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Perfumes
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perfume

perfume (pûr´fy¡m´, per-fy¡m´) noun
1. A substance that emits and diffuses a fragrant odor, especially a volatile liquid distilled from flowers or prepared synthetically.
2. A pleasing, agreeable scent or odor.  FRAGRANCE.

verb, transitive
perfumed, perfuming, perfumes (per-fy¡m´)
To impregnate with fragrance; impart a pleasant odor to.
[French parfum, from Old Italian parfumo, from parfumare, to fill with smoke : par-, intensive pref. (from Latin per-, per-) + fumare, to smoke (from Latin fúmâre, from fúmus, smoke).]

• Anomalog: Jim & Tammy: $100 Worth Of Cinnamon Buns To Perfume Their Hotel Suite
• track _Perfumed Metal_ MP3 by Chrome off of _Blood On The Moon_ on Siren (1981)
• dance pop track _Perfume Girl_ MP3 (160k) by Madonna off of _Ray Of Light_ CD on Maverick (1998)
• techno track _Perfume Industry_ MP3 by Digital Princezz off of _Listen To Me Tender_ 12" on Mosquito #019 (2002)
• track _Ode To Perfume_ MP3 (160k) by Holger Czukay off of _On The Way To The Peak Of Normal_ (1982)
• noise jazz track _Perfume Of A Critic's Burning Flesh_ MP3 (vK) by John Zorn off of _Torture Garden_ CD on Shimmy Disc (1989)
• neo-psychedelic track _Valley Of One Thousand Perfumes_ MP3 (160k) by Mary Timony off of _Mountains_ on Matador (2000)
• track _Perfumed Ammo_ MP3 (256k) by Somatic Responses off of _Augmented Lines_ CD on Hymen (2001)
• trip hop track _Silks, Perfume & Gold_ MP3 by Up, Bustle & Out off of _Light 'em Up & Blow 'em Out_ on Ninja Tune (1997)

Nearly all commercial perfume formulations are secret.  A typical heavily merchandised fragrance - _Chanel No. 5_, _Bal a Versaiiles_, _Joy_ - is a blend of many scents.  Industry conviction is that a perfume that simulates a single, identifiable scent, such as rose or orange blossom, is difficult to market:  Consumers assume a complex scent is better.  Prospective customers are less likely to refect a scent if they can't explain why they don't like it.  Instead of saying, "No, that smells like lily of the valley, and I don't like lily of the valley," they say, "Maybe."  Or so the industry postulates.

Blending perfumes is a complex business.  Good perfumers command salaries commensurate with those of investment bankers.  It often takes years to formulate a fragance.  Some perfumes are reputed to contain as many as three hundred ingredients.  Insiders say the large perfume houses routinely analyze each new competing fragrance as it is introduced.  The analytic powers of "noses" - skilled perfume blenders - are legendary but have limits.  Increasingly, gas chromatography and kindred techniques are used for analysis.  Any sufficiently popular new fragrance is soon copied by competing manufacturers and sold under a different name.  Thus Estee Lauder's _Cinnabar_, a cinnamonlike Oriental-type fragrance, seems to have inspired Yves Saint Laurent's _Opium_.
- William Poundstone - _Big Secrets_ 1983

"Perfume, Defence & David Bowie's Wedding", Lecture and slide installation, Sadlers Wells, London by Brian Eno slide intallation:  "The Future Will Be Like Perfume", Martkhalle, Hamburg, Germany 1993 by Brian Eno

• Members of the group Master Musicians Of Jajouka, who speak Arabic, adopt the surname "Attar", which translates as "the perfume maker".
• David McConnell started the California Perfume Company (CPC) in 1886. Today the company is known as Avon, which he named after his favorite playwright William Shakespeare, and Stratford on Avon.

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