Comments On Comments #17 Live Q and A

How you doing? Welcome to Real Magic Review. My name is Steve Faulkner. Hot innit? Basically all that everybody in England is talking about is that it's hot. That's all we've got to talk about because we're talking about the weather and when it's extreme, which this isn't compared to a lot of countries, we can't handle it. Look how shiny I am. Shiny Steve. I'm a bit concerned. My, well it says two hours, so I'm quite happy now. This hasn't been charging for some reason. So if you can hear me, let me know. If everything's good, I think we're okay. I think we're, I just feel a we don't have air conditioning in England, which means nobody sleeps very well at the moment. And I'm in an attic room and I had a good night's sleep for about six nights and I'm old. So I'm slightly broken and my head's not working properly. So this should be fun. Before we do this, or do what? Just have a chat really. That's not a review. It's just a check-in and comments on comments. So I have a few questions, not loads. A couple of things. Mr. James takes it easy on the CVF deck that I will talk about and anything you've got here. If you want to ask any questions you can, but do check out cardmagiccourse.com. That's my online card magic course. It's really good and all that sort of stuff. Have a look at that. That'd be lovely. And, uh, and like and subscribe. That would be great. Before we do this, I just want to mention something. I'm always on the lookout for interesting magic things that kind of tend to rise above the usual stuff. And, uh, I've been reading a bit of Rory Adams on your ideas, uh, newsletter. So Rory Adams is a consultant and he started consulting for Dynamo when he was like 19. Amazing. What gig? What gig to have when you're 19? What was I doing at 19? Just lurking about. That's what I was doing. He was consulting for Dynamo. Blimey, that'd be good, wouldn't it? Uh, so he was doing that and, uh, he's worked with Troy and he's worked on magic for humans. So really knows his stuff and he's got a newsletter. And what's different about this newsletter from a lot of newsletters? Well, a lot of them are, I suppose, but a lot of he's giving advice. It's kind of from the horse's mouth. And when you read the blogs and I get sent an awful lot of blogs and I can't, just can't keep up and they're fine. And, but this one really does sort of capture me. He's, um, he's got some really interesting stuff on performing for TV, but also on performing for lay people. And, and he's, he's happy to be a little bit controversial and sort of relay stories, what stories of what, of what, of what has happened on these TV shows. Um, I got an awful one recently where he's talking about how he lost, um, he lost something really important. I don't want to ruin it, but, uh, but check that out, have a look at it. It's a paid thing. So you sign up for the newsletter, but I think you can get a set amount free. I don't quote me on that. I don't know. Um, but that is on, um, only ideas dot club, only ideas dot club. Uh, have a look at that. And if you, if you don't know much about where we have a look at my review of only ideas, the book is based on the book and it's great, full of really good, proper advice, not advice for advice's sake, but just proper advice that really, really after you really feel inspired to kind of do something, he's got different ways of, uh, some stuff of doing tricks as well on there. There is some practical stuff as well as the TV stuff. So very good. Have a look at that. That's my recommendation of the week, right? Um, you can hear me great. Uh, sounds good. Brilliant. No question, but just wanted to say, I really loved your enthusiasm in your video about juggling. I actually bought some juggling balls myself. Brilliant. I'm loving it at the moment. As I said in the review, it's for you for years. I didn't do it because I became a magician and magicians sometimes, not all magicians, um, but in professionals, sniffy about juggling and juggling about magic. There's not, I'm not anymore really, actually, but back in the day, um, and when I was doing comedy, obviously comedy is like jugglers were kind of frowned upon a bit. And even though I didn't feel that way, I kind of got caught up in that and sort of stopped juggling. I've been embarrassed about it for some time. And I can't tell you how much it's informing my magic and just that, and my sort of wellbeing. I know, I know I've said this, if you didn't watch the review though, is that, you know, when you're practicing magic, a lot of the time you're down here, it's very insular, which is kind of why I love it sometimes that you close off, but just to get up and use the mind and use those sort of that engine of practice in a different way, that's a little bit more physical has really helped me kind of be able to go and refocus. So, uh, it's a lovely thing to do and I'm very much enjoying it. So thank you very much. Um, and thanks for saying hello everybody. Hi Tom, Manish, Gary, uh, Max, Magic Max, um, just re reminding me, um, there'll be links for the people's palace of prestidigitation, which is the discord server discourse server. Uh, you can watch the videos on there. There's a, there's a feed on there would be, um, uh, these videos too. So have a look at that links below. Right. So a few comments, um, CVF deck that really divided