A Guide to Sound & Scent in Chicago
Independent musicians Soh Darling, Elizabeth Moen, Akenya and more talk their favorite scents —and sounds — in the city.
Autumn in Chicago. My favorite season in my favorite place. Full of ritual, nostalgia, routine. I pick out my perfume of the day, queue up a playlist, and ride the CTA to my job as a full-time fragrance shop girl. A diverse array of local artists accompany me on my journey, soundtracking the scent-filled day, creating layered memories.
Music conjures the window to the past: the people we were with, the particular light that day, the cinematic moments we yearn for. Scent makes those remembrances richer, more vivid, complex, and complete. It wasn’t just a drive down Lakeshore; it was the smell of the lake, the newly laid mulch, the staccato of the radio static, the sound of the cicadas.
While Chicago is the birthplace of so many music legends, sonic genres, and iconic albums, it’s quickly becoming a top spot for fragrance lovers alike. New niche brands (and bands) pop up with every algorithm scroll. I thought I’d connect with some favorite local musicians to see how the art of the olfactory has shaped their sound IRL.
x Hannah Black
This interview has been edited for grammar and clarity.
Saxophonist, multidisciplinary artist, and film enthusiast Aja Essex can be found at Music Box Theatre interviewing legends like Lilly Wachowski and providing sax support for bands such as Jennifer Femme, Stereo Mapping, Busman’s Holiday, and Technicolor Band. See Aja with Stereo Mapping at Cole's Bar, October 3rd, and check out their upcoming single, "Fall to You." Up next? This October, Aja heads to her hometown of Bloomington, IN, to record minimalist-adjacent music with musical partner Jacqui Lee.
Chicago native Akenya is an award-winning multi-genre vocalist, pianist, composer, and producer synthesizing jazz, hip hop, soul, pop, classical, and world music into one seamless sound. You may have heard her vocals on tracks by legends such as Mavis Staples, Noname, Saba, and Paramore’s Hayley Williams. Be sure to see Akenya on December 16 at Austin Town Hall as part of Future Folk Fest.
Known for her confessional storytelling, sharp sense of humor, and vocal power, singer-songwriter Elizabeth Moen embraces the classic Americana of Midwestern folk and the gritty pathos of indie rock. See Elizabeth and her full band at Fitzgerald's on October 3rd. Her album Fields on Fire (produced by Spencer Tweedy) comes out in early 2027. Pre-sales for the Fields on Fire vinyl are available now via her website and Bandcamp.
Art rock band Facing builds densely layered, compulsively listenable, fuzzy, droning soundscapes. Comprised of Claudia Ferme (lyrics, vocals, guitar), Kirk Rawlings (vocals, production, guitar), and Nathan Whitman (production, bass, guitar, synth), Facing blends ethereal melodies with experimental, industrial pop-adjacent sensibilities. Check them out at Empty Bottle on October 7 before beloved Claudia leaves Chicago for NYC.
Artist, producer, and multi-instrumentalist Softmax crafts left-of-center pop with haunting hooks, throbbing bass, and a distinctive alternative R&B sound. Her recent single “Don’t Think About It” is available everywhere, along with the accompanying music video. Softmax’s debut album is currently in progress.
Chicago’s own Soh Darling sparkles on lush, jazz-inspired tracks with rich vocals, playful lyricism, and an effervescent ingenue spirit. Her retro sound taps into a lineage of raw, soulful women a la Amy Winehouse and Etta James. Get hip to her latest “PISCES (REMIX)” video and stay tuned for upcoming live performances.
Sports Boyfriend, aka singer-songwriter Eileen Peltier (joined by Ashley Guerrero on drums, Alex Lukawski on bass, and Abby Santourian on keys), creates sun-drenched, nostalgic pop so catchy it feels like you’ve lived a life with it in your CD travel case. Sports Boyfriend will play VV Lightbody’s release show at The Hideout on October 15th. Their debut record Slice of Life, released in June, soundtracked many a summer memory. The band is currently hard at work on a follow-up.
Hannah Black: How does scent affect the recording process: i.e., what does the studio space smell like? Do you have any specific fragrance rituals when recording or writing?
Akenya:
Having nice candles around while recording is always a nice touch, adding to [the] overall ambiance and mood. I also like to sometimes sage and palo santo the space before recording, or have some good incense burning just to clear the energy in a positive way. Can't go wrong with Nag Champa!
