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
Noel Qualter
What makes a magic trick truly unforgettable? For Noel Qualter, it's creating moments that make spectators exclaim, "That's the weirdest, craziest thing I'll remember for a long time!" This philosophy has guided his remarkable career from three-time originality award winner to fooling Penn & Teller.
In this captivating conversation, Noel opens up about co-founding Trick Trick Boom with Roddy McGhie, a company dedicated to producing magic that breaks free from convention. Their first release, Mini Book Pro, exemplifies this approach – a miniature laptop impossibly transforming into a signed card – and has rapidly become a modern classic that professional magicians worldwide have embraced.
Noel's desert island selections reveal the mind of an innovator who values theatrical presentation as much as methodology. From Jon Allen's Destination Box (a twenty-year workhorse in his repertoire) to his newest creation Bandit (which solves the age-old problem of vanishing folded objects in an interesting and fooling way), each choice demonstrates his commitment to practical, memorable magic.
The conversation takes unexpected turns as Noel shares his creative process, including his technique of pausing magic product trailers before the full premise is revealed to spark original ideas. He delivers strong opinions about mentalism (spoiler: he's not a fan) while championing "mental magic" with clear, visual impact. His journey from being cut from Fool Us to eventually fooling Penn & Teller years later offers an inspiring glimpse into persistence and creative evolution.
Whether you're a professional performer looking for fresh material, a magic enthusiast curious about innovative approaches, or simply fascinated by creative thinking, Noel's insights will transform how you view the art of impossible. Check out tricktrickboom.com to discover the offbeat, unforgettable magic this unique creator continues to develop.
Noel’s Desert Island Tricks:
- Minibook Pro
- Destination Box
- Band-It!
- Benson Burner
- Glyphs
- Card Tricks are Extinct
- Cylinder and Coins
- WZRD
Banishment. Mentalism
Book. Daemon Magic Catalogue
Item. iPad
Find out more about the creators of this Podcast at www.alakazam.co.uk
I I've been on Fool Us years before. I've certainly filmed for it and for various different reasons that got cut and I was filmed for the very first episode. In fact, johnny Thompson, I was the very first person that Johnny Thompson offered a position on Fool Us to to be one of the contestants. That's a great story, right up to the moment I get cut. Then we fast forward. I think it was 10 years and then I had met Johnny Thompson, maybe at a session convention, and I showed him the trick and he was like, oh my God, you've got to do Fool Us. And I said, oh, yeah, no, I'd love to, I'd love to.
Speaker 1:After the convention I sent an email to Johnny Thompson Now he was a man in his senior years at that time and I said hey, johnny, can you put in a word for me, because you really like the I was hoping for in the email that I was cc'd into. Jolly's email said hello producers, I'd like to introduce you to noel qualter, who was on the show before or filmed for it before, but was cut anyway. He's got another trick. He'd like to tell you about it, but now he was a brilliant magician and a lovely man, but I remember that time thinking, ah now, now I just I do, I just look like I've asked my friends to ask them out. Really, he hasn't really helped to sway the opinion. It was mild endorsement.
Speaker 3:Hello and welcome to another episode of Desert Island Tricks. We have another guest waiting in the wings the virtual wings here, and I say virtual because he is a big fan of all things virtual. In fact, he loves tech-related magic and is a dab hand with AI now as well. So today's guest is a distinguished member of the inner magic circle with gold star fancy fancy. He actually won the originality award three times consecutively and received the cecil lyre award in 2018. In 2021, he fooled pen and teller fancy again.
Speaker 3:He's a magic consultant, or has been a magic consultant, for tv shows like cbbc's help my supplier, teachers magic and bbc3's killer magic consultant, or has been a magic consultant for TV shows like CBBC's Help, my Supply, teachers Magic and BBC Three's Killer Magic, which we've spoken about both of those shows on the podcast before. He's also performed at the Magic Circle and, like I said, he actually debuted his show, tech Tricks, which was a tech themed magic show, at the Edinburgh International Magic Festival. Now he also has a company called Trick Trick Boom and we have spoken about Trick Trick Boom and hopefully we'll get into a bit today and he shared that with or he shares that company with Roddy. Now, if you haven't listened to Roddy's episode, go back, listen to it. It's very, very good. But today's guest is a very, very funny man, so I'm sure this is going to be a very interesting quirky episode. So today's guest, of course, is Mr Noel Quarter. Hello Noel, hello Jamie, you put petty to shame.