people. This didn't it? Um, if you haven't seen it, I'm sure most of you have, you know, coin on the table, give it a tap coin vanishes. It's in the middle of the deck next to the chosen card. Uh, all of this, uh, asked if it works with dollar sized coins. I said, yes, it doesn't. Yeah. Really important. And I'm not sure. I think I forgot to mention it's smaller coins. I'm not even sure if it works with a half dollar, maybe it doesn't, but it's gotta be a certain type of coin, but a 10 pence piece for the UK is perfect. So I don't know what that is. Yeah. Equivalent sizes in the U S um, but the, the, the coin has to have certain qualities, but yeah, someone said that they were told that, and I'm sure that was just a mistake. Uh, Maxim X didn't Sankey release a similar thing with flash, but yeah, yeah. So in a flash, the Sankey thing, it kind of similar, but I think looking at it from a lay person's point of view. So in the flash, you put a coin on the top of the deck. They choose a car goes in the deck. You light the flash paper and the coin melts through and lands on their chosen card. Very similar mechanics, but a very different feeling trick. And, and again, for us as magicians, we look at that as being similar, but if you think of it from a lay person's point of view, yes, the coin, the similarities are the coin lands next to the card, of course. Um, but the way the trick feels is very different. You could argue that Sankeys is kind of more magical because it melts through. It's a slower thing and flash paper is always great, but a lot, but you can't get it knackered as well. I remember having it and doing it. And my friend Gareth Kelly, and when I met him was doing it at a trade show. Uh, but it's great, but again, very, very different. This one's got that sort of quick kinetic feel to it. It's totally different thing. And, uh, and again, I didn't think it was amazing. It was, it was just really cool, really magical. And, and I said, some people aren't going to like the fact it's just one trick that does one thing. Um, so on here, um, the lighting restrictions, by the way, um, someone said there are no lighting restrictions on this really. That's totally fine. Um, for me to justify carrying around, this is from magic, magic man. Oh, and the last one was, uh, Kelly Griffin was um, for me to justify carrying around a one trick deck, the effect has to be really strong and unique. In my opinion, this is neither Craig Petty or neither, uh, depending on what way it stands. Craig Petty wasn't that keen on it either. And, uh, stated that it could be replicated with some basic slot of hand and a duplicate coin. I'm not sure about that because the basics, the thing is it's on the table, isn't it? And it's like gone, turn it over, spread. It's that, it's that quick thing of, and it can be a sign coin, which again, I'm not sure I said, I think I did. Um, so I do think it is like slot of hand. Yes, you can do a coin vanish and end up in the, in the deck, but there is the moment of that trick, that CVF trick. The moment that makes it magical is that you, the coin vanishes and in kind of in the same movie, turn the deck face up. So it really is nowhere. And it's gone in their eyes from the table to the middle of the deck within a millisecond, really. And again, I'm not saying that's good, bad or whatever, but that's the difference I think of putting slight of hand to it. And don't forget, you know, a lot of people do magic to the same people, you know? So when you're talking about doing a gig, yeah, of course you carrying a deck and to do that one trick. But you know, a lot of us have got friends, we, we hang out with the same friends and we show them magic. And when then we show the same people, different magic. And I think that that's a, it's a very different thing. So in that way you can justify having a deck that does the thing. You might not use it that much, but if you like it and if you enjoy doing it, uh, but I do totally know what you mean. It's like a lot of these things. It's literally a one trick pony. It's not literally a one trick pony, is it? Cause that means it wouldn't be a deck of cards, it'd be a pony. But, um, you know what I mean? Right. Um, what was that? The Jellings book of your performance surface. Yeah. Well, that's the thing with these things. You need a surface, don't you? And I was reading the book and I had that on me and there's some people there. I thought, Oh, I can get some footage. Use what you, what you can. The Jennings book has a big kind of black bit on it that you can put a coin on. And for them it was, they didn't question it. They didn't go, why are you putting on a book? But I know what you mean. Um, but that was from, from Andy. So, uh, magic corner. Good afternoon, everyone. Good afternoon, sir. Do you always close with the same trick? Not, not at all. My, um, with closeup magic, I, I tend to improvise a lot. And by that it does, it's not as grand. I don't mean improvised as in I walk out, have no idea what I'm going to do, but I tend to kind of go, I'll do this and then I'll do that. And sometimes I'll think I'll finish with the bottle food table. Um, but I'll kind of get there in different ways and sometimes change my mind. And sometimes I'll kind of realize that I won't get to the last trick and I'll finish halfway through just because the meals come in or whatever. And that's