Desert Island Tricks
Each week we invite one of the biggest guests in the world of magic to maroon themselves on a desert island. They are allowed to take with them 8 tricks, 1 book, 1 banishment and 1 non magic item that they use for magic! We discuss their 'can't live without' lists and why those items were chosen.
Episodes are uploaded every Friday and are available via all Podcast service providers!
To find out more about the team behind Desert Island Tricks, please visit: www.alakazam.co.uk
Desert Island Tricks
Phill Smith
This week we welcome the incredible Phill Smith, one of magic's most prolific creative forces. His fingerprints are on countless books, decks, and products in the magic industry - and anyone who's seen his Penguin Lecture knows his creativity extends far beyond visual design.
In this surprisingly eclectic episode, Phill reveals the eight effects he'd take to a desert island, beginning with the delightfully absurd "Tiny Hand" by Michael Ammar. This unexpected choice creates what Phill describes as a surreal moment where spectators briefly imagine an impossible scenario - a tiny person inside the performer's hand. Contrast this with his second selection: Fork Bending performed as a serious demonstration of seemingly genuine ability.
Phill shares how his journey through mentalism began with Bill Goldman's "Mental Yarn," the first real mentalism effect he ever witnessed. He explains why this procedural method of expanding minimal information into mind reading fascinated him and influenced his own creative approach to magical methods.
The conversation reveals Phill's practical philosophy toward learning and performing. Rather than constantly seeking the "best" version of an effect, he advocates mastering one solid method thoroughly. "I will find a version of something that's good and then I'll polish that so that it becomes the best, rather than spending forever seeking perfection," he explains.
Perhaps most fascinating is Phill's discussion of creating powerful moments through opportunistic performance. He describes how he and his colleagues secretly prepare name revelations at magic conventions by noting spectators' names on badges, then seamlessly integrating this information into performances that feel impossible and deeply personal.
Whether you're familiar with Phill's work designing marked decks like the DMC Elites and Elysium Duets or completely new to his creative contributions, this episode offers valuable insights into creating magic that resonates on a personal level with audiences. His selections demonstrate that sometimes the simplest effects, presented thoughtfully, create the most powerful magical experiences.
Phill’s Desert Island Tricks:
- Tiny Hand
- Fork Bending
- Mental Yarn
- Inexplicable Thrift Store Find
- Key Master
- Twisting the Aces
- Hands Off / Alpha’s Deck
- Thetalia
Banishment. Magic Beef
Book. Ahead of the Pack
Item. Forks
Find out more about the creators of this Podcast at www.alakazam.co.uk
We came up with an incredible way of doing it when we were at Blackpool. I feel like I perhaps shouldn't mention this, but what we noticed was that when people come at Blackpool, obviously they've got a name badge on, and so what we would do was that if somebody's performing because we've got three guys on our table at Roxanna so me, luke Hennessy and John Watson what we would do is if, whilst one person is demming something for somebody else, regardless of what it is, something for somebody else, regardless of what they, what it is if we could see their name on their name badge, or we heard their name, we would. So we'd set it up, put it in the box and just tap that, put it down and just tap their elbow with it, and so this person who's looking has not seen anything, and so that, from his point of view, then he just takes the deck out of the box, visibly, shuffles it and then goes into. This trick I, I got it. Was it like the london magic convention, I think?
Speaker 1:But I was with Peter Antonio and he saw the girl's name. It was a girl who'd come along and he guessed what her nickname was off the back of that, because it was like a weird shortening of the name and I kind of like, from spreading the cast face down I knew what he put. And then at the end of course they're like we never said that name. You know, it's like if a girl, if it was like if her name was Charlotte, he didn't guess Charlie, he gets Lottie, and that way I just got to lean on Pete Antonio being a complete legend at this kind of thing. But they were floored by that. I'm pretty convinced that would have been the best trick that they saw at that convention, just purely because of that, because it was an opportunistic kind of thing.
Speaker 3:Hello and welcome to another episode of Desert Island Tricks. We have a guest that I'm sure the majority of you are going to know by now, surely? And if you don't know him, then I guarantee that you either own or use one of his effects. Now, I was just talking to him and mentioned that we do have one of his products that has turned up quite a few times on the podcast. In fact, just a few days ago I recorded someone else's and it was their first choice.
Speaker 3:He's an incredible graphic designer as well. Designs all of his own effects, designs so many effects for other people. He's consulted on different effects for other people. He's consulted on different projects for other people. He is very well known for designing books for many, many people. So even if you don't know him directly, the chances of you reading one of the books that he's had a dabble in or his hand in is highly likely. He's incredibly clever. If you've not seen his work, including his absolute tome of a book of material, then please do go check out his stuff. Also, I would probably put his Penguin Lecture in my top 10 lectures that I've ever seen. He's got some incredibly clever ideas on there, so do go check that out. So of course, today's guest is the wonderful Phil Smith. Hello, phil.
Speaker 1:Hey, jamie, thanks for having me. That was a great intro. Pretty good about myself now.
Speaker 3:Well, it's so true Everyone knows you. At this point it's hard to say what people would know you for, because you really do have your hand in so many pies, so to speak.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I've done quite a lot of stuff in magic and I think that that's. I've just been around for a while. They're like I recognize that bit and what did you do before?
Speaker 1:magic then were you a graphic designer yeah, so I mean, my origin is as a uh like graphic designer out in the world, designing like signage for diy stores and brochures and business cards and all of that kind of stuff, and I ended up, um, doing a few sort of projects within magic, because I was a magician and interested in magic and, uh, I think that there's there's few enough like graphic designers within magic. That that I think I've just ended up picking up quite a lot of projects and it's been, uh, I guess the rest is uh, the rest is history. I've just ended up picking up quite a lot of projects and it's been, I guess the rest is history. I've done a lot, I've done a lot of stuff and I think it's been yeah, it's been a bit of a fun journey.
Speaker 3:Well, it would be remiss of me not to mention your very special deck of cards, which seems to have had a journey all of its own, because you sort of had the DMmc deck actually, you had one before that as well, um, I believe and then that sort of morphed into the dmc and now you have a brand new incantation of that.
Speaker 1:So talk to us about that deck, because if anyone's not heard of it, they really should check it out I think that that's maybe what I'm most known for is I've ended up designing more marked decks, I think, than anyone ever. That's my extremely minor claim to fame. But I designed a deck of cards with Drum and Money Coutts. I suggested we'd done a deck for his TV show, the Card Shark, which was just like a branded deck, so that they would have clearance to use it on TV et cetera and could get all the gas they needed. Um, and I suggested that we do a a a mark deck, cause I'd had an idea of something that was possible and we kind of have done a lot of generations of that now, using what I call my optical marking system, which is like an interesting.