Speaker 1:That is ridiculous. Thank you very much for all the sweet things.
Speaker 3:But how did you find putting your list together? And have we got any Noel trick, trick, boom tricks in there?
Speaker 1:Yeah, do you know what? There's definitely a bit of boom in there. There's a couple of outliers. How did I find it? The answer is easier than Roddy. So, yeah, I just sort of banged it around a little bit. I'm easily distracted, which we both have in common, me and Roddy. So some things I knew straight away were going to be in, and then some things I was like you know what? There's things I do all the time, but I'm also I do them all the time, so I don't need to do them again. I'm also, I do them all the time, so I don't need to do them again.
Speaker 3:I'm good. Well, we've had some amazing Null Quarter tricks over the years. I remember Alarmed I had Alarmed when that first came out. I thought, it was absolutely superb, great trick, and I also had the one that I should know the name of iDEC.
Speaker 3:Yeah, idec, which was brilliant, and it had the headphones. Any newbies headphones used to have wires on mental uh, but the wire used to connect to the deck in a really cool way. So let's talk about very, very briefly we don't normally do it, but we have you here so we might as well let's talk about Trick, trick Boom and let's talk about your development of the company and the tricks that you're sort of trying to put out and develop.
Speaker 1:Oh, thank you. So we've been going for just shy of two years. It's me and Roddy McGee who is my teller. He's the genius and I'm sort of a mouthpiece, but he's the genius. So we put out we've actually released four tricks, but we've made a bunch more which have only been available at Blackpool and Magic Live and, like our thing, there's plenty of sort of magic production companies.
Speaker 1:Our gimmick will be that it will all be offbeat magic and slightly weirder stuff, and maybe so maybe it might be a classic magic trick with a fun novel presentation, or it might just be pretty out there weird anyway, because I think magic is more understanding of weirder stuff now. And if you want to learn 12 variations of triumph, there's lots of monthly things you can sign up to. So you've got all that covered. But if you want something a bit weird and I always want with all of our releases that someone you know is going to show that trick to friends, co-workers, wives, the guys at the pub, whatever it is, and they want them to say do you know what? I've seen a lot of magic from you, gary, but that is the weirdest crazy. That's something I'll remember for a long time and that's memorable magic. All card tricks roll together. All coin tricks roll together, unless something sets them apart. That's what we're looking to do.
Speaker 3:Well, I think you've achieved that already and, like I say, seeing some of the things that you're putting together and trying to produce are phenomenal. They are going to be.
Speaker 1:We've gone straight to put the rocket behind. It is the sort of plan, anyway, because it's always this thing. Being a creator is one thing, and I've been doing it on and off for 20 years. Every so often when I could be motivated to finish a project, roddy can't stop creating, um. I mean, we spoke to him today and I know we will have created a trick. Um, so, um, so that's that's always, uh, good news. But then putting all the pieces together, uh, of the work, the promotion, speaking to factories and all the other things and the numbers Like I didn't get into this for a real job, and sometimes some elements does feel like a real job, but we know that the things we've got coming are just absolutely ridiculous. So a couple of things that even big magic shops would go wow, why didn't we think of that? Not just novel fun tricks. So some pretty gigantic things to come from us.
Speaker 3:Well, there's a tease, if ever there was one, all right, so let's get into your episode. So, if this is the first time that you've joined us, the idea is that we're about to Maroon Noel on his 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 did he get there all of that good stuff? We do not mind, it's in noel's own imagination. So, with that being said, no, let's find out what you put in position number one great.
Speaker 1:Um, I'm going to start off where Roddy stopped and mention, unsurprisingly, minibook, which was the first Trick to the Boom release, and I'm going to sound full dealer now. It has absolutely been unbelievable, I'd say, in the last couple of decades. There are a few tricks that have immediately got into people's repertoire. The professional magicians and things like double cross didn't really exist. Extreme burn put a new spin on easy money. Those things you know came around around the same time, early sort of 2000s, and they have put a rocket behind those tricks. Many bookies like that in that. So many people do this now professionally Amateurs. It has just changed everything.
