Lloyd Barnes, Christain Grace and David (Unbiased Magic Reviews)

Hi, welcome to Real Magic Review. My name is Steve Faulkner. Today, I'm going to be talking about other people, Lloyd Barnes, Christian Grace and David from Unbiased Magic Reviews. Before we do this, please like and subscribe. Check out onlinemagic.co. I'm very biased about that, because that's mine. It's my baby. It's been going for 10 years. Just put a new course on it. There's loads of different courses on it. Rope Magic, Coin Magic, Card Magic, Special Guests. We had Roddy and Noel from Trick Trick Boom on the other day, running a session and discussion on creativity. We had John Allen a week before that. We had David Williamson, Looch, Andy Gladwin. Those people, have a look at that. All uploaded, over 900 videos, onlinemagic.co. And do like and subscribe. Right, so I have been compelled to make this video. And it's a complete stream of consciousness. I've got three notes there. Just a couple of things written down. But the last couple of days, I've been in the gym listening to and watching Lloyd Barnes's response to the David from Unbiased Magic Reviews response to Dex. And then I'd seen the Christian Grace review that he did on Enigma. So much in my head at the moment. Not very good when there's lots in my head. And there's all this stuff going on. And I have been thinking about it a lot. And when I think about something a lot, and it wouldn't go away, and I thought, I think I've got some things to say on this. And maybe a different take on it. And something that I see happening more and more, which is kind of unhealthy, or could be unhealthy if gone unchecked for the people involved. And there was a lot said about magic reviewers. And me being a reviewer, I kind of felt like I had a couple of things to say on that. Not really in defense, but I think it's a really, really interesting discussion. And I remember why I kind of do this, is to discuss magic. And that is part of magic and what's going on. So I think, yeah, it's a good thing. So, love to hear your comments on this. I don't really know where this is going, but that's what is fun, isn't it? So, just a background, if you haven't seen it, I'm sure you have. Christian Grace came out of Enigma. The most hyped trick probably, as far as I can remember, or especially equal to a lot of tricks. Dex similar, so everybody's expecting amazing things. And then when you get someone come out and saying things about them, it creates this kind of tension and people start getting hurt and start making videos. And I'm not judging any of this stuff at all. I'm trying to keep to the lovely saying that I heard many, many years ago, which was, a gentleman, the person hard on the issue. I really recommend all involved and all not involved, live your life by that mantra. It's a really good one, because it means we can be directive, but we can actually look at the issues and what's happening without kind of getting into the mudslinging thing that arguably could, I'm saying the word arguably all the time at the moment, I might say it again in a minute, could be happening at the moment. It's not really arguably, it is happening. So, that last bit was, I can't be, I'm not gonna edit this, and I'm not gonna put graphics in it, I'm not gonna cut in or anything like that. You can watch all the stuff that's out there. But, just to try and look at the human interaction side of this and why it's not really surprising and why we have to treat magic reviews maybe a little bit different from a lot of other reviews out there. So, the first thing is, let's go back to Enigma. I think it's really important to look at our own responses to things and be very honest about them and then be able to pick them apart. So, Enigma came out, it was hype, hype, hype, hyped. I'd seen it and really liked it. I'd seen Christian do it at the session convention version of it, and everybody's talking about it there. I was a little bit like, oh yeah, it's really cool, but I don't know what the method is, and maybe for me it may not be. And then, when the hype machine started, I felt myself kind of doing what a lot of us may or may not do, whether we admit it or not, is kind of get a little bit, and kind of almost start internally going, God, people are expecting too much. I think that's it. Not at all an annoyance towards Christian and the trick itself, just the kind of, the whole machine of it, which I'm not against at all, by the way. And we'll talk about the marketing thing in a minute. I have talked about this before. But what happens when something gets hyped? Some of us will start getting either excited, or if we know it's not maybe the sort of thing we would do or the sort of thing we would struggle with, maybe start sort of internally pushing against it a little bit. And this is a really human response. It's kind of a form of jealousy. So when I had an idea how this was done, I think I thought, I'm not gonna be able to do that because of ADHD and the way my brain works. And this was completely incorrect, by the way, because I now have it. I thought, it's not for me. It requires this, this, this, and I'm not gonna be able to do it. So this is all basically unconscious. And I think that what happened is that when it did come out and I didn't get one, okay, I kind of went, well, actually, it doesn't look like the sort of thing I could do, and maybe it's not that great. And this was not voiced publicly, really, but just kind of go, oh, no, it's just this, this, this. And I think looking back on it, what that was is my lack of knowledge and making so many