Speaker 1:It came about because of the fact that the in the old days when people marked deck, it had to be something that was added to or taken away from the deck if you're going to mark a deck yourself. It became possible to be able to print relatively smaller numbers of decks and because of the way that I work on the computer, I was able to build this marking system that's become over several generations, sort of more and more refined. So I worked with Drummond on that for quite a long time it was a DMC Elise is probably what I think people will most be familiar with that the optical marking system on. But now I've got a new product because I've he's off doing his own things and working on my stuff and we've got the Elysium duets, which is kind of like the latest update of that. I think it's like the sixth or seventh generation of that system. So that's like one of my sort of most proud things that I've worked on. So I think that that's uh yeah, maybe that's what other people will recommend.
Speaker 3:It is the uh oms on those various decks it's such a interesting marking system in that distance actually aids, I would say yeah, it's got a really good read on it so that it's not a coded one.
Speaker 1:It's like it's a reader deck or so. It just says what the card is and I made it as big as possible and it's a like a context shift thing. So once you know that it's there, you can see it, but unless you know that it's there, it just looks like noise.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah, I think it's great. I think it's such a phenomenal deck of cards. Now let's talk about your list as well. Going forward, I primarily know you as a mentalist. I think most people would say that you are a mentalist, but that doesn't mean that we won't get any curveballs in your list it's, it's like 90 curveballs.
Speaker 1:Oh, when I when I perform, the majority of the stuff that I perform is my stuff, not because I think that it's the best stuff, but like in the same way that if you went and saw, like ed sheerer, he's gonna play ed sheerer songs, um, because they're like, you know, it's my stuff, but I don't think that it's really cool just to come on and be like, well, here's a list of all of my favorite coolest stuff. So I've got a bunch of like, I think, slightly unusual things, when each one illustrates a different, I don't know, like interesting moment in magic or something that caught my attention that, oh, I was really interested in, so wow that's that's so.
Speaker 3:That's what it's about. Anyone playing Phil Smith bingo is going to really struggle, I think.
Speaker 1:It's going to be tricky, I think.
Speaker 3:Well, if this is your first time listening to the pod, the idea is that we're about to maroon Phil on his very own island. When he's there, he's allowed to take eight tricks banish one item, take one book and one non-magic item that he uses for magic Particulars like who's there? How many people are there? Are there animals there? All that good stuff we do not mind. It is in Phil's own imagination. With that being said, let's go to his island and find out what he put in position number one.
Speaker 1:Okay. So position number one is I think this is the curveball-y one. If I'm on this island, then I've got to be on there with Roxana, my wife, otherwise I'm going to start swimming and her favorite trick is, um, michael Amar's tiny hand, um, and I've performed this a lot, not just for her, but for people that she's demanded that I do it for, and I actually mentioned it when we were sitting having lunch not long ago and she agreed that it would keep us happy on the desert island for a while with a tiny hand. But I think that it's really. I haven't done it quite a few times. It is a really interesting piece because it's so ridiculous and it creates a weird little. It invites them just for a second to imagine. If it creates a weird little. It invites them just for a second to imagine.
Speaker 1:Like, if you make a coin vanish, you are creating the illusion of a world where a coin can vanish. Or you know, if a card changes from one card to another, then somehow maybe that card can change. But when you do Little Hand just for a second, that person goes okay. So there's like a tiny guy inside his hand. That's like reaching out and grabbing the coin, and I just love it because of that.
Speaker 1:So if people aren't familiar with this, essentially I've given it away by holding it up. You cup your hands like this, with a coin balanced on your hand, and just a tiny hand comes out and grabs the coin and there's quite a nice way of kind of acquitting it and getting out of it at the end. And it's just so surreal and there's no way. There's no way on earth. If you got into that position there and you said to a lay person who doesn't know what's going to happen, what do you think is about to happen, it is the thousandth, ten thousandth, millionth thing that they would ever think of. Just a tiny handful, come and grab it out.
Speaker 3:I love it, yeah yeah, it's a great trick. It's one that we've had a few times on the pod, and I think it's the sort of absurdness of it and it's the idea that, yeah, like you just said, it's the last thing anyone's going to think of. And I think, if you're quite a serious performer, it would be a really interesting thing to break up the seriousness and you could still play it serious. That's the thing it's like.
Speaker 1:a visual joke. It has a really strong visual to it. But also there's a nice moment of magic, because they kind of go okay, I can imagine what's happening, somehow that's in his hand, it. But it's also there's a nice moment of magic because when you they kind of go okay, I kind of I can imagine what's happening, somehow that's in his hand. But there's a way of doing this like misdirective take and it's still like it's really strong. It's a strong little bit of magic in addition to being just a ridiculous joke.
Speaker 3:Yeah yeah, it's a wonderful, wonderful trick, and I'm sure it's one that we'll have many times again in the future, just because it's so, so out there, it's so, uh, yeah, crazy. So what did that take you into your second position? What did you put in your second spot?
Speaker 1:that one I quite like because it's so absurd and it's so, so surreal. Um, the the kind of the exact opposite is something again that I've performed a lot that's's very visual, which is metal bending fault bending, um, and it used to be. I've never published anything on it because I've not got any work on it. I just I've got a routine that I've got built from, like other people's routines, like banner check, um Osterlund and just a few people that I've seen, yuri Gallup just watching him. Um, and unlike the tiny hand, where you create in this world, that's just completely surreal metal bending. When I performed it, I was to perform almost like as a signature piece. It's my favorite thing to do, um, because it is. It only works if you present it as real, as a trick, as a magic trick. I think it's crap. Um, but as a like a piece of theater where you're showing them something that is inexplicable. It's, it's just brilliant and so much legwork has been done by um yuri gala as well, who, uh and and again, in complete opposite to the first bit like roxana, loves the tiny hand, but she cannot stand Uri Geller. She doesn't like. I don't think she respects what he's doing. Um, but there's something about it. I think that's really mesmerizing.
Speaker 1:Um, and I, the way that I perform it is kind of like rather than doing the very visual, you know the time bend stuff, and it's like very fast as you do it as slowly as possible, um, and kind of get to this, there's a, there's a.
Speaker 1:The second bend that I do is this, this bend. I'm sure people are familiar with where it's in your hand and the phrase I saw someone used to describe it a while ago. It's that it is one of the only sustained illusions in magic. That when you like, if you wave your hand over a card and it changes, they can't really like watch the card change, register what they're looking at and then look harder, whereas when you're doing the this bend, which is just, you know it's a, it's an illusion, there's nothing really happening, it's a bit of nothing at that moment. They, they, could, they see it happen and I've performed it so many times. People see it happen, go and they, they, just they can't look close enough to break the illusion and they just can't, and they're looking at it happening and they have time to mentally interrogate what's happening. There's not a lot of things like that in magic. It's such a nice piece to do.