Speaker 1:For us, it means that I'd say that most magicians in the world would have boom. I know who they are. They're the guys with the laptop trick. It is a signature trick for us and, yeah, I love performing it. I love trick for us. And, um, yeah, it's, I love performing it, I love Deming it, I, there's so many things to get excited about with it. And he gets I mean, I don't repeat all the same stuff as Roddy, although, that said, I'm quite happy to if it means we sell some more.
Speaker 1:Um, it is stunningly strong trick and it gets insane reactions. It gets insane reactions. It's um, and it's unlike what he said. It was sort of, you know, it's kind of carted bottle location. I, I, I think, I think it's.
Speaker 1:It's a transformation trick Really. Um, it's um, uh, assigned card, uh, you know, a metal laptop becomes assigned card and um, and so even if you are doing card or bill or something to a boss or location, this isn't the same kind of vibe to it. It is that object has transformed amazingly and, as Roddy said, it is misdirection-themed, something that scares a lot of magicians. But when you do a misdirection-related trick, and if you think, when you first do a top change, there's a little bit of joy. When you're like, oh, my god, I can't believe I've got away this slight hand, there's a bit of misdirection and motivation and all those other things. When you first do a trick and it accomplished with misdirection you have earned it is, it's not hard to do, but the reactions, um, are unbelievable. So it's, that is the. That is the biggest joy with the uh, with the trip. For me is knowing that it's all things are controlled, uh, you've got this motivated action and then suddenly we've got this phenomenal uh finish.
Speaker 3:So, um, yeah, mini book I will be going with lots and lots of refills, um, to do it for the, for nobody who's on the on the island, but it's definitely, it's definitely coming with me yeah, I think it's a good, good choice for number one because I think it sort of exemplifies what we've got to know you for now, which is workable routines that are made for not just hobbyists but workers as well. Quirky and something a bit offbeat and out there about it and clever, just a really really clever routine and clever thought. So how did you come up with the concept of mini book pro? How was that something that came about?
Speaker 1:So I had a gig for Samsung, I think, and they said and let's hope they never listen to this, because I did a gig for Samsung and I said I'd do some custom magic for them and they were keen, but not keen enough to actually pay me a lot of money. So I said, all right, I'll try. Basically, I'll try a little bit. And my plan was going to be I had seen these little dollhouse laptops before and I thought I'll buy one. I'll print a sticker at home of something that I will use digital force bag to produce, something that I will use digital force bag to produce, and on the back I will put a little sticker that I'll laser cut a little Samsung sticker and put it in the back of the laptop and say this is the new Samsung laptop that's got advanced AI and yada, yada, yada. And then suddenly it's got a picture of Donald Trump on the laptop something like that and that was the plan.
Speaker 1:And I thought you know what? I'll produce it from my iPad, which I've done similar things to that, in fact, that's largely what I professionally do. So I was going to do that. And then I bought one laptop. It was a plastic one. I said, oh, it's all right, it's okay, but it's a bit small, bit too small. And then I looked online and I seen the um, uh, silver ones and there's, I think the exact same one we've got are. You can get them in different colors. And I and I bought the silver one and when it came I put in my hand and I I remember that moment I think I was at.
Speaker 1:I was at the Magic Circle and I was with Simon Lipkin of the Alica fam and Preston Nyman and some other people and we were all chatting and I remember having the laptop in my pocket and I went wait a minute, that's the same size as a folded card. And to me I thought, well, I've got all the pieces in the puzzle. There was nothing like, as a magician, you go. Well, I know how I would produce the rest of it If you know that these two things look the same and you go. That's remarkable. I remember telling I think it was Preston and with like the excited, like, oh my God, oh my God, oh my God, oh my God, and he's just looking like cool bro, like just because because some of the I sometimes think that people like sort of peep show can get inside of your head and go and see through my eyes.
Speaker 2:It's like why does he?
