Some people want to be smelly, though. Mostly, these are women as the notion of spraying something on yourself to "smell nice" is a pretty chick thing to do. Sure there's cologne, but firstly, that's unisex and secondly, it's still a gamble. Most guys, being made out fat, crap, of anything but money, will most likely opt for either Calvin Klein or Old Spice. That is to say, fragrances that will enable the wearer to either pretend they have a six pack, or are their grandfather.
You could try mixing them, but this is dangerous.
"But Black Ranger," you say, "what about all these commercials I've been seeing for this Axe stuff? According to these commercials, I won't be able to walk down the street without attracting the rapaciously-strong affection of mobs of strictly and exclusively comely young women."
"Well, my well-spoken friend," I respond, "you're missing out on a couple of facts." This would include the fact that Axe bills itself as a deodorant, but actually has an odor, making that a misnomer, but let's not get into that. We'll be focusing on the body spray, anyway.
"What facts?" you ask, rapt to find out what magic aerosol you can spray on yourself, not to help you overcome your crippling fear of talking to women, but to make it moot. After all, the women in the Axe commercials are running the man down, not the other way around.
"Have you ever smelled Axe?"
Your eyes suddenly narrow, as you can feel me about to crush your dreams of unprotected group sex with a smorgasbord of women who look like the girls who wouldn't talk to you in high school, only hotter. "No..." you say.
Well, friend, read on, and I will burst your bubble like a can of hairspray in a fire. If you're lucky, I might even mix a few more metaphors.
Just while I'm thinking about it, I must point out the questionable wisdom behind naming a fragrance "Axe." To compare, we'll use the common "smell-goods" mentioned earlier: Old Spice and Calvin Klein. These are two brands established enough to be good watermarks. After all, the former was responsible for the Baby Boomers and the latter for the legitimization of male models, or, Old Spice is killing Social Security and Calvin Klein made my self-image plummet. Thanks, bastards.
Anyway, Old Spice is known for its musty, tingly scent. You might even call it "spicy." Its symbol is a sailboat, because the sea smells like manliness, not dead fish and rotting wood. Its ads promise to grow body hair and proclaim its hand in the conception of your parents. Old Spice forces you to grow bushes under your arms and think of your grandparents having sex.
"Well, my well-spoken friend," I respond, "you're missing out on a couple of facts." This would include the fact that Axe bills itself as a deodorant, but actually has an odor, making that a misnomer, but let's not get into that. We'll be focusing on the body spray, anyway.
"What facts?" you ask, rapt to find out what magic aerosol you can spray on yourself, not to help you overcome your crippling fear of talking to women, but to make it moot. After all, the women in the Axe commercials are running the man down, not the other way around.
"Have you ever smelled Axe?"
Your eyes suddenly narrow, as you can feel me about to crush your dreams of unprotected group sex with a smorgasbord of women who look like the girls who wouldn't talk to you in high school, only hotter. "No..." you say.
Well, friend, read on, and I will burst your bubble like a can of hairspray in a fire. If you're lucky, I might even mix a few more metaphors.
Just while I'm thinking about it, I must point out the questionable wisdom behind naming a fragrance "Axe." To compare, we'll use the common "smell-goods" mentioned earlier: Old Spice and Calvin Klein. These are two brands established enough to be good watermarks. After all, the former was responsible for the Baby Boomers and the latter for the legitimization of male models, or, Old Spice is killing Social Security and Calvin Klein made my self-image plummet. Thanks, bastards.
Anyway, Old Spice is known for its musty, tingly scent. You might even call it "spicy." Its symbol is a sailboat, because the sea smells like manliness, not dead fish and rotting wood. Its ads promise to grow body hair and proclaim its hand in the conception of your parents. Old Spice forces you to grow bushes under your arms and think of your grandparents having sex.
This was considered kinky because that guy is wearing a white bow tie.