Speaker 3:I love it, yeah I think that's a really interesting point and I think there are two sort of perspectives when it comes to fork bending or spoon bending, and that is, yeah, like you just said, the really fast sort of snappy version, or the really slow version, and the fact that you just said it was like a sustained moment of magic is a really interesting way of looking at it. But I think something else that you said there, which is very true, and I wonder if everyone else has found this to be true but when you fork bend, it almost doesn't need any narration as soon as it starts to happen. Yeah, they narrate everything themselves and all these years on, gala's name pops up every single table yeah, I, I used to what I used to.
Speaker 1:I used to follow, like I, when I did um, like restaurant magic, I'd go and do like cards and you know, visual magic and card magic, and then kind of like I'd almost put like a little break in and be like, right that we're finished, we're done and I'm about to go, but like I've had a great time with you, can I show you something that I'm probably not supposed to show you because it's not really magic, it's just something that I can do and just like to like do a state change like that and I think they could realize there's still a performance, but it's this different kind of vibe change the mood and perform it as though it's real. I have no real explanation for this. Maybe you do and then perform that and I used to finish with like a twist that I've kind of backward engineered from watching Richard Ossolan do it and you leave them with that like impossible thing and it kind of solidifies this whole. At any point they've gone. Well, that's not real. They are nonetheless left with this thing that they can't untwist.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's just the best, and I've used it a number of times for people and then be convinced that it's just the best and I've used it a number of times for people and then be convinced that it's real. I used to work at a design company in nuniton, um, a long time ago and I did metal bending there for one of the um, one of the women on the production team, and she sat there looking at me like this for a long time and then she goes you could heal. I'm like no, no, no, no, I can't heal. No, no, no, she's in your hands, that power you could heal. I'm like it's a trick, I can't heal bail out.
Speaker 3:So phil smith's uh medicine center will be opening up next, that's it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I'll do like I can like. Uri geller reiki faith healing yeah, great.
Speaker 3:Well, that's a great choice and a stark contrast to number one tiny hand into fork bending. I can like Uri Geller. Reiki, faith healing, yeah, great. Well, that's a great choice and a stark contrast to number one tiny hand into fork bending. So what did you put in your third spot?
Speaker 1:So the third spot was is the mental yard. This like Bill Goldman piece with the two lists I think a lot of people are familiar with and the reason is because it was the first like mental mentalism magic piece that I was ever shown in real life like by somebody. It was actually by Scott Creasy, who's an incredible performer and a brilliant inventor At the Leicester Magic Circle. When I was at university I kind of realised that there was a magic club in Leicester and went to join and at one of the meetings very early on I got talking to that there was a magic club in Leicester and went to join and at one of the meetings very early on I got talking to Scott and mentioned that I liked mentalism because it was around the time when Darren was first on TV and Scott showed me that and I was like I remember being annoyed by it and when I was thinking about it recently it was just because I just had no clue what had happened. It felt almost like this is quite a. It's quite a small piece and it almost felt like I don't know how to describe it it was almost too too small a presentation. Not that it was scott did something wrong, it's just built into the trick for this, this thing. But because it was the first time I'd ever seen it I'd never seen any mentalism. I was so sort of impressed by the ability to read a mind that I felt like what's all this about? And it's not a perspective. I think that we have so much anymore because we're so used to the sort of procedures and processes that are inevitable and necessary to do the stuff that we do. I always try and sort of bear that in mind, thinking about, like, what kind of compromise is there? That's a bit of a weird one, isn't it? There you go, but it's such a great, it's a great trick, and I've spent a lot of time trying to like come up with a nice sort of alternative or version of like how it would look, and I've never really been able to push past like the fact that the original is really good.
Speaker 1:I'll tell it from the perspective of the punter, for me, as like a 20 year old in leicester, that you think of a number between one and ten all, and the only information that you give the performer is whether it's odd or even. So, he shows you a list with a numbers down the side of 10 words or descriptions or whatever, and he says don't tell me what it is, just remember the word that's at that number. So if you pick number seven, it would be like um silver. And then he says right, so puts that list away. Gives you another list which isn't numbered and said just, it's 10 items. Now find the item that's on there that links mentally to the first word that you came up with. And then you do that and it's like you know wristwatch, and then he's able to tell you what that is.
Speaker 1:And it's a very reliable, old-fashioned kind of a method. It's not like bold or risky, but it's a fascinating way for a procedure to expand that very small piece of information that they tell you. They just communicate that one thing and then, because of this sort of whole process that unpacked, you're able to then create the impression that you're able to read their mind. Yeah, it's a really interesting piece. I had to ask somebody what it was called because it's a. It's a. It's a really interesting piece. I'll completely. I have to ask somebody what it was called because it's one of those things that's so iconic, like I bought it 15 years ago and it's in my desk somewhere. I don't know what it's called. I can't remember what it's called mental yarn.
Speaker 3:Thank you, luke it's a phenomenal trick. I again, this is one that I think a lot of us see early on, but I do actually think I would argue it's probably lost to time a little bit at this point.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I mean if people aren't familiar with it, if people are out again. Here's the thing it is a very early incarnation of the kind of tricks that people release now that are really strong, so the kind of tricks that somebody like Nicholas Moreses or or david jonathan would release, which have got these very clever procedural methods. It's a very condensed down, it has this nice structural flow and then you can reveal a big thing at the end. But I think that there's a lot of thinkers out there like those guys who are working on those kind of things. But there wasn't so many of those kind of mental pieces being released then. I think it was one of the early ones of those. So I think that just within our industry, completely aside from the performance of it, there is something sort of interesting about it.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I think if people haven't heard of this and you're sort of new to the industry, please do go check it out, because it really is a timeless piece. It will work now just as well as it did then. It's just a phenomenal piece. And the fact that it fits in your wallet as well.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and again, one of the things that I find appealing about it is that if I was going to do a version of that, it's quite easy to restyle it, so you could make a 60s version of it or a victorian version of it. You might have to think of some different objects, and that kind of process is the kind of thing that I you know I really like. So it's, at its core, rebuildable into lots of different directions, which is good, because if you're building a like a set list or a routine with a particular theme, it's one of those things that you could, with a bit of shoehorn and figure out how to fit it in, and it would build on whatever theme it is that you're putting together.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah Well, that's a great choice and leads us very nicely into number four. So what did you put in your fourth spot?
