The Fall of Icarus (c. 1610) by Jacob Peter Gowy
Jeremy Fragrance is the most watched perfume vlogger on YouTube today. His channel boasts over 600,000 subscribers and in a recent Kickstarter campaign, he raised over $1M dollars to hire perfume creator Alberto Morillas of Firmenich to create his first perfume. Let me add that Mr. Morillas is no slouch… he created many extremely popular perfumes including Acqua de Gio by Giorgio Armani. Calvin Klein’s CK One and Daisy by Marc Jacobs.
I won’t be buying Jeremy’s perfume and so I can’t criticize it. You can view Jeremy’s video below where he describes his new fragrance. The video is very, very odd.
So what is Jeremy’s YouTube channel about? It’s not perfume criticism… I’ve never heard him not like any perfume. Jeremy Fragrance is the fast fashion of perfume vlogs with click bait titles such as Top Five Fragrances for Men and What Fragrance do Women Like on Men.
I find Jeremy’s videos disturbing. I ask myself… WHAT has happened to perfume criticism that THIS kind of vlog has so many followers! He appears to have a very small vocabulary. All men’s fragrances are fresh, woodsy. Women’s fragrances are fruity and/or floral. That’s basically it. Now, you might say, “Normand, Jeremy is German. He can’t be expected to master English.” Maybe not. But his vlog is in English and he actually does very well… he just doesn’t seem to know a lot about perfume.
For me, Jeremy Fragrance is an Icarus-like figure… moving from perfume vlogging to manufacturer… getting closer and closer to the sun, although he was warned by his wiser, more experienced father, Daedalus, not to fly too low or too high. I wonder how it will end. It looks like a reality show… scripted, but difficult to predict. Many other vloggers are criticizing Jeremy to the hilt and many laugh almost hysterically, but I’m not laughing. Something is not quite right.
And this particular video is REALLY disturbing. It’s all very odd.
The Perfume Chronicles 
Mario Fournier
/ January 11, 2019Ouf ca va pas bien du tout! Je pense qu’il est malade. Bipolaire ou quelque chose comme ca. Il prétend avoir dit 45 fois a Alberto Morillas de changer la formule. No way! Je ne pense pas que AM se laisserait mener par lui…
Je trouvais ses vidéos amusants il y a quelques années. Ca fait longtemps que je ne regarde plus de vidéos sur YouTube.
C’est triste de voir les gens dépérir 😥
Normand Cardella
/ January 12, 2019Oui! C’est très troublant.
Brigitte
/ January 18, 2019Indeed it is.
Brigitte
/ January 18, 2019It’s also really sad that there are so many extraordinarily talented small one person indie and artisanal perfumers like Diane St Clair and Jessica September Buchanan who make extraordinarily beautiful fragrances that the mainstream public has never even heard of….there is so much money as well as greed in this field….and too many new releases being churned out that are subpar….such a pity…..
Normand Cardella
/ January 18, 2019Yessss! I totally agree. It bodes badly for the perfume industry.
enchantéfragrance
/ May 8, 2019I find the whole spectacle disturbing, but it’s a sign of the times I suppose. It’s most unfortunate that his “style” has inspired so many other people to adopt the same methods and aspirations — I feel like fragrance discussion has been dumbed-down to its absolute lowest common denominator as a direct result of certain “personalities,” and he is their ringleader. 😢
Normand Cardella
/ May 8, 2019I agree with you on all points. The YouTube generation of perfume criticism is almost insulting. It’s a world that looks inward, comparing lacklustre fragrances to other lacklustre fragrances. The mediocrity of the criticism is depressing! There are no references to any other forms of artistic expression. And yet, they have the followers! Go figure.
Thank you for commenting.