kind of okay as well. I'm not over, and I know this is going to be wrong for some people. I'm just, for my own personal thing, when I'm doing a show, it's very different when I'm doing a parlour show, but when I'm doing a table, sometimes I don't do that classic thing, which I know you should do is finish on a big, big trick. Sometimes I finish on a kind of smaller trick and go on, but do you want to see something else and finish on something that's a little bit more reserved and nice and just to kind of end with. So I kind of play around with it and I haven't got a strict thing, but what I will do when I'm doing closeup when I have got like, you know, not many tables. So I have to kind of really think about doing quite a lot. I will do a different finishing trick on each table. So say there's five tables and they can kind of see each other. I will do that. One finishing trick might be a cartwallet kind of thing or a coin under watch is another one might be bottle free table and I'll kind of mix it up a little bit. But again, no hard and fast rules and just sort of have a play with it. I think that sometimes we make rules to kind of give us something to talk about. And I think it's very valid for some people, but for me, I kind of I get a bit bored if I do the same thing all the time and not all about me, but I'm sure that's contagious as well. If I keep myself fresh and mess around with things, it's it kind of gets communicated. So let me do this. Mr. Jennings takes it easy. There wasn't actually because I thought there's a lot I didn't talk about with that book. And what I didn't talk about was this hit double left. I think it's called a double left minus one. Two minus one. I've got it in front of me. But that is really interesting. The hit double left because if you don't know what hit double left is, it's a double left where you have no get ready. Actually, you go straight in and turn it over. And it's got a way of doing that. That's a little bit more little bit more natural. And I really like that. I wanted to mention that. I don't know why I just thought it was one of those bits in the book where I got to and just went, that's really cool. And I took it. We talked about it on the course. Andy keen. It's a great book. I start with the intention of going through slowly from beginning to end. Don't we all? However, it's almost overwhelming. So I took a break from it to read something else new and now need to discipline myself to get back to it. Yeah, there's a thing about books, which is they are overwhelming. So I almost think that's why I got really stressed reviewing it, really, because I knew I had to do it at some point. And I had that thing. I had that goal of finishing it. And I think maybe it's not to not beat yourself up by going away from it, you know, chip away, go to something else, come back to it. And sometimes I would sit and go, I'm just going to read half a chapter. I'm just going to read four pages. And it's amazing how you do get through a book by doing it that way. It does seem really intimidating. But if you forget about the goal and do a little bit every day, you realize you kind of go, oh, I've got that far through the book. And I found that really helpful. And, you know, sometimes it's not helpful to read a whole book because you don't you don't take it in. I think sometimes find something you really like, stay on that and go, I'm going to, I'm going to really work on that before I move on. And sometimes it's okay if you don't finish the book. I think it's if you can, who's it that was saying the other day, if you can get one thing, oh, Chris Kenner, he was saying, if you can, you know, get one thing from a book, that's quite a lot. So it's, you know, with all this library of stuff, if I had all these books and got one trick that I could use, that would still be way more than I'm doing now. So it's a kind of weird thing to start thinking about. But it's very cool. 30 years in the making. Let's take it tough. Isn't another 30 years? Yeah. So from 23, Mr. Jennings takes it tough. And as I said, these a lot of the stuff in this book is not easy. It's easy for Larry Jennings. It's not. Some of it I found quite challenging. So it'd be really interesting to see what the how the tricks are and takes it tough. So, yeah. And if you're not aware and if you haven't watched the review, there's a trilogy. So you've got Jennings 67. Mr. Jennings takes it easy. And then Mr. Jennings takes it tough. There's a lot of people, a lot of love for the book. I'm getting a bigger bookcase, Gary. Got some nice things. I'm not going to gush over myself. Somebody, I'm trying to, oh yeah, this is, this is the one I was looking for. Could you elaborate a bit on the difficulties you found with the classic magic of Larry Jennings? I have very recently purchased the e-book, but haven't really delved into it properly yet. I'm just curious to hear your opinion about it. So it's a great book and I didn't have loads and loads of difficulties with it. I think part of it was what I got the classic magic of Larry Jennings way before I was kind of ready for it. So I misread a lot of it and I really struggled with it. I mean, the standup triumph, I remember in the hands triumph, I completely misread. I went back to it years later and thought, what was I doing? I completely got the wrong end of the stick. I think the difference