Jazz Yves Saint Laurent

I can't say that I know traditional men's fragrances well. In this genre, the main advantage is not originality, and somewhere in the second dozen blotters, they all smell approximately equally fresh and dusty. But there are several compositions that a colleague on a perfume forum once poked my nose into, and I first listened to several hour-long lectures on the merits of Tsar Van Cleef&Arpels, Green Irish Tweed Creed, Safari Ralph Lauren and, of course, Jazz Yves Saint Laurent, and then tried them all.

In the early 90s, Jazz drove many people crazy. So bright against the generally restrained background, Jazz burned the nasopharynx with a bitter wormwood spirit and a teasing frosty smell of freshly ground coriander and nutmeg, turning a classic glass with soap foam, lavender and geranium into an unpredictable and crazy spicy bomb. Lemon peels and sparkling apple cider added even more spiciness, and fragrant hay warmed by the July sun, on the contrary, imparted some kind of relaxation to all this motley hustle and bustle. I think if Jazz had been made not in conservative 1988, but now, they would have added hemp and almond milk. But it was made then. And it was worn by men trying to be masculine, sexy and meet the expectations of others at the same time. And which ones didn’t get torn apart?

Jazz is the work of perfumer Jean-François Latti, whose portfolio does not include many famous fragrances. I suspect that he created most of the compositions for the mass lines of the Puig company, and no one counted that in the 80s. The bottle, on the contrary, was remembered by everyone - a contrasting, black and white plastic with broken lines, reminiscent of black and white piano keys, black and white jazz. The bottle was abandoned in 1998, replaced by a regular glass one, and at the same time the composition was changed, making it softer and lighter. It is also not bad, but the intensity of passions is not the same.

By the way, in the first advertising video accompanying the release of Jazz in August 1988, a profile of a young Naomi Campbell flashed, whom Yves Saint Laurent then helped to get her first Vogue cover.

Jazz Yves Saint Laurent 1988

Jean-François Latty

Wormwood, lavender, bergamot, nutmeg, cloves, cinnamon, sandalwood, leather, amber, moss.

SHOP NOW