Speaker 1:So number four I kind of like because I do perform almost like mainly my own thing I wanted to put one piece in. That was one of my pieces and the one I wanted to put one piece in that was one of my pieces and the one that I wanted to include is the one that I think best exemplifies the kind of tricks that I like and that I like to build. And it's an inexplicable thrift store find and I'll briefly outline it without describing what the trick is, because if anybody ever sees me at a lecture or a convention or something, I'll show it to you and it's kind of weird, but it has this kind of presentation. It's like a novelty from the olden days that is unique because it actually works, unlike X-Ray, specs or Sea Monkeys or Joy Buzzers, and it's just the psychic game and it is a game with a dice and pieces and cards that does something impossible. That is not like explosively exciting, but it feels very fair all the way through and I feel like I have fought quite a lot of people with it, like at Blackpool and conventions and stuff, and it's like it's the combination of a bunch of people with it, like a black pool and conventions and stuff and it's like it's the combination of a bunch of different things. It's got, I think, an interesting hook and a story.
Speaker 1:Hooks are something that I work a lot on, but there's a point in it where you've set this. You've baited the hooks so well that even if people aren't particularly interested in the magic, they just want to know what's inside the box for the psychic game. It's got this sort of retro design that makes it feel like it is what it says it is. The script is quite well refined. The method is this sort of reinvention of a mathematical principle called Quinta that I use for loads of stuff, but I took it and made it like more practical, so it's self-working rather than having to do any mental jumps. And, yeah, I love performing. I've performed it maybe more than almost any of the other tricks, and so that was the one that I wanted to incorporate. It was going to take one trick with me to the island. There's one of mine. I wanted it to be that one.
Speaker 3:Yeah, Well, quinta is one of those moves that often gets referenced in my day-to-day job. Now, when I'm talking to other magicians and we're talking about clever mathematical principles or ideas in mentalism, quinta always comes up because it's just a phenomenal piece of procedure that just feels so clean and is so adaptable to so many things. And what I love about this particular like version of that is the props. I think the props are great. I think they're so interesting and I find that with a lot of your routines and effects, you put a lot of care and effort into the production, even your I have your version of the magic square, which comes with a really cool notepad, and even the thinking and the design behind that is phenomenal.
Speaker 1:I think that that's part of my like, part of my process is that I'm I'm quite a good technician in terms of doing design and if I can get an idea in my head about how I want something to look or feel, I can usually figure out how to make the you know, make the artwork look like that and increasingly, because I've got more production experience doing things, I'm able to make it look like that in the real world. Quinta, especially, I think, has come about because it was originally an idea that I had that would allow me to be an alternative to Equivocate, which I love. But if you used it in a set or you want to change something around sometimes it's nice to have an alternative and, just like the optical marking system, it just evolved over a long period of time. I published it in one of my early books and, just from conversations, the first version of it was not very good.
Speaker 1:It was something that I could do in my head, but when I ran it past people, it always seemed like it was unnecessarily complicated and just so many people came back with like small changes to oh, have you thought about you could do this?
Speaker 1:How about, if you do this, you could do this, that I was gradually able to rebuild it and it's almost like that um, you know the stone soup, where somebody comes along and says, oh, we can make a soup just by putting a stone in, but oh, oh, it needs a bit more. Can you add something? Can you add something? And in the end all they've done is just catalyzed everybody else to contribute. So I think that that's a little bit what it was, and the iteration in Inexplicable Thrift Store Find is kind of like another design solution to it, where I was able to use the design of the artifacts and the objects themselves to make that mathematical process self-working. I've got a new version. I'll talk to you about some other point which again is a sort of a visual solution for quinta. That is something we're hopefully we're going to get later in the year. They got a little mysterious tease for well, we love a tease.
Speaker 3:We seem to get teased far too often on this podcast.
Speaker 1:We're finding out as this series goes on but everybody's got something on the back burner, haven't they? They're just like maybe I'm trying to tease it for myself, to remind myself I should probably pull my finger out and get on with doing it well, I'm sure that's going to be great and it's something we can all look out for.
Speaker 3:Uh, and it does take us to number five. So what was in your fifth spot?
Speaker 1:so number five is um the trick key master by um craig petty, who I've done a load of work for, but not on that we and the reason why I got it was, um, you know, mainly what I do is mentalism and like, so, like, I would love to perform inexplicable thrift store find all of my sort of weird stuff for various people. But we've gone to Romania, which is Roxana's home country, and I knew that I was going to be performing for people who didn't speak English, that she would make me do magic and I can only do tiny hands so many times so I knew that I wanted to get a like a. That was my chance to get a modern visual piece of magic. And Keymaster is essentially like a coin changing trick, but instead of coins is keys and instead of changing like values and denominations, you're moving a hole around on the key in this really interesting visual way. And what I like about it?
Speaker 1:It it's like the reason why I wanted to get that one in particular, because I've worked with craig for a while on a bunch of like design things and cards and projects for him that have gone through murphy's and penguin and stuff. But I quite like how he um deconstructs and puts together routines, and Keymaster in particular has got what I think is quite a clever structural routine which gets rid of as much of the sleight of hand as possible, because I'm not very good at that kind of thing. It's never been my focus. I can do it, but not great if someone's burning my hands. But I knew that it had a nice piece of routine in it and I yeah, and so I talked about, I spent a bit of time learning it and when we went and saw, say, broxanna's family, it was nice to be able to show them something from my universe, some kind of magic, without, you know, just completely losing it.
Speaker 3:All of the things I like about magic, storytelling and the presentation, yeah yeah, I think that's a great choice and at the beginning we said that these were all going to be kind of choices we wouldn't have put with you and I don't think I would have put key master with you in one respect. But then when I think about things like inexplicable thrift store find can't say that then it sort of makes sense because it's sort of a quirky out there presentation and earlier on you mentioned that you spend a lot of time on the hook and with key master, the hook is there from the get-go.
Speaker 1:You bring out this key and it doesn't really take a huge amount of explaining for people to understand what on earth is is going to happen yeah, I think that there's some mentally, some stuff I love I find fascinating, obviously because it's kind of ended up doing it, um, but the visual stuff where it's, it's the, the solidity of things moving, like a hole moving around is like it takes no explanation to explain why that's impossible, even like moving objects and pieces of things around can be done, but the hole.
Speaker 1:I remember learning um. Michael close's uh got a routine where he's got a little hole puncher and he punches a hole out of a card and moves it, moves the hole from place to place and then like he's got a really beautiful ending in it. Maybe I should have taken this one instead, cause I remember I used to do this when I was gigging that you tear it in half and you've got one half of the card has got a hole in it and one half hasn't. You hand them the half without the hole, take the hole off this one, put it on that one and the one in their hand has now got the hole. It's incredible, um, and it's on one of his um dvds. I used to do that a lot, but I remember thinking, watching just the very first time that I ever saw him performing on the dvd thinking that but how can you move a hole around?
Speaker 3:it does remind me a bit of like a cartoon come into life yeah.