Speaker 1:why does he not understand that this is absolutely epic? So yeah, that was the sort of start of that. Then quickly got some simple samples and then me and Roddy started talking about it. This is before Trichet Boom, when he was still with Penguin, but banging ideas around for the routine, and then it grew from there.
Speaker 3:Well, I think it's a great trick and a great choice in at number one and leads us into number two. So what did you put in your second spot?
Speaker 1:I am going to go with John Allen's Terrific Destination Box. I imagine you've had that before. It is a. I must have done that, that box thousands and thousands, I mean for 20 years, even before I did it, before even John sold the boxes he taught it on. Spectators Don't Exist and I made up a box and I have done it with pretty much that same box, cheating John out of some money by not actually buying the box. But I've done it with the same box for over 20 years and I've done it tens of thousands of times and it has it's paying the mortgage. It is absolutely the workhorse there was.
Speaker 1:So there's so many strong moments in magic, but there is something about that trick that ticks every single possible box and when, uh, when punters come to think about the, the methods of magic tricks and and there is, there are so many clever bits in it that will close you off from working out the method and it is a feature and all you know anyone's concerned. I've heard people in the past say I don't want to walk around with a box. That's a feature, that's a great thing, what you know punters saying what have you got? What's the box about? What have you got in there. It's you got in there. There are no weaknesses to it. And I remember for years and years and years it was always my closure and the only reason I do it less now is because of the iPad stuff and it's weird to be the box and the iPad guy. It's just too many things to carry. But it was just a straight, close-up gig, absolutely a destination box, and it destroys people.
Speaker 1:When I didn't have it, I think I forgot it for two gigs in about a 20-year period and I remember having the sweats. I'm also deeply unfit and overweight, but it could have been that as well. But I was just so anxious I thought, oh my God, what am I going to do? I have to have this trick. I remember thinking I'll quickly go and knock up, I'll go to the corner shop and see what I can buy. That would approximate the trick. I was sick with worry. But yeah, no, it is an absolute barnstormer.
Speaker 3:So why did you go for destination books, in terms of all of the versions of that kind of trick that are out there? What was it about destination box?
Speaker 1:because, like you said, we have had it a few times on the podcast, so it'd be interesting to know why it was that particular version you went for I think I like the fact that it is a statement piece and, like I said before, that, um, that is the kind of thing that people will be a little bit. One of the reasons why people get funny about buying it is because it is a great big lump it is. You know, it's a you can put in a jacket pocket, but then you're a guy with a box in his pocket and it's a. That's a weird look like. I'd quite happily carry it from table to table. It's absolutely fine because it is the clothes that I would use and it's so strong Lots of other things that are out there but what makes them the strength as a magical consumable?
Speaker 1:We'll use Kennedy box or paper clipped or or a million other clear boxes and all those other things. They're all phenomenal and I have used, if not all of them, pretty close to all of them. I have dabbled with all of them. But the difference is that they aren't statement pieces, they are. They are something you can say. And now let me introduce you this to this and it is a smaller item, so I think it plays bigger by the size of it, also, without getting into method, because you can change the moment with that trick. All the other ones rely on it being a one momentmoment trick. This is a two-moment trick and I'm a big fan of that as a method thing to change to have if you, rather than doing one sneaky thing, do two smaller sneaky things and that is a devastating tool to use.
Speaker 3:Well, I think it's another very good choice, another heavy hitter as well, but we do have two sort of car to impossible location things going on here, yeah.
Speaker 1:so I'm not sure if we're going to get any more of those this may be, I don't think that is also the best, uh, the best trick. Um, it's uh, uh, the themes impossible location. In fact, our item number three is themed in that world, in that universe well, let's find out.
Speaker 3:You sort of sne sneaked in there as a little tease. So what did you put in number three?
Speaker 1:Yeah, we're in the Cart Impostor Location cinematic universe where all things are sort of slightly related, which is item number three, is a new release from Trick Trick Boom. Won't all be Trick Trick Boom, which is Bandit, which is something we released a couple of weeks ago, and apart from, obviously, the dirty dealer who wants to shill his own stuff, I genuinely absolutely adore this trick and from the moment of me and Roddy creating this, which was, I mean, a game for two years ago when we had it at Blackpool 24, so we had the whole thing worked out long before that, it was being on such a journey that, as well as like it was good when we had it at Blackpool 2024 and it was a limited release, it was only available at the stand and since then every you know, seemingly every there was another huge breakthrough and I filmed. We had the instructions already done. I filmed great big chunks of them all over again because of the huge breakthroughs we'd had with the trip. What I haven't done is give you a synopsis of what happens.