assumptions about what it was that I already started kicking back about it, probably based on insecurity and probably a little bit of jealousy. Now, none of these things are conscious. I'm not sitting there going, I'm jealous, but it's a very human response to anything we see. You see it all the time when our friends are very successful not our close friends or actually people that are very successful that we kind of know that maybe we don't feel they deserve it, again, very unconsciously. And we start going, well, they're not that good. It's a classic thing. Nobody loves a winner. The way many of us can rise above that is to know what that is, to know that that's a kind of ingrained thing that can happen if we don't keep it in check. And the older we get, the more we realize how unhealthy that can be. And I think part of a huge part of personal development is to go, actually, what are the things that aren't healthy? My human responses and how can I analyze them and maybe not do that? And, you know, almost like a meditation thing. Oh, that's a silly thought. Let's get rid of it. And we all have that. I think we are all, none of us are immune from things like jealousy, envy, or it can be really healthy and it can be a drive. And the only people that don't really get it as much are the people that are very, very successful once they've got that. And actually then they can get it depending on who they are anyway. That's a different thing. So some people will bias towards looking at the negative in something and some people will bias towards looking at the positive in something. And it doesn't mean they're bad or good people. It doesn't necessarily mean they're negative and positive people in other aspects of their lives. So when someone has a huge success or a perceived huge success or a potential for huge success, many of us on one level of that will either be really envious or we'll start kicking back against it. So that's why you will always get stuff on The Magic Cafe, positive as well, but always negative about pretty much anything that is hyped because that hype thing does start annoying people and it creates such an unrealistic expectation that you can't help if you're that way inclined to start looking at the negative. I will briefly talk about hyping products and marketing because I think it's important we start thinking it this way. What's happening with magic now is what has happened for so many years with movies, with music, with anything, anybody that comes out with anything that is anticipated, there's a huge hype machine around it. And this is quite new for us in magic. We've never really had it as much as we have now. So we're not really used to it. So again, many of us will kick back against it. I actually really love it. I love, I'm a film fan. And when there's a film built up, it starts that excitement. When I see that teaser trailer, there's nothing in me that goes, I don't want them to hype this up. I want them to get me excited about something. I want that feeling of there's something cool coming out. And it goes way back to horror films in the eighties and seventies that would promise so much and never deliver. You know, like this is the scariest film you're gonna see. People run out of the cinemas, people fainted in the cinemas, all just absolute nonsense, but it would create that hype. And I've got nothing but affection for that. I absolutely adore it. I love it. And you know, that's a really big, I love seeing a big film poster that's really mysterious. It's a new Spielberg or something like that. Great. So I think we're kicking back against it, but I think we've got to accept it. And actually I quite like it. The problem obviously becomes, comes when something is released because of the secrecy around magic and, and we get it and we go, it's not what I thought. Or it's difficult, or it's gonna take work. And I thought it was gonna be easy. And I thought anybody could do this. And I think we have to define that as well, which is maybe for another video. So that all happens and that's fine. We have to accept that. I think what's happening in reviews is that I've had a lot of feedback saying you should be more negative. You should find the negative stuff. And I always say, I don't get sent it, right? And I'm not gonna go buy and everything or review. I cannot afford it. I don't get paid for this channel. Yes, it helps me market my online magic course, but that's not the only reason I do it. I couldn't do something like this just because of that. And I get sent stuff to review. Now, does that make me bias? Not as much as other things make me bias. What makes me bias is the fact that I will always try and find the positive in something. And nearly everything that I get, even if I buy to tell you the truth, I still buy a load of magic. I will see the positive in and try and work with. And that's not very difficult for me because I think nearly everything that gets released is decent. I don't think many people knowingly are putting out crap. They don't wanna put their name on it if it's not very good. Their reputation's at stake. And they know, regardless of what the hype does, that the minute it's gonna disappoint people, it's gonna be all over the magic cafe and people are gonna know. So the quality of the work and the usability of the thing will always win over the hype in the end. Now, it doesn't mean people won't buy it before they've realized that. And I think that's up to us. We can vote with our wallets and our feet, right? We can wait and see what people say. And if we wanna get caught up in that and be the