Speaker 1:I think that sometimes those things where it's a we take, like we said, we we in the industry have certain visions of how these things are so, like cards changing, being found or coins moving or disappearing and reappearing. But then there's the things that come out of left field that are just so completely bizarre, like the, you know, card warp. It's almost impossible to describe what's happening. He made the card go inside out. It's such a weird little piece and I'm fascinated by those.
Speaker 3:Moments of weird.
Speaker 1:Yeah, moments of weird Things like that, like Lub know, lubor's lens, these are, these are this is the honorable mentions, I guess. Isn't it like that? Lubor's lens is this thing where you know it rotates around and it's uh, my friend, pete antonio, found a video of his a long time ago, um, and we were watching it in like late at night once and it was just we do this thing where you just get. Each trick was increasingly ludicrous in terms of what happened and what the method was, um, and we just like get to a point and we'd pause it and then we'll be like right, what, what do you think the method's going to be? We come up with these outlandish things just joking around. It's so stupid press play and the real method is even stupider or more ludicrous and and that kind of like surreality I was kind of like is something that magic does really well.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah, no, I think that's a great, great choice, and anyone that wants to deep dive into Luba a bit more, then do go all the way back to our first episode with Preston Nyman, where he talks quite a lot about Luba Fielder in his episode, so do go check that out.
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Speaker 3:But that does bring us to number six. So what was in your sixth spot?
Speaker 1:Number six is twisting the aces. Specifically, I think it's the Aldo Colombini version of it and it was. It was I mentioned before about going to the Leicester Magic Circle and sort of. That's where I began to cut my teeth, doing close-up and learning like a full set with cards, and it was. I always used to do stuff from a regular deck that's tended to be the way that I would approach things but not from gaff decks or not carrying a pocket full of different gimmicks. It would just be like from a regular deck, and at the time obviously there was lots of packet tricks were becoming big and it was the first trick that I like properly learned. That wasn't what I would consider a regular card trick, a normal card trick that you're like your uncle might know where you find the card, or you deal with these ones down and the top ones all match up, or something like that. Although those are all great, was this one of the first times that it had this very condensed down piece using the? You know, I remember learning the Elmsley count and getting the all of the sort of secret tips from Moz, who was another Leicester guy.
Speaker 1:I was like very lucky to have like been in a club with a lot of people who are actually extremely talented. A lot of people who are actually extremely talented, a lot of people who know Moss from Alakazam, I think, on his stand of Blackpool. He's just a great thinker. I remember sitting down with him and him giving me the inside scoop on Twisting the Aces and the Elmsley Count itself. But there was an interesting point on it.
Speaker 1:I learned another move at the end of Twisting the Aces.
Speaker 1:People don't know, I don't know how somebody who doesn't know what Twisting the Aces is watching this. But you have four aces and they flip over one by one, seemingly under some strange control. And I just had this sort of this thing that I thought was quite a nice ending for it, which used a move that Moz had had shown me, where you kind of I said I say actually the way that it works is that they're just magic cards, if you just turn the top card over and you turn the top card of the four over, and then you could spread all four and they're all turned over and it's a really beautiful illusion when you know what's happening. But I had to stop doing that because too many people went oh, like this, like that was the actual explanation. So was that? Always a bit wary about those kind of things? Now, there's too many times when I put something in that I thought was like a funny little um, a funny little moment, that almost like it becomes a little bit overwhelming for the rest of the routine.
Speaker 3:You have to, you have to bin it, yeah so my question would be why that particular version of twisting the aces?
Speaker 1:Because that's the one that I learned first, and I'm a bit of a. I think what a lot of people do is that they will learn, you know. So they'll have like a spoon bending routine and then they will fiend after every possible spoon bending piece of information they've got. If they learn to twisting the aces, they'll just go seek out everybody's approach to doing it, um, and then just like min max it so that they get what's the what's the best? What's the best, what's the best spoon bending routine? What's the best spoon bending move? What who's has got the best? Um twisting the aces? What the Asis? What I liked about Colombini's one when I learned it was that everything is verbally explained. So if you had to turn these over, he's got a reason in the script for doing it.
Speaker 1:But what I tend to do is I will find a version of something that's good and then I'll polish that so that it becomes the best, rather than spending forever Because I've got, you know, like peak methods or something that I think perhaps I learned Richard Osterling, slow motion, center tear. And a lot of people have been like oh, do you know such and such a center tear? Why didn't you learn this? You know this one's better and the reason why, although there might be another center tear that is a superior method, none of them will be as good for me as Richard Osterling's one, because I've done it like a hundred thousand times. That's the one that I can actually do really well.
Speaker 1:So sometimes I'll just like I acknowledge that something, rather than focus too much on trying to find like the absolute perfect version of something, like accepts the, the bit that you've got is good enough. The version you've got is good enough. If there are bits that need ironing out, you can iron those out. But to try and build a presentation and everything around that, that's not a great explanation. But that's why that's, I think, why Not necessarily that that's always my mindset, that I'm like no, I won't look at any more Twisting the Aces book and it's got a new version of twisting the aces. My response isn't to be like oh, I wonder what's new in that. It's to go, I've already got a twist in the aces.
Speaker 3:That's not great, is it no, no, I I think I'm the same as as you in some respects that I still perform routines from when I was 16. You know, uh, watching alan rorison's fingers of fury dvd. Uh, that I still perform the same um sandwich routine from that dvd because, for me, I really enjoy it. There's some really lovely moments in it. It's something that I've done hundreds and if not more times. That's it now I don't.
Speaker 1:I don't know if I need another version I think, as sometimes although this is even more in the weeds in terms of talking about what we do but if there's a version of something that resonates with you, what we do is art and you communicate some part of yourself through it. So, when you're performing a piece now, there's a very seasoned magician who's done it in front of hundreds of thousands of people um, you're performing a piece from when you're a kid. There's that through line that goes all the way through. That's not nothing, that's something there's. That itself is a reason to do it. Let me show you. You know, that's the kind of thing that I would say. I want to show you a trick, the first trick I ever looked. That's a great, that's a great hook, you know. And for if it's true, that's that's even better.
Speaker 3:There's something to it, I'm sure, about things like that yeah, I think an idea for a future product which I'd love to see from you and this is legitimate, although it will seem like a joke is phil smith's book of hook lines, so I'd love the idea of you just writing like a hundred different trick hooks and then magicians have to create to those hooks.
Speaker 1:I saw um really lucky to see a very small convention in london a long time ago david burglars doing a card set, um, and before he got started he goes look, I don't ever perform anymore. I don't ever perform anymore. I haven't touched a deck of cards for a long time, but I really wanted to show you this, and this is going to be the first time for maybe years that I will have performed any of these pieces, and so obviously it was this really incredible moment and looking back afterwards.