Elizabeth Moen:
I love these questions; they've made me realize how much of my memory in the last ten years is tied to the smell of venues, green rooms, recording studios, the air outside gas stations. When I think of the smell of most studios, my mind goes to dust, sweat, rugs that should have been cleaned a few years ago, and the leftover delivery food sitting out after hours of guitar takes. So much of my life as an artist is transient, and I've felt like I can't make a space my own. Now that I'm getting older and feeling more sensitive to being away from home, I'm bringing candles with me and dousing my clothes and guitar case with perfume with more clean, crisp scents to it [sic] gives the allure of freshness and home even when I'm far away or stuck in the studio cave.
Facing:
Kirk: The only pervasive scent or ritual pertaining to recording is the smell of cannabis. Nate and I are regular smokers, and it personally helps me to remain a bit removed and keep a soft focus [on] the overall picture of a song. It allows for the illusion of some objectivity, maybe. The scent is comforting and constant. Other than that, it’s all dank warehouse smells and the occasional incense stick.
Claudia: The building we practice and record in doesn’t smell great… it usually reeks of cigarettes and sometimes trash. My bandmates smoke weed, and I don’t, but I guess that’s a smell I’ve gotten used to in our room when we practice or record. There is something about familiar smells locking you into the past or present in different ways. I do most, if not all, of my songwriting at home, though, and there I love burning incense, a candle, palo santo, or all three. I spend a lot of time making things in my room in general, and it’s important to me that it smells good and familiar.
Softmax:
Scent gets me into character when I know what I’m working on, and it gives me a starting point when I don’t. It’s world-building and character-generation. It’s the fantasy. The studio space is quite small, so it smells like whatever I’ve put on myself, which is ideal as I’m not a studio candle person. It’s tight enough in the room that I think I would knock into it and then fail a bunch of QuickTime events and then table and instruments on fire, hard drives melting, etc.
Soh Darling:
Scent is so important to my daily life, so inherently it’s important to my writing and recording process. Usually I’m recording in a friend’s home studio, and more often than not there’s the smell of weed, haha. Even though I don’t smoke anymore myself, it’s actually so comforting and puts me in the creative mindset — even secondhand! The scent of herbal tea, lozenges, and throat spray is pretty ripe too, as any singer knows.
My main collaborator lives in L.A. in this little gnome apartment, and the ambiance is usually low light, lots of plants, incense or sage burning, and a fresh pot of tea always brewing.
Sports Boyfriend:
I love to light a candle (I’ve been working my way through a serious stack of Brooklyn Candles from an old job) when I’m writing at home — but I’m so often writing out in the world. I think the scents and sounds of things like the airport, the train, [and] when I’m out on my bike are very transportive and inspirational.
The studio we love to record in (JAMDEK in Chicago) has this amazing wood/old equipment smell. Makes me feel like I’m in some kind of pre-digital era.
HB: Do you use fragrance to draw out specific qualities when crafting melody? Are there any genres that feel more aligned with certain scents or scent profiles?
Aja Essex:
Having a space feel and smell warm is really important when I'm writing. If things are too sharp, too bright, or too strong, it's hard for me to get into any good creative mindset. I like things like patchouli or the smell of leather or tobacco or sandalwood.
I associate Black music with those smells, simply because those were the smells in my grandma's house when I was growing up and listening to music on her record player or with headphones in with my Walkman or iPod. Jazz, funk, soul, gospel, [and] R&B all smell warm to me.
Akenya:
This is not something I've done in the past, but honestly I might start adding this to my practice! Since scent is so emotionally evocative, I definitely think scent and sound are a natural pairing. And I like the idea of pairing scent profiles with genre; maybe jazz is earthy and warm, while pop is fruity and effervescent. Maybe rock and roll has more bite, with some leather or tobacco undertones! The possibilities are endless.
Elizabeth Moen:
I love using candles when I write. It's the quickest, best way to make the space feel like it's set to an intention of creating. I light a candle, set my laptop to offline so I can type lyrics but not be distracted, tune my guitar, and plug in. I've been in a rockier era of my music, and I've also been drawn to smokier, grittier scents like Teakwood and Tobacco by P.F. Candle Co.
Facing:
Kirk: I don’t think we have used fragrance with any specific intention all together before, but in any type of songwriting you have to employ your senses. Especially lyrically, Claudia often seems to draw on her senses to paint a more visceral picture with words.
I would definitely say punk and hardcore carry an implied scent. Musty and lived-in. Unconcerned with cleanliness. Reggae and dub have their own obvious odor association, earthy and lots of weed smoke. Rock smells like stale beer and cigs. Math rockers and bedroom indie poppers are usually a bit fresher but with a hint of cat litter. Not a lot of noticeable perfume or cologne in any music scene I’ve been in, really.
Claudia: I guess tying into my previous answer, I like the ritual of lighting candles, incense, etc., and that helps me be more comfortable and present, and the more comfortable and present I am, the more I can focus and create things.
Not to give [in to] stereotypes, but I definitely associate stinkier, unpleasant scents with rock and heavier music, and pop music with sweeter, brighter scents. Noise and jazz music with interesting, piercing scents. Doing music, I’m around a lot of men who I suspect don’t care about smelling good, so that’s what I associate, scent-wise, with doing music in general — musky, lived-in, earthy.
Softmax:
I definitely do use fragrance for direction in the writing and production stages. If I want to bring a coldness or an element of the machine to a song, then I will wear something that smells like that, to me: cold and crisp and sharp and probably metallic. If I want intimacy and humanity to be front and center, then I’ll go skin musk all the way, or a warm, lived-in leather.
Thinking about it now, I’m finding that I could absolutely pick scents/scent profiles for an album or for a song, but my brain is locking up when I try to pick something for a whole genre. I just don’t think any genre exists in enough of a vacuum to have its own overarching answer. But I definitely could do it for a track or an album or even single/album artwork. I could also do the inverse and start with the scent and then pick songs and albums that live in its world.
Soh Darling:
There are so many elements of fragrance and music that overlap. Fragrance accords are composed of multiple notes, just like musical chords. A perfumer’s workstation is called an organ; their work is a composition, and that composition unfolds through top, middle, and base notes. This is no coincidence!
Because I’m more entrenched in the world of jazz, R&B, and soul, I think — although it’s cliché — dark, resinous, sweet, woody, incense-heavy, smoky, and sexy scents come to mind with those genres. Those are base-heavy fragrances and bass-heavy music. They have soul. But just as music doesn’t have to live in one category, neither does fragrance. Both can be as complex or as simple as they want to be and still be perfect.
Sports Boyfriend:
I love samples of fragrances. I try to make sure I keep just a little of them when they are gone so I can get transported back in time a bit whenever I need help remembering something or a specific period of time. I think my best songs come from drawing out a single vivid moment — and scent helps me get back into the headspace.
HB: Scent and memory are so intrinsically linked. Are there any scent memories that have inspired songs or album concepts?
Aja Essex:
This is so specific, but it's kind of the opposite for one song! I co-wrote a song called "Chase Infiniti," and every time we play it, I can kinda smell fresh rain? No idea why. I don't have synesthesia, but there are moments when we perform that I swear a storm cloud has come and gone and left the scent of a damp wind in its wake.
Akenya:
Of course! I think it's hard to conjure up past stories and not think about every part of their texture, even if subconsciously. The way a former love smelled conjured up when writing about them. The way my granny's house smelled when thinking about aspects of my childhood. I think one sensation can even be translated into the song the same way certain visuals come to mind when hearing them.
Elizabeth Moen:
Totally! The smell of fields and gravel inspired my upcoming album Fields on Fire. The fresh smell of gardens. One of the last lines on the album is "Lilies in the garden and grandma's laugh." The record is a lot about rebirth, moving forward; so [the] smokier scents of a bonfire came to mind. I think of people's memories and the smell of their homes, clothes, cooking, cars.
Facing:
Kirk: I’m not sure if scent has inspired any of our songs directly, but I would associate a clean freshness with our music. Facing smells fresh out of the shower. Maybe because it’s multi-tracked digitally, and we don’t play sweaty punk rock.
Claudia: Not yet, but there’s an artist, Ziemba, [who] I played a show with years ago, who made scents to go along with her albums as merch, and it’s something I’ve thought about doing.
Softmax:
I have a song called “Ghost In The Shell,” which is of course named [after] the manga and anime, but also [after] the fragrance from Etat Libre d’Orange that I have loved and [have] had a fascination with for a long time. It smells like silicon and milky soap and like a hot computer loading too much or running out of memory, which was kind of the point of the song.
