve ever encountered to this point. It’s definitely a Middle Eastern vibe being generated, but I cannot be sure how. Perhaps it’s the palm dates doing it. Given that I’ve no idea how a palm date smells, I thought they were probably a safe bet. At least for the “nothing I’ve ever encountered” part.

You know, I hardly smell the crushed-up Camel cigarettes. It’s as if they’re not even in there.

There is a light sweetness to Camel that belies its tough exterior. It really is a shame that this one is illegal to own.

Certainly one of the more 'user-friendly' fragrances offered by Zoologist, Camel is quite pleasant - a sweet, woody tobacco accord (though there is no tobacco in the actual note breakdown) with rose and date palm that adds a sugary floral vibe. I don't really get the civet or anything animalic off my skin, but the overall experience does darken to something more ambery and rich (vanilla, tonka) in the dry-down.

Amongst Zoologist fragrances, this and Chipmunk have really impressed me as being quite wearable and nice, while others in the line seem more abstract and challenging.

When exploring trendy niche houses that tend to oversell their own novelty, I find that it's best to experience their wares blind, without expectation. When I sampled Camel, I didn't know that it was a Zoologist release, and found myself impressed by its way into a thoroughly explored genre of "Middle Eastern" opulence: spices, florals, incense, and animalics.

The hint of delicately applied "skank" gives Camel an element of interest often missing from the genre, but while that comes through heavy on paper, on my skin it is considerably more polite. This wears as an alluring fresh rose darkened up with dried fruits and smoky incense with a leathery base. The heaviness of the denser notes is alleviated by an aromatic structure that keeps it feeling open and dynamic and surprisingly wearable.

Nothing Camel does reinvents the wheel, but it has depth and heft and balance, putting it lightyears beyond the likes of shallow releases like Penhaligon's Cairo. Another way of saying the same thing: Camel feels like a complete perfume.