Speaker 1:I was like that's just a hook. I'm sure Of course he doesn't never perform magic, but it was electric in the room If it wasn't a hook. If it was true, then it was a brilliant moment. If it was a hook, I'm even more impressed by this, like the ease with which he just went like got the entire room, just put them in the palm of his hand. I mean, his performance was incredible and very memorable. But it was incredible and memorable partly because of that, because of the hook, and I think that those kinds of hooks that you can use to draw people in.
Speaker 1:I love them. I look, another person who's great at those is um andy nyman will. He will be telling you a trick about his life, a story about his life, for like three minutes before you realize it's the presentation for a trick. You'll start, you'll be leaning in and he's talking about like a shot that he used to go in when he was a kid or something, and you just think that he's telling you about a shot that he used to go and he's like, oh actually, and then and then they had this or whatever it might be, and it's those, I think, a lot of the time. Those hooks are what people will remember, whether they consider them to be like a presentation or gambit, which is nice, or just like that thing with david bergla. It's just the framework within it which happens.
Speaker 3:Yeah yeah, we've spoken about on on this podcast before about a theater device where, uh, it used to be scarcely used and now it seems to be in every show that the west end kicks out a moment where the actors will come out of character because something happens on stage and they start laughing and at that moment the audience feel like that's a really unique moment, that they were there for the night, that the actors couldn't carry on because X, y and Z happened. And I still think it's something that putting it into our performances even close up that the night that this thing happened, that's just another story that people can go away and tell.
Speaker 1:You're right, like a book of hooks or just something that emphasises this idea of like, in a way, the trick isn't the trick. The trick is almost what happens around the trick, and that's the bit that they're not. You know you're painting this picture, but they don't realise that to get there they've also had to buy all of this other stuff.
Speaker 3:Well, phil Smith's A Book of Hooks is coming out later this year. You heard it all here first year. Um, you heard it all here first. Now, that was your first card trick as well in your list, so you've got two more choices left, so let's go straight into number seven.
Speaker 1:So number seven is um, a trick called hands off, which is a trick that uses a, an alphabet deck. So me and um drummond released a marked alphabet deck called the alphas and we sat down and brainstormed a whole load of different routines that used the alphas to create various different effects and Drummond came up with this is his piece, this trick called hands off, that we put in the passport, the little instruction guide, and essentially you give the spectator the deck and they walk through a, a method of, you know, shuffling these cards and mixing them up, and they end up with, as they turn over the tops of all of these different piles, that it spells out their name Um, and it's, it's the, it's pretty, it's pretty much the tops, it's the best trick that I've enjoyed performing, probably the most, and everybody who's watching this or listening to this, who's performed any number of times, will have moments that stand out that they remember. Or there's some, you know, at the end of a show or at the end of a gig there'll be like one person at one table where something happened and you're like that's what I'm going to remember and most of those stories that I've got are performing this trick like this, not just with the alphas, not just with the alphabet deck, but specifically this trick, because it's so, so personal and essentially it's just the same as like an ace location or something like that, but instead of pulling you know four aces or a royal flush out which has got no sort of semantic meaning, it's their name. I did a lecture in um coventry, I think it might have been and I, when I'm at the beginning of a set or something like that, I'm trying to scout out names for people, because it's a without tipping, not too much. It requires a little bit of, or it's easier if you've got it sort of ready to rock and roll with someone's name.
Speaker 1:And so I'd spotted this um, uh, this old fella earlier when I was sitting in the bar drinking, who mentioned that he um, I wasn't at their table. I heard him say that he proposed to his his girlfriend the night before, and so I'm like, and I heard her name, so I set her name up so that I could use her name and I could use him, because I thought that that's a great opportunity to make it more personal and more powerful. And so all the way through, I'm building through my set doing this lecture, knowing that I'm going to use this guy, and just as I was coming to the end of the trick, that's before that one in the set he gets up and goes over to the door like he's going to go, and I'm like, oh, it's not the end of the world. I've got some other names I can go and I can do it on the fly. But it was a shame because I thought it was. It would have been nice. But what he was actually doing was that his friend who was like in a mobility scooter or whatever, needed to go. So he was holding the door open for it and I was like, oh, you guys. Okay. I said actually, since you're standing up, do you want to just come and help me with this?
Speaker 1:And so, of course, now it feels completely impromptu and so he comes over and, um, the kind of the denouement of the presentation is about making choices, and the choices that we make. I said you know, if you, you know, I chose to come here and do this rewind further back. I chose to become involved in magic or we would never have met if I hadn't made those choices. Have you made any like big choices recently? And so he tells everybody which itself was a nice moment, and they give him a little bit of a round of applause.
Speaker 1:I'm like wow, that's really cool, that's a great choice, what was?
Speaker 1:What was her name?
Speaker 1:And he's like Joanne or whatever, I can't remember.
Speaker 1:Um, and I was like there's no way I turn over the first one and it's a J and the room went silent and I was like nice, but it was just everything just lined up just perfectly and it's not like I'm like Mr Ultra Season Performer People who know me know that I'm not a professional performer and I'm not like out gigging every night, but I'm always trying to keep an eye out for that kind of moment where you can leverage something unique that happened in the room and use what you were set up to do, what you were going to do these sort of set pieces that we have. Can you just change it slightly so that it feels like something that could never have happened at any other moment? It had to happen then in that room with that guy at that time, that kind of thing. And I think that that's why I like that, because it's a very set piece but you can navigate around the method and the structure of the trick to create something specific to what's happening in the room.
Speaker 3:If you were in that situation where he walked out, or if you were at a gig, is there like a different variation that you would go to with that? Would you come up with a different way?
Speaker 1:Yeah, I mean so there's sort of two ways of doing it. You either have like it's, have it ready to go so that you've clocked someone's um name or their name badge if you're a conference or something like that, and you've just got it ready to go, um, but I also know, um, oh my god, the roadrunner call. Whose is that? Cost you kim lap? Cost you kim lap? Yeah, yeah, I'm not very good at it, but you can. You can roadrun a name out of the alphabet deck um, and you just do it rather than like as if it's an incredible thing. You just faff around with the deck for a bit and you can queue it up, um, you do it whilst you're chatting. So that would have been what I would have done. I would just have taken a little bit of a moment to have a bit and you can queue it up and you do it whilst you're chatting. So that would have been what I would have done. I would just have taken a little bit of a moment to have a drink and be like how's it going, are you guys? Okay, what's the time? Like and just break state so I'm not in the performance mode, and then use that time to be like oh right, I know I will show you this. It will work. So with that. But we actually we came up with an incredible way of doing it when we were at Blackpool. I feel like I perhaps shouldn't mention this, but what we noticed was that when people come at Blackpool, obviously they've got a name by John. So what we would do was, if somebody's performing because we've got three guys on our table at Roxanna so me, luke Hennessy and John Watson what we would do is, whilst one person is deming something for somebody else, regardless of what it is, if we could see their name on their name badge or we heard their name, we would set up alphas. I'm sat here, he's sat there performing for somebody there. We'd set it up, put it in the box and just tap their elbow with it. This person who's looking has not seen anything because it's somebody else. They're focused on John performing the elder deck or something, and so, from his point of view, then he just takes the deck out of the box, visibly shuffles it and then goes into this trick and it's beautiful and I got it.
