Fruitchouli Flash
Tauerville (2016)

This is probably an in joke by Tauer, playing around with the tried and true fruitchouli formula of fruit + flowers + clean, musky patchouli to see if he could make it less conventionally ‘pretty’. Joke’s on him, though, as Angel, available at every perfume counter, had already nailed the ugliness of matching a dishcloth-sour patchouli with neon fruit and vanilla. I recoil at Fruitchouli Flash in the same way as I do Angel, but my question as a reviewer is if there is a twist or innovation here that would justify the jump to niche? It depends on how you like your patchouli. Fruitchouli Flash displays the same rotty-garbagey foulness of the patchouli in Angel, the same aspect that makes me think of dirty dishrags moldering in the wet sink of a lonely incel who has never learned to take care of himself or his house. The perfume does innovate somewhat by introducing a distinctly vegetal tone to the rot, like stewed celery. The neon peach note is not particularly natural-smelling, but provides a momentary relief to the sludgy darkness of the vegetal rot, like spraying a peach-scented deodorant all over the room to mask unholy odors. Overall, though, Fruitchouli Flash is a strange and borderline unpleasant experiment, the point of which ultimately escapes me, unless you have a particular kink of wanting to smell like leathery peaches sweating under a cellophane wrap.

Buzzy, sweet fruit. Patchouli invades immediately. Fruit soda vibe occurs. Becomes dry, dusty, with the rose and mysterious white flowers. There is a resemblance to vanilla lurking about. Fruit lingers. There's spiciness here. It reminds me of freshly ground cinnamon. A 70's musk accord. It mixes in with the patchouli. A whole different take on patchouli here. Not bad!... A kind of smoldering fire or fireplace smell later on... Even more patchouli, later...

Fruitchouli is not bad in itself. It's bold, a bit original. Fruit is Peach and ananas to my nose. A bit of pot-pourri as well. But it lacks depth and work. Liking it, only for 2 cl.

On paper, this is a lovely perfume. I love patchouli, and love apricot. My body chemistry doesn't mesh with it! I would love to swap my bottle.

Och, the burden of expectation.
I love Andy Tauer's way with a fruit note – how the apricot is so frisky within the poise of Phi before finally settling down on a powdery bed, how the raspberry has such an enormous smile on its face in the otherwise rather stately Une Rose Vermeille. I was nigh salivating at the thought of cheery fruit excess.
But Fruitchouli Flash turns out to be an altogether different perfume – for one, the note differentiation one expects from a Tauer creation is pretty much absent. Instead it comes across as a hugely lactonic white floral with some peachy tones to it, with more than a passing resemblance to Gucci Rush. Don't get me wrong, I love the disco-babe attitude of Rush and own a bottle, but Fruitchouli Flash feels a bit too much like re-inventing that particular wheel.

Whereas I love the first four entries of the Tauerville/Flash series, Fruitchouli Flash--perhaps the biggest departure from the rest of the line--is simply odd to me. I've not smelled this much apricot or peach in a fragrance first, and with mainly florals mixed in, I'm not sure I really want to.

On my skin, FF is very linear, the fruity notes dominating the entire experience with the florals a bit further behind. I hardly get any of the patchouli or musk at all in the base, and I suppose they're mostly in existence to bring the rest of it back down to earth.

Overall, it seems to be the most feminine of the Tauerville line, even more so than Rose Flash, and I don't think I will wear it again. Performance is good, as a stronger EDP, like most of the other Flashes.

5 out of 10