is with the, it is a really good book, but sometimes you'll read, there was a kind of add-on move in it I remember reading and I couldn't visualize what it was meant to look like. Whereas this book, the Kaufman book really takes you in depth, you know, where every finger goes and where, if you move the finger up a little bit, that'll happen and you'll notice that this will be off balance. And if you put this finger there, all that kind of stuff and you really get a clear idea of what's happening with the move. And I just, in the classic magic of Larry Jennings, I didn't get that sometimes. Now I've gone back to it recently and not had any problem, but that's because I kind of know a lot more now anyway. So I think that, and that's why this is a beginner's book, because you really can go into this, even though some of the moves are quite challenging, it explains it in a beginner's way that you can follow it along. So that's kind of what I meant by that. So that's that. Do you like rope magic? Yeah, we're teaching on just Professor's Nightmare on the card magic course tonight. Someone asked for Professor's Nightmare, this basic version, and we're doing I do like rope magic. I think it's really magical. I perform on stage Richard Sanders fibre optics, which always goes down really well. And it's just a lovely trick. And it's something, again, a lot of magicians think is a bit naff. And sometimes it feels naff, getting the ropes out, you kind of feel about the minute you start, you go, that's just all in my head. And I remember seeing a blackpool, that routine, I'm thinking it was so magical. It's just a brilliant routine. Obviously, it's based on loads of old stuff. But I love rope magic. I think it's brilliant. And I it's not as confusing to watch as it as it seems, as it can seem, as it reads, you know, sometimes it's hard to learn. And it can be a bit long sometimes, you know, some rope, I cut a bit sometimes out the middle of the fibre optics routine, because sometimes it feels a bit long, but it's, it's just brilliant. And it's easy to follow. And genuinely magical. And it's got and it makes people laugh that routine. It's not a comedy routine. But the minute you start cutting bits and putting it back and putting people to start laughing, it's a really joyful thing. And it works great plays big, you know, you can step back and play to an audience. I love it. I think it's great. And the key I would always say with fibre optics and rope magic is slow it down more than you think you should. I've watched videos myself even after doing it for like a year on stage, I just went Wow, I'm really battling through that you don't give people a chance to kind of process what's happening. So I really recommend that it's a great routine. David, I'm looking forward to receiving my copy in order to pay your review. That hit double if sounds interesting. I bought six books in the past two weeks, a lot to learn. Yeah, I've had to stop. I'm just like, you know, I'm, I can't. I've had to sort of turn down a couple of people to review books recently, because I just can't keep up with them. And I want to enjoy it again. I want to pick up books and read them for reading. So I'm going to try and, as I was doing earlier, just delve into some unless a real big one comes out that people want to know about. But it's a lot. Yeah. And the danger is, of course, we get overwhelmed. And when we get overwhelmed, we don't even open any books, because it just seems too much. So again, take your mind off getting through them all. Just pick them up, pick them up, be in the moment, do it mindfully, and just enjoy it. Enjoy that. And that process. So yeah, it all worked, didn't it? My battery still here. So thanks very much. And that was a bit rambly today. Sorry, I'm a bit all over the place. I'm tired, but happy. And that's the important thing. And I hope everybody else's a strange time at the moment. We're coming out of lockdown. It's I'm finding it quite hard sometimes, you know, challenging, get a little bit anxious in certain situations. And that's just and if you're feeling the same thing, that's completely normal. You're absolutely fine. We are going to get there. So I really, really hope you're all right. And I really, you know, really appreciate you coming and saying hi. It's a hot day. You know, if you're in the UK, it's really hot. So thank you. And if you knew us, I know some of you got up early in the morning, just to be here is lovely. And Glenn, more for you. There are no rules. Absolutely, Glenn. And it's I think we all try and, you know, sometimes it's something to write in it, you know. And the first batch fell off. Yeah, I forgot about that. Yeah. Andy Woodhouse. Interesting. But the Jennings book on pre-order last year in the first batch fell off a ship in the sea from China. And enriched that to send another. I received it months ago. Yeah, it's that was nuts when he lost a whole load of them. Gotta be heartbroken, wouldn't you? So anyway, must go. Gotta get ready for me. Card Magic Course live session at six. Do go and check it out. Like I said, cardmagiccourse.com. I know I mention it every video, but it's really, really important. If you like this stuff, you'll love that. Live session is great fun. And take care of yourselves. Like and subscribe. All that stuff. And where's my thing? There you go. See you later. Take care.