Speaker 1:I was at like the London Magic Convention I think that I can't remember what it was, but I was with Peter Antonio and he saw the girl's name.
Speaker 1:It was a girl who'd come along and he guessed what her nickname was off the back of that, because it was like a weird shortening of the name and I kind of like I could, from spreading the cast face down, I knew what he put it was and and then at the end of course they're like we never said that name and it was a hit. And I said to pete I, you know, it's like if a girl, if it was like if her name was charlotte, he didn't guess charlie, he gets lottie. And that way I just got to lean on Pete Antonio being a complete legend at this kind of thing. But they were floored by that and I'm pretty convinced that would have been the best trick that they saw at that convention, just purely because of that, because it was an opportunistic kind of thing well, if that was ever an advert to get something, you're never going to get something, you're never going to get better than that.
Speaker 1:That's a great choice, I mean you have to have Pete Antonio following you around, which is obviously a little bit restrictive in terms of how practical it is.
Speaker 3:He's going to be busy after this podcast.
Speaker 1:Yeah, he's doing a tour at the moment. He's in the US doing a tour with his psychic comedian piece and I was trying to talk to him the other day and I'm always trying to play it down because I don't want him to feel too stressed about it but then I'm like how mad is that?
Speaker 2:Like you're doing a tour in America.
Speaker 3:Yeah, that's great. Yeah, well, that's a great choice and leads us, very sadly, onto your last trick so what did you put in your eighth spot?
Speaker 1:so so this one is a bit of a bit of a weird one, um, as have they all been, I think. Um, and it's kind of maybe 50, 50, maybe one thing, maybe another, and it is um, a trick that I learned a while ago called Fatalia, which is an Ian Rowland piece Rowland Ian Rowland, who everybody knows, an incredible mentalist, mentalism performer, really great thinker, some incredible work, and Fatalia is a piece that he has in which you create the illusion that you are the world's best gambling cheat. Like card handler. You can do all of this kind of stuff, and it's hard to talk about what I like about it without talking about the method, but without going into too much of it. It is a great example of rolling with what the situation is.
Speaker 1:The method is largely bluff. It is an exercise in taking what you are served and using that to adjust the procedure of what you're doing to create an incredible outcome. And the name Thetalia means the talk is all. The core method is not like a card slight method. It is like a verbal method that you link in with this sort of quite simple, actual, physical method for the trick. And it's incredible and the reason why I wanted to include it is I've not performed it as much as I should, but when I was learning it it's almost like playing when you're practicing it. You have to practice it a lot so that you can understand how to create this outcome of having, like, all of the cards arranged the way that you need them to be. Um, but it's almost like playing solitaire. It's the closest thing to a magic trick solitaire puzzle.
Speaker 1:So I so I would take Thetalia for my own entertainment, because I've performed it for myself probably 100 times more than I've ever performed it for anyone else and it's really interesting. But the other thing that I would say is like 50-50 with that, for a very similar reason is that I would say is like 50-50 with that for a very similar reason is that I started learning to perform magic with a tarot deck and I'm sure you've played around with tarot a lot and that, like building spreads from that and using I like Enrique Enriquez's sort of interpretation method of looking at the pictures and then building narratives from that has got I've discovered as I've been practicing that got a very similar vibe to Thetalia. So I think I probably would take a tarot deck with me, because I'm convinced that there is a crossover between those two, that there's almost like a cold reading aspect of Thetalia and I think with a tarot deck there's a an interesting variation on that. So one of those two, or both of them in a box I'll.
Speaker 3:I'll let you have both because, from what I see, the talia is the method, not the item, so you can take whatever item you want you can.
Speaker 1:You could definitely do the talia with a um, with a tarot deck, but it will be pretty Well. Maybe that's how I could just include a trick that doesn't exist in the hope that it will give me something to do on this island. That's it. Fatali with a tarot deck is my trick to take with me because it doesn't exist, and I think it will keep me busy for a while.
Speaker 3:Well, it's a great choice.
Speaker 1:It's one that I've not actually heard of. I have just researched it. As you were talking, I remember showing it to John Carey and he was like I'm not sure about that. And then, when he watched it, he messaged me later and was like I've just been doing this Thetalia thing for like days now.
Speaker 3:Well, that's one that I'll be looking forward to. I'm sure that everyone else who hasn't heard of it will be checking out as well. But let's quickly revisit your list before we go on to your last three things. So we started with Tiny Hand, Interfork Bending, then Mental Yarn, Inexplicable Thrift Store Find yes, nailed it, you got it. Key Master Twisting the Aces, Hands Off, Slash Alpha's Deck, I put there. And Tartaglia what an interesting list. I wonder how many people got on Phil Smith Bingo.
Speaker 1:That would be quite a good set. That would I reckon. You could do that top to bottom and that would be quite a good fun. It's a bit of a journey.
Speaker 3:It would be into what would your opener, be in your closer? No, it's that in that order.
Speaker 1:It would be in that order. In that order. Yeah, A tiny hand straight into metal bending. I think that the tarot was the finish. I think that the tarot was the finish. The tarot is like hands-off is a great finish. That was essentially the conclusion. And then what you then do would be like pour some whiskey and then you do tarot for like half an hour.
Speaker 3:Yeah, that's great. Well, I think it's a great set of tricks and I love that there is a Satalia there for us to get sunk into, if we've not heard of that, but it does bring us onto the banishment. So, phil, you get to banish something from our industry. What are you going to banish?
Speaker 1:It's got to be what normally is my guilty pleasure but I've gone off it a bit is Magic Beef. I've seen too much Magic Beef. I'm sick of going on the Magic Cafe and seeing things being eclipsed by magic beef. I think that, like what we do as magicians and as entertainers and thinkers or writers or whatever aspect people have in the world of magic, is interesting and within our lives, obviously it's important. It's important to me, but what you do is important to you Otherwise you wouldn't do it but at the same time, there's plenty of room for everybody, I think, and sometimes people get a little bit like backbiting, like horses in a stable. They'll just get the ass with each other other and I want to leap in and be like what, what are you doing? Like, I think, perhaps a lot of the time. Yeah, there's.