early adopters, we know there's a risk with that. We know that when something new comes out and we don't know anything about it, that's the gamble we take. And I think if you're not gonna wait for what people are thinking, and there's no reason now, really, other than that excitement, which I totally get, then accept that unless it's complete trash, and if it's falling apart, you should get your money back anyway, but that's the gamble we take. If we wanna, you know, the pre-order. We pre-order something, we don't know what it's like until we get it, and then we make a decision on that. And obviously, if we spend a lot of money on it, that's gonna cause some bad feeling. So, you know, if you're worried about that and you haven't got that sort of money to gamble, then I would suggest don't do it. So we've got the jealousy and all that kind of stuff that we've all got. We've got the people looking at the negative, people looking at the positive, the pressure on reviewers like me to kind of find the bad in it. I will not play that game because I'm not lying. You know, I will say this isn't for anybody. It's, you know, I struggled with this, but I'm not gonna make something that I know will get me more clicks because if you look at my views, they are way lower than people that are, you know, trying to find a negative in the controversy in something. Controversy, still don't really know. But my values are so strong and I'm 50, you know, it's harder for me to do anything outside my values. There's not much dignity in that for me now. That I'll go, okay, we'll go, I'm gonna do what I think is important to me, be positive, and that is my bias. And I am totally biased. Am I biased when a friend sends me a trick? Of course I am. I can't not be. But am I gonna lie and say it's not good or is good? And I'm not saying anybody's lied here. That's not my place. Because I still don't really kind of know. But with things like MiniBook Pro, yes, Noel sent it to me. I'm going, this is brilliant. I try it out when I perform it and I know it's good. Which takes me on to another thing. Does a reviewer have to try or perform a trick to be able to review it? Now this came up on Lloyd's video and I know David from Unbiased Magic Reviews and loads of people have talked about this. My opinion is yes and no. My first performance of Close-Up Magic was 30, terrifyingly, 30 years ago. I thought it was like 25, but it was 30 years ago. Which is absolutely terrifying for me. If I get a trick, so Balloon Oracle, I'm gonna be reviewing and recording today. I don't have to take that trick onto a stage to know the responses it's gonna get because it is an old trick. It's a way of predicting something completely mind-blowing that falls from a balloon, you open it up. I don't have to try that and take it out into the shops and go, is that impressive? I know it is. There's other things about it that I can talk about as well, but I don't need to take that onto a stage to do it to be able to give you an idea of the quality of it, of what it does, does it work, all that. I have to try it here and make sure the thing works, of course. Some tricks, like MiniBook Pro, even though I loved it, I didn't know how it was gonna play. I had a good idea because of the trick, but I thought, how is it, they're gonna connect to the MiniBook Pro thing. So when I'm not sure, I take it out and I take it to people that are a difficult audience walking into a shop. It's not easy. If you're getting responses in that weird, awkward way, I know it's gonna work, or ideally a gig. So if you know your stuff, my feeling is, no, you don't have to try everything and perform everything, but if you're not sure, you do have to see what those responses are because sometimes it's really unpredictable, but sometimes it's a complete no-brainer. With Christian Grace's Enigma, if I do that and get a word, are they gonna be blown away? Of course they are. Now, going back to that, those feelings I had when I didn't have Enigma and I was a bit, I was probably a bit like, I've got it, nobody else has got it and they're excited about it, I'm kind of missing out. I was starting to look at the negative in it and go, it's not for me and I wouldn't be able to do it anyway. Like I said, now I've got it, I know how wrong I was. I didn't really understand what it was. I didn't understand how it worked. The criticisms I had internally from it and I would talk to some people and go, it's not for me because I think it's that, privately, I'm actually wrong and that's why you do obviously need the thing before you review it. Now, saying this isn't a review of something but I'm gonna say the things that it's not practical, et cetera, is maybe a version of that that I had, but I wouldn't dream of being public about it because I knew, I didn't really know and I kind of know myself enough to go, that's just me kicking back and being a bit jealous probably and fear of missing out going on and so I'm gonna ignore that and maybe ignoring it a little bit too late, maybe thought I shouldn't have thought those things or said them in private conversations to people. So I think there's that thing of maybe, if you've got anything negative to say about summing, definitely do not, unless you're 100%, 100% sure, understand the consequence of this and this I think is the important, I know this is random, this is all stream of consciousness and I'm gonna check the two or three things I've written that I wanted to talk about and one thing at the end that I think is very important of the way we can enjoy our magic and get more out of it is that