Calvin Klein is a more modern brand, but its effect on the brains of men my generation is, while less disturbing than forcing thoughts of ancestral lovin', is no less immutable. Whenever we hear the name "Calvin Klein," we can only think of one thing. No, not designer fashion or the lifestyles of beautiful people who shop at Walgreen's. We think of it as the alias Marty McFly used when he visited his parents in 1955. Unlike his other monikers like "Darth Vader" and "Clint Eastwood," he didn't have to come up with that one himself because his mother found it on his underwear. This was while she was falling in love with him, but before she tried to get Marty to, ahem, park with her. So, yeah, I guess cologne invariably leads to incest.
So Axe has that going for it. At least it's name may only remind you of that scene from American Psycho where Christian Bale splits that guy's head open while playing It's Hip to be Square. Or, if you aren't crazy like me, you think of lumberjacks, which is pretty manly and has nothing to do with people fondling their relatives.
Axe still has a problem though, and it might be the most important problem a scent could have: it smells bad. More accurately, it smells stupid. Not that it started that way, but rather aspired to have the most juvenile and gag-inducing odors to come out of a can, short of that stuff you spray on your couch to keep the dogs from getting on it. Yeah, it's kind of like that, but for women.
Axe started in 1983 in France (strike 1) as a spin-off of Impulse, which was a spray for women (strike 2). Its first three scents were Amber, Musk and Spice. Only Musk, a smell most people associate with caves and attics, is still in production. These three styles make sense, though. While amber doesn't have a smell, it illicits an idea, which I guess would be tree sap. Their spice, I like to think, was probably cumin and paprika, becuase then you could smell like chili, which is pretty manly. So those weren't too bad.
It started getting silly four years later with the Oriental variety, the progenitator of the annual novelty scent line. While I'm not sure what this smelled like, I am prepared to offer a few theories. It smelled like:
1) A Chinese restaurant, a sort of "ode d' cat covered in MSG."
2) A junk boat, with subtle undertones of rancid drinking water to subdue the fish gut base.
3) A Thai ladboy prostitute.
I think these are all equally likely.
After this, there were a number of varietals named for various geographic locations. There was Nevada (because arid wastelands are sexy), Java (think coffee from Southeast Asia: land of 1,000 terrors), Alaska (because frozen wastelands are sexy) and Africa (AIDS).
"I've never heard of this shit," you say. "You're making this up."
Oh, friend, I wish I was. The reason you've never heard of these is because they are all European smells. The US line launched in 2002 with Apollo, Kilo, Orion, Phoenix, Tsunami and Voodoo. Now, I ask you, what the hell do any of these things smell like? Two of them are mythical, one is a unit of measure (for drugs), one's dark magic and the last is full of dead fish.
A recurring theme in modern cologne manufacture.
So Axe has that going for it. At least it's name may only remind you of that scene from American Psycho where Christian Bale splits that guy's head open while playing It's Hip to be Square. Or, if you aren't crazy like me, you think of lumberjacks, which is pretty manly and has nothing to do with people fondling their relatives.
Axe still has a problem though, and it might be the most important problem a scent could have: it smells bad. More accurately, it smells stupid. Not that it started that way, but rather aspired to have the most juvenile and gag-inducing odors to come out of a can, short of that stuff you spray on your couch to keep the dogs from getting on it. Yeah, it's kind of like that, but for women.
Axe started in 1983 in France (strike 1) as a spin-off of Impulse, which was a spray for women (strike 2). Its first three scents were Amber, Musk and Spice. Only Musk, a smell most people associate with caves and attics, is still in production. These three styles make sense, though. While amber doesn't have a smell, it illicits an idea, which I guess would be tree sap. Their spice, I like to think, was probably cumin and paprika, becuase then you could smell like chili, which is pretty manly. So those weren't too bad.
It started getting silly four years later with the Oriental variety, the progenitator of the annual novelty scent line. While I'm not sure what this smelled like, I am prepared to offer a few theories. It smelled like:
1) A Chinese restaurant, a sort of "ode d' cat covered in MSG."