Speaker 1:There's things that I see crop up where people end up like having to go with each other and there's weird machinations and stuff happening. I find very frustrating, um, and I don't think it's particularly positive for magic and I don't think it looks great. If somebody's all getting into magic and coming in and looking at it and that's what they see going on the magic cafe doesn't necessarily encourage people to start coming up with their own ideas, or start like sticking their neck out because they know that they might get stepped on by somebody who's just inexplicably got the ass with them, um sorry, got the hump with them yeah, no, I think you're absolutely right, but I will admit, when you first started talking about that and you said magic beef, I did think that maybe there was a new genre of magic, like the floating steak that I just completely missed out on maybe that's why I don't want to get rid of magic beef.
Speaker 1:I want it to be that. Yeah, yeah, yeah, oh yeah, so yeah, can we swap magic beef over so that, instead of it's people arguing on the magic cafe, it's uh, yeah it's a hamburger.
Speaker 3:Yeah, that's great. I mean, we've spoken about it quite a few times and I think it will be a banishment that we hear of quite a bit, but I do always remember the that it's. I guess it's quite a corny trope, but, um, it's, extinguishing someone else's candle doesn't make yours burn any brighter, and I think it's very true. Like putting someone else down, it doesn't make anything better for you no, not really.
Speaker 1:I, yeah, you want to measure yourself against the entire rest of the world or your own development, rather than I don't know, like some rando.
Speaker 3:Yeah, just do what makes you happy I think that's the most important thing and don't get caught up. I think it's about surrounding yourself with the right people as well. I really do believe that we're in an industry which is small enough that you can find your core group of people that you trust and you can speak to, and as long as you're surrounding yourself with those good people, I think you'll always be in a better position.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and I'm sure everybody has got that. You've got all the people that you've got, like you, you, you know, are the people, all the people that I've mentioned so far, who are like invaluable p antonio, john watson, luke, hennessey, roxana, um and luch, who, you know, you mentioned earlier. You know, you, you've got to have, uh, you've got to have some trusted people, haven't you, who hopefully aren't going to start beef with you because they'll let you know rather than go and put you on blast on the cafe.
Speaker 3:Yeah, well, I think that that is banished. Magic beef floating steaks are gone.
Speaker 1:Get out of here beef.
Speaker 3:Now that does bring us to your book. So what did you put in your book position?
Speaker 1:My book is Ahead of the Pack by um jack avis and lewis jones, which is my favorite magic book in the world, um, and I'm I don't think it's available anymore. So there you go, guys. I'm just actually trying to push the price of it on ebay up. It's, um. What I like about it is it's essentially these two guys, lewis jones andis who both of them now unfortunately are not with us would have a regular meetup and they would take a trick or a routine or something that they were interested in and they would figure out an easier, better, stronger way of doing it, or they would put restrictions on it, like how would you do monkey in the middle from a regular deck of cards, or you know things like that. And what I liked about it was the structure of it is very nice.
Speaker 1:It just purely in terms of it being a book, um, and it's something that I've kind of leaned on when I'm producing my own work and also try and like throw towards a little bit in terms of how it's constructed and laid out when I'm doing work on other people's books, cause I think it's like the optimum way of doing it, um, but it also the idea that solving problems in magic was obviously there like a fun thing for them to do, which is proved to be for me as well, and I'm sure for you that sometimes you'll sit down at the end of the day having done a load of work and a little part of you be like right now I'm going to crack this, we're going to I'll find the right method. You know a great presentation. I'll solve this bit here that I wasn't sure about and it's a kind of it's a almost like a really strong magic that these two guys have like whittled down to be as doable as possible and, like I said before, most of the time I used to perform from a regular shuffle deck of cards and most of them are doable from that. But it was the, it was the first magic book that I thought.
Speaker 1:You know, this is. This is great and I really enjoy it. So, yeah, it's, it's got to be that.
Speaker 3:Well, thankfully this podcast goes out after I talk to you about it, which means I can get that book before everyone else tries to get hold of it.
Speaker 1:Snap it up on eBay if you can.
Speaker 3:I don't know why.
Speaker 1:It's just an hour of print. I don't know why. There's nothing I can do about it.
Speaker 3:And it does lead us to your last item. So what is your non-magic item that you would take?
Speaker 1:I think it's going to have to be a massive box of forks, very cheap forks from I would have said Wilco's. Back in the day you used to go on Wilco's and now Wilco's is gone. What am I going to do? B&m?
Speaker 3:Yeah, b&m. What am I going to do?
Speaker 1:b&m, yeah, b&m, yeah, yeah range, or you could find a magic retailer that has a specific fork design for fork bending.
Speaker 3:I don't know who that could be, um, but yeah, I think that's absolutely true.
Speaker 1:Now, you actually did mention that you would have your wife, uh, with you during the first trick as well so you've actually snuck your wife on there with you that's converted it from an emergency situation where I'm stranded on an island to a protracted and extended holiday where I can just put my feet up.
Speaker 3:Yeah well, I think that's a great list. We've gone from tiny hand fork bending, mental yarn, inexplicable thrift store find yes, key master, twist in the aces, hands off alpha's deck. Um thitalia, your banishment is magic beef, your book is ahead of the pack and your item is forks. What a great list, one that I don't think anyone was planning on at all yeah, that was good fun putting that together.
Speaker 1:Yeah, there's a few interesting ones to revisit.
Speaker 3:Yeah, well, it was great, and if anyone wants to find out more about you, phil, where can they go?
Speaker 1:Probably the best bet is to go to my website, philsmithcreativecom, and sign up for my newsletter. I've been going off social media Facebook and Instagram and things like that because if I post something on there unless I pay them a lot of money, no one sees it, Whereas if I send an email to my email list, everybody who's on my email list gets it, and then they can email me back and I'll definitely see it. So I think that that's the best place. Philsmithcreativecom.
Speaker 3:And if people wanted to find a tarot deck, that would be perfect for Thetalia, where could they go for one of those? The same place maybe.
Speaker 1:Yeah, we did my Mark Tarot, bounika Tarot last year. That was good fun, but that's why I've been spending a lot of time. I never used a Mark deck before we came up with the Elites. I never really used an Al mark deck before we came up with the um elites. I never really used alphabet tech before we came to the alphas. I've never spent a lot of time with tarot um until now and just been fascinated kind of digging into it and figuring out how to put it to use.
Speaker 3:Yeah, good times well, do go check that out. And do go check out his website, because it's full of just amazing stuff. And do check out his version of the his website, because it's full of just amazing stuff. And do check out his version of the Magic Square, because it's very clever and goodness knows how it was put together. But thank you so much, phil, for your time. Thanks for having me, jamie, it's been really good. We're going to be back next week with another episode of this, so for now, have a great week. Goodbye.
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