when some, with film reviews and when people, like my favorite reviewer is Mark Kermode and he will rant and really slate a film if it's bad and then we go back to the thing of, are you biased if you get paid or are you biased if you get sent stuff? He can do that because he's paid by an independent body to review films, not by the film industry and he's paid and he can take those risks and he knows that the people that make films have already probably made a huge amount of money so his famous rant was about sex in the city too, he knows that regardless of what he says, they are gonna make millions and it's a drop in the ocean, you know what he says, it really doesn't, you know, it's nothing. So yes, of course there'll be people hurt and there'll be people, feelings that the director of that film probably wouldn't have liked that but he's probably gonna be all right. Now, would he slate a film that was more independent and was gonna hurt more people? Yeah, he probably would if it was absolutely terrible but you can tell he's a little bit more generous and he looks at kind of, okay, well, that didn't work but it was brave and I could see the creativity in it. So we are human beings affecting other human beings and we have to remember that magic reviewers aren't paid so we're not talking to, you know, a whole world of people that might see this film or buy this trick, we kind of are but what we're doing a lot of the time is we're talking about a very small community, someone in that small community creating something that I would say 99.9% of the time means an awful lot to them and they've put an awful lot of work into it. Yes, there are the people making videos on their phone to try and earn a few quid every now and then but they're a minority, you know, nobody's interested in that stuff anyway. What we're talking about are the big releases and they usually come from a place of someone spending hours trying to find something that excites them, means a lot to them and they put an awful lot of work in. Now looking at, I haven't got decks, I've got nothing to say about it but I've seen it, Lloyd's been very open with showing me and I can't see, I can see a couple of things, a couple of maybe it wouldn't fit in his pocket, all that but I can't comment on that but if it works and it clearly does unless the whole thing falls apart and again, I can't really comment on that, if you get it, it works and you can do it and it's been demonstrated again and again and again that you can and you want a really good index that holds 52 cards or 48 or whatever you want to get in the ring and fight about, those things are kind of irrelevant anyway to me then if you get the trick and it works, you've really got nothing to complain about. Yes, it might not feel as good as another one but again, we can say that about music films and everything, that's the thing and then, has a lot of work gone into this? It clearly has, I mean, Lloyd's, you know, there's been loads of work and he's been using it, he's finally released it and we look at Enigma as well and now I've looked at it and this is not a review because I haven't done it yet, I will be doing one, the work that's gone into that is incredible and I've met Christian like three times, it's not like we've talked loads but I can see the work, I can see where it's come from, I can feel his excitement about it and yes, of course, wanting to make money comes into it so he's not gonna say no to that hype. There is incredible risk, personal risk and monetary risk goes into all of these things and I think that at the end of that, we've got someone sitting at home watching the reviews or not watching them but even their reviews from friends or the community or whatever, really hoping people like their stuff. Now, should they like it? If it's rubbish, no, should you criticize things that are problematic about it? Yes, I think with respect, you can do that but I think we've just got to be careful about who we're affecting and what the benefit of that is and the consequence and in the end of the day, it comes down to consequence. If I say this, is it really gonna help people? Yes, sometimes because something might be 150 quid and be utter trash. Calling something, I think completely, actually, I'm not gonna quote because I'll get it wrong but being critical about something unless you're really, really, really, really 100% sure that that's a solid thing, I just think you've got to be a little bit careful of as well as calling back to that person and maybe being a little bit too personal with your criticism of them because that's a different thing and I remember, it kind of made me feel a little bit like when the Russell Brand controversy happened recently and there were people going, well, I never liked his comedy anyway. You kind of go, that's irrelevant and we're not talking about that. Let's keep it to what we're doing here. It seems on both sides, people are upset, people have made mistakes and I'm not gonna get into that but I just think to be understanding of it, we've got to look objectively at what's going on or what could be going on and basically, we've got human beings that have had their feelings hurt, understandably, kicking back from that and I think we have to start being careful that that doesn't become something else and something a little bit more damaging for the mental health of many people and also possibly for the community because we need to regain trust and compassion, I think and there's a lot on the internet and in life, of course, of kind of that negativity. I just wanted to share with you