2) A junk boat, with subtle undertones of rancid drinking water to subdue the fish gut base.
3) A Thai ladboy prostitute.
I think these are all equally likely.
After this, there were a number of varietals named for various geographic locations. There was Nevada (because arid wastelands are sexy), Java (think coffee from Southeast Asia: land of 1,000 terrors), Alaska (because frozen wastelands are sexy) and Africa (AIDS).
"I've never heard of this shit," you say. "You're making this up."
Oh, friend, I wish I was. The reason you've never heard of these is because they are all European smells. The US line launched in 2002 with Apollo, Kilo, Orion, Phoenix, Tsunami and Voodoo. Now, I ask you, what the hell do any of these things smell like? Two of them are mythical, one is a unit of measure (for drugs), one's dark magic and the last is full of dead fish.
A recurring theme in modern cologne manufacture.
Fast-forward a few years through the other boring and atrocious Axe sprays to the newest two: Dark Temptation and Instinct.
I'm not sure what Dark Temptation smells like, because the Wikipedia article claims both that it, "did not smell like chocolate, but claimed that it made the user 'as irresistible as chocolate,'" and "A chocolate-smelling fragrance; advertising implies that because women like chocolate, they will find men who smell of chocolate irresistible." Either way, you're irresistible. Understand, I love chocolate, but I don't want to smell like it. This isn't even the problem, though, the problem is this:
I'm not sure what Dark Temptation smells like, because the Wikipedia article claims both that it, "did not smell like chocolate, but claimed that it made the user 'as irresistible as chocolate,'" and "A chocolate-smelling fragrance; advertising implies that because women like chocolate, they will find men who smell of chocolate irresistible." Either way, you're irresistible. Understand, I love chocolate, but I don't want to smell like it. This isn't even the problem, though, the problem is this:
Now look at that. He looks like the freaking Golgothan from Dogma. That's supposed to be irresistible? If you've ever left a Hershey's bar in your pocket, you know that answer's "no." Think about that Hershey bar. Think about how, if you were lucky, it melted in the wrapper. You opened it up and it oozed brown all over your fingers. You couldn't eat that, let alone have sex with it. Now let's say you weren't lucky, that it escaped its confines without your leave. You walked down the street with all that milky candy oozing out the back of your pants. You look like you have diarrehea, which is why you think you need Axe, so you can get the confidence to talk to the women who think you crap your pants. By the way, Axe Pulse makes you dance so well you get the confidence to talk to girls, so there you go. Axe to the rescue.
So, that pretty bad, but possibly not as bad as the newest scent: Instinct. Instinct "includes cardamom, amber, and atlas cedar to produce a spicy scent of leather." This seems like an awful lot of effort to yield a conditioned response in your lady friend's memory banks, namely making her remember the leathery smell of when she lost her virginity in the back seat of her 3rd-string quaterback sort-of boyfriend's faux leather El Camino seat while behind the gas station off the highway and how badly her ass stuck to the bench's cheeseburger wrapper-covered upholstery. Which is to say, Instinct is the smell of romance.
Wikipedia, which is definitely never updated by advertisers in the employ of the article's subject, says, "The advertising campaign features a caveman who sprays the fragrance on himself and becomes irresistible to women. The tag line is "No one can resist a man in leather.'" I would like to call this into question.
Ladies, you know you can't resist.
There's your proof that Axe is sex in a can. Its unique combination of insane names, gross ads and adolescent foolishness is the most sexiest smells on the planet. So, fellas (or ladies, whatever), next time you're getting ready for a date don't forget to style your hair just right, change out of your manure-shovelin' coveralls and hose yourself down with some Axe body spray. Second thought, you might want to just stick with your Speed Stick. It has Irish Spring scent now.
-Black Ranger (smells like gun oil and the jungles of Vietnam)
-Black Ranger (smells like gun oil and the jungles of Vietnam)
