Natural Incense Company – Angels – Metatron

Mid-2022, I bought a bunch of packs from the Angels line on kleinanzeigen.de. The regular price is between €4-6 per pack. They are also sold in a slightly different packaging design by Fiore d’Oriente (who own the Natural Incense Company), which are more expensive. A pack contains 20g/10 sticks of 23cm/9″ length. The burning time is stated as 60–80 minutes, but in my experience, they burn even longer.

Metatron is a Nag Champa in disguise. It differs from Namaste (the Nag Champa out of the Yoga line) by having a warmer, more balsamic character that feels heavier and calmer. It spreads its lovely fragrance immediately after lighting, whereas Namaste seems to have a kind of warming-up phase, during which it smells rather smoky and somewhat scratchy. After this phase, Namaste has a very fresh scent. However, I prefer Metatron by far.
Metatron has an incredibly rich floral scent. The typical scent of Nag Champa, champaca, is still recognizable, but it is accompanied by a lush bouquet of florality, making it impossible for me to discern anything else.
This bouquet is underlined with the combination of an omnipresent, amber-like, balsamic-soft sweetness, accompanied by equally soft sandalwood, which gives the composition a lot of warmth and depth.
From time to time, I find a fresh note in the scent, which appears a bit like lemongrass to me. It is the same freshness found in Namaste, but in those, it really dominates.
Initially, I perceived Metatron as very resinous. It reminded me of the kind of ‘Frankincense’ incense sticks that don’t really smell like frankincense. This impression has now receded into the background as I’ve discovered the depth of the florality.

Metatron is one of my absolute favourites, a scent I want to immerse myself in.
The entire line is exceptionally beautiful. Due to the strong family resemblance resulting from the base ingredients, they can feel very similar. It takes a while to get to know them properly. If one doesn’t particularly like the base scent, it can quickly feel like ‘if you know one, you know them all.’ This is how I feel about many varieties of Pure Incense. In both cases, exceptions confirm the rule.