Speaker 2:We didn't do any of them, but we got the rough idea.
Speaker 1:Mini book wooden box. Card appears inside the wooden box, the destination box. So Bandit is a vanish. So it is my contention that there are lots of ways to vanish, not lots, several ways to vanish a small folded up object like a folded card or a banknote. And I think that all of them are a bit rubbish, for various different reasons Not all of them and some of them are situationally poor. So, for example, you could do a full transfer. You could use a thumbtip, you could put under a hanky it's a devil's hanky type thing. All right, granddad, um, you could, um, flash paper. Uh, no fire in the venue. Uh, you could. Um, uh, you could put into an envelope. Maybe it's all. There's lots of uh things.
Speaker 1:And if you do card or banknotes to post a location, I think every magician, certainly if magic is your thing, you have done or wanted to do that trick since the early days of getting into magic. If you watch a TV magic special, this thing disappears and it reappears, dug 10 feet in the ground, locked in a concrete box. All of that good stuff. You can now do TV magic with Bandit. So what actually happens is you get if it's a card trick, you get them to sign a card. You do all the fun stuff you want to with the sign card. You get them to fold it up into quarters. You then put it into a clear little plastic bag and they can see it all the time time. So it really is inside there. You drop it in the box, you show them that you can see it, that they can see in the box. You put a rubber band around it on one side. Um, you shake it, they can hear it's inside the box. You put another rubber band around it. You can shake it, they can hear it's inside the box. Uh, you give them the box. You say, pop it inside of your pocket and then two seconds later, um, you've got that and you can put it anywhere you like. So all of the boxes that pete settles, all those funky things, um, we also have lots of um, several great routines that don't require any other bits and pieces.
Speaker 1:But that is a trick that when you, as well as having killer actions and all that good stuff that you'd expect from a magic trick, the most important thing is it is joyful to practice, and I've, even though I've been, I do gigs, even though I do it and I've demned it thousands of times at Magic Legends the last sort of year and a half. The most important thing for me is it's still fun to do at home and to practice it and I just love doing it. If you've ever you know, I imagine only a handful of people listening have worked behind the stand at a magic convention, but it's exhausting and you get to learn those magic tricks intimately in a matter of hours and even if you had any issues with them, that is by noon. You are a machine and you probably don't want to think about that trick much in between demonstrations because you know the thing inside out With Bandit.
Speaker 1:I still absolutely love going. Do you know what? Let's have a little bit of a go. If I've got some time to kill, if I'm just fiddling, I just love doing it.
Speaker 3:It's such a clever trick and it's such a fooling trick and I think when you did it, I think you did it in the shop early last year and there's a moment where you think you know, you think you know what's happening and then you get to see the box and that is when your brain melts um, and it's the fact that the card is put inside. See, normally when we think about this sort of trick, the revelation is where there's one thing inside another, so maybe it's the nest of wallets or even destination box, right, but you never tend to have a card where it's placed inside one thing and then inside another thing in order to make it vanish and have that level of fairness in the procedure and then to band the box up as well. I think all of those layers and those levels that you've put in there really mean that it must fall the pants off of everyone I remember doing this is a bit of ego, but a magic live last year, um uh.
Speaker 1:So magic life, if you don't know, is a huge convention that happens in las vegas and it's sort of the we'll call it fancy Blackpool and it is. There's way less people that go to it, but because it's in Vegas, there are. The standard of magicians is phenomenal, whereas Blackpool will tend to have. You know, all of us will be there, but there will be the booked acts and there won't be that many other people. You're either a booked act that is well-known in magic, for whatever reason it is, and then a load of everyday folk who love magic that are there. Magic Life seems to be insane that you can't tell the punters and the booked acts are the same. They're just all phenomenal magicians.
Speaker 1:I remember being behