Haha that brought a grin to my face :D those were some of the first pills I had, they were fucking brilliant. There were pink and peach ones IIRC.
What you and Treacle are talking about comedown is spot on. I was actually in a depressed and gurny mood on Monday this week after that MDMA. Hadn't had that the past umpteen times.
Now I have done some research so if you bare with me I will try my best to explain...
In the 90's pills were made with safrole. I'm guessing this was the case til around 99 and the mitzi's, when PMK became common place. The reason PMK is used it is more similar in chemical structure to MDMA = less steps to make the MDMA. However PMK was still made from safrole. From what I read with a good chemist this change in precursor should have made no difference.
All was well the pills were good...
Then the drough came. There were big busts of the precursors. PMK oil became very hard to transport (but it does still go around - thank fuck - the better MDMA now probably comes from PMK oil) and now you have PMK glycidate - which is purely synthetic powder. No safrole in the making, it comes from petrochemicals. It is easily converted to PMK but it has never seen Safrole.
Now you can all make of that what you will. But I'm willing to bet there is your reason. And the marquis reaction is a very good indication of what is good. Because the stuff pre drough (pre PMK-glycidate) went purple first, not straight to black.
Let me know what you guys think but I think this is it. I would say the Canadian stuff has a good chance of being better, as they still have safrass trees in parts of North America and Canada. Let's hope they take the long route and use safrass, which with a good chemist should be on par with 90's pills.