A sandalwood transistor radio radiates the heat of Bandra Ragas. Hot copper pipes warm the soft wood, allowing musk, cream, peach, ambrette, coconut and cedar distillates to blossom.

TOP NOTES
radiant wood
copper
cedar
HEART NOTES
sandalwood
radiant iris
Boronia
BASE NOTES
Balsam fir absolute
Coconut musk
Ambergris

I'm interested in hypothetical scents. Not everything has a strong or easily perceptible scent, but objects can suggest a scent. Lightbulbs glow. Electricity flows through their metal filaments. They melt the dust on their surface, giving off wisps of heat. The tubes in amplifiers have a certain smell. When my '69 Fender Deluxe is heated up (after some fast-paced monster shredding), the back of the amp gives off a hot, dusty, metallic, greasy smell - the smell of backstage in a humid venue.

So what if a tube amplifier in an old radio was made of sandalwood? Then the interaction of the heat would open the pores of the wood and release its soft, elegant scent - hints of musk cedar, peach, coconut, lactones, milk.

Real sandalwood essence is perfection. I often wear it pure. It smells of India, of images, purity and concentration. Unfortunately, it has been over-harvested, so perfumers no longer use the oil from Mysore.

Radio Bombay is a deconstruction of the Mysore Santal, rebuilt from all the aspects described above. I imagine the radio in a small hot shop in Bandra - the "Brooklyn" of Bombay (sorry). The heat decomposes the oils in the wood. Ragas and Geeta Dutt tunes ring out from the tiny speaker in the bustling city.

-DS