The Last Flowers on Earth. The Olfactory Soundtrack to Silo.
August/7th/2088. Rundholz. It opens with cucumber, ginger and lemon, as if you threw all three into a blender. Everything is cold, metallic, extremely ozonic and somehow completely deserted. It immediately gives me this image of the future after some kind of radioactive disaster - an empty field, nobody around, maybe something still living underground. Then a little sweetness appears, something powdery and aluminium-like, and these frozen white lilies, already slightly past their prime. Not rotten at all - more like cold, spicy pollen. And the floral core here is incredibly beautiful. The flowers seem to be blooming in almost complete darkness, surrounded by poisonous greenery, creeping ivy and strange plants slowly taking over this empty landscape. Lily of the valley is listed, but to me it smells more like a poisonous tuberose mixed with a night-blooming lily. The air is thick and electrically charged, with almost no wind. Every now and then, a sudden gust comes through, lifts this fine black-pepper dust into the air and disappears again, leaving behind a strange feeling of vacuum. You’re standing there surrounded by metal, frozen flowers, pepper, ginger and cucumber, and everything feels icy. The floral smell is everywhere, penetrating the air almost like poisonous fumes. Honestly, this could be the perfume illustration of Silo. That same empty, post-apocalyptic landscape, something toxic and beautiful growing through it, and the feeling that there might still be life somewhere underneath. Towards the end, it softens a little and develops this violet-like powderiness, but the sharp, ringing core never really disappears. And it’s not scratchy or irritating at all. It simply surrounds you and pulls you completely into its atmosphere. Metallic, frozen, green, spicy, toxic. Like some futuristic potion. Such a cool fragrance. Really, really cool.