Soh Darling:
Oh totally. Specific scent memories, or even just the idea of scent as memory, have inspired verses of songs, lyrical imagery, and even album artwork. “Left my perfume beside his bed, now all he smells is my regret.”
I also create and absorb lyrics with scent in mind. I think being so immersed in fragrance over the years [Editor’s note: Sophie is a fragrance specialist at Merz Apothecary] has just made me more conscious of scent in general. For instance, if there are lyrics about the ocean, a picnic, or even the color green, I can imagine the way it smells. In fact, maybe I should use that more in my songwriting.
Sports Boyfriend:
Yes, absolutely. I'd say our record was inspired by the smell of a bar; like the smell you get when you walk past a bar with open windows. Literally a scent you can time travel with (especially for me now that I don’t drink anymore).
The smell of tobacco is always full of memory and inspiration for me. I also don’t smoke anymore, haha, but I do miss it…
HB: What fragrance do you wear daily (if any)? Does it differ from what you wear when performing?
Aja Essex:I love rotating between [Etat Libre d’Orange’s] The Ghost In The Shell, [binaurale’s] Matchbox Romance, and [Le Labo’s] Santal 33. I feel like those three scents really found me in a big way. I definitely love to have Santal 33 if I'm going out and want to feel sexy. I've been told it’s a good feral scent. The Ghost In The Shell is just my ride or die at this point. I could wear it [every day]. I think Matchbox Romance has found its way into my rotation as my scent to put on before a show. Something about it makes me feel a little more confident.
Akenya:
I'm a big fan of lavender; I often dab just some natural essential oil on pulse points. I also enjoy anything with a sandalwood or vanilla base, so I keep those on hand. My latest fragrance obsession has been Tears by Régime des Fleurs; I find it so nostalgic with a touch of bittersweetness. When performing, I try to keep things fresh and light because the stage lights can be very hot! So I don't tend to wear heavy fragrances in that instance. But one of my favorite scents currently for going out is Choux Choux by Liis.
Elizabeth Moen:
I wear a fig-centric scent called Philosykos by Diptyque daily because my boyfriend is Greek and I'm always dreaming of the day we get to go there together. When I perform, I like to wear their scent that has more grapefruit and rose, called Vetyverio. Scent one smells like home; scent two smells like showtime. [I’m] excited to branch out with new scents when I stop by Merz soon. To be honest, I didn't wear perfume until a year or so ago because super chemical-ly perfume gave me headaches. Now that more natural perfumes are on my radar, I'm finally diving in!
Facing:
Kirk: I just wear deodorant in life and performance. I’m not a fan of most colognes.
Claudia: In the spring/summer, I wear She Was an Anomaly by Etat Libre d’Orange, and sometimes I mix it with Ghost Pine by LVNEA. In the winter, I wear By the Fireplace by Maison Margiela Replica and/or Somewhere but Nowhere by Lore. If I’m playing a show, I usually spray some more of whatever I was wearing that day!
Softmax:
The fragrances I wear daily are pretty consistently Heliotrope Blanc from L.T. Piver and Almond Suede from Arquiste.
I usually wind up wearing something resinous or leathery to perform — something that has its own texture and [ambiance] beyond me and beyond skin. It feels like an element of the production like lighting or set design, even if it’s mostly just experienced by me onstage. [It] also makes me feel braver, less like an exposed nerve. Perhaps it reminds me of armoring up and saddling my steed before charging into battle.
Soh Darling:
I wear a different scent (or a few!) almost daily, but I’m lucky to have a fragrance wall at work at my disposal. When performing, I tend to reach for something that feels the most “me” and makes me feel my boldest.
Fine, I won’t gatekeep anymore — my favorite fragrance is Moonmilk by Stora Skuggan. I don’t only wear it for performances, but I wear it sparingly because I want it to stay special and never get sick of it. Any sandalwood fragrance makes me feel the most self-actualized!
Sports Boyfriend:
One of my favorites is Comme des Garçons AMAZINGREEN, which I actually bought on name alone in the middle of a Chicago winter. I was craving something, anything green. I also love Debaser by D.S. & Durga. I first smelled it in a hotel I was staying in for work. I find my day jobs very inspirational! When I’m performing, I’ll pick a random one of my samples and throw that on. I try to keep things a little unexpected for myself going into a show. 🌀
Hannah Black is a fragrance specialist and creative director living in Chicago, IL. Find her at the library, in North Side cinemas, or on Instagram @pinkvariegated.