a thing, I think we also get wrong about magic tricks and routines when we get them and we base the quality of them on. We, I think when we see the work that has to go into something, on our part, it can be very daunting and intimidating and it can also cause that fear and frustration. What a lot of us don't realise and I'm gonna talk about a model called the Ronke model, I think that's how you pronounce it, which I've talked about a lot, which is just, it's like a board, like archery target. In the middle is comfort, second one out is stretch and the third one out is panic and what most of us think we want is we think we want to live our lives in comfort which is why we respond to things like easy to do, doesn't take much practice, no sleight of hand because that's comfortable. We know we can go and perform something that is a surefire winner, we don't have to do much work and it's a winner, it's a worker. And then the next stage out is panic and stretch and that's that feeling that we're gonna have to work, we're gonna feel insecure. The first time we try it, it's like we're stretching ourselves and it feels kind of uncomfortable but actually it's what drives us and they know now when they study things like happiness, Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi who wrote the book on flu, that's where we tend to be happier, you know, in that stretch, the fact we're challenging ourselves which is why when we're learning something that's a little bit challenging but we can see ourselves get better at it and we finally perform it, we feel amazing because we know the work we've done and we know the challenges we've had to overcome. Panic is the next one out and that's not really where we want to be, that's where it's so difficult, we've got no chance, we walk on stage, we don't know what we're doing and we don't want to be there. Dipping our toes into it every now and then is fine but a lot of the time we think we're in panic but we're actually in stretch and that feeling of discomfort, when I was looking at Enigma yesterday, I can't get my head around it, I now really like that because I know and have trust that I'm gonna get my head around it because that's part of the learning process and I'm someone that has found none of this easy, everything that I do has been, taken me twice as long as most people I know to learn from shuffling a deck of cards to juggling everything but I now love that process and have faith in it and I think some of us when we're promised something easy, see that and we go, oh no, that's not what I want and in our culture at the moment, I think everything is geared towards everything being quick, taking shortcuts, a phone does this, we don't have to think about that, we can just do this, if we want to know anything, we can just Google it and actually the process of learning something, maybe through researching through books, other things other than just finding out straight away or learning something that requires a skill or something we can't yet do is sold to us as being unattractive and I think it is actually great, I think that's kind of what drives us as humans and why so many of us feel so bored I think at the moment and unhappy in our society because we're not getting that and I think that with all the technology we have, are we any happier or are we less busy? No, we're not, it's not really doing what it promises so we feel disillusioned and we feel, and that's where depression can come from and all that kind of thing This is a discussion stimulated by what's happening at the moment and the main points I'm making is we're judging Magic Tricks, reviewers and other people a bit harshly based on things that we shouldn't really be judging them on and I think these arguments are caused by very human things of insecurity, of having your feelings hurt, of what you put out in the world being criticised, maybe unfairly and that causes anger which gets from, and if we're not careful that's kind of, well, in the end that's how wars happen over hundreds and thousands of years sometimes. So, I know it's a bit grand but I just think it's a really important thing to step back and go how can we actually stop, be compassionate, empathise and by that I mean not agree with what's happening but look at why somebody might be doing something and you know, and if it's juicy, we are gonna click on it, aren't we? So, you can see the temptation of kind of putting something out that you know, you know, like me, my views are not high so I know that even this may get higher viewers than normal and subconsciously that might have been one of my motivations as well but I know if you're here now, you're gonna regret giving such a load of waffle but something I believe is useful to all of us. Anyway, right, that's it, like and subscribe. Just briefly, my opinion on Enigma is that it's way more than I thought it was and I'm very, I've already put a lot of time into it and I'm happy to put a lot more into it. There will be a full review and I will look at the things that are challenging about it. Dex, I have not got yet but it looks fine to me and I will be getting one. I do get sent stuff, I can't afford to buy everything and I wish I could have that sort of money. I pretty much haven't because I spend so much time reviewing stuff which doesn't get me paid but even if I was, I wouldn't be looking to slate things. You know, you've got plenty of other places to find that. Right, none of us are biased, remember it. None of us are unbiased, remember that and let's just celebrate the fact and talk about it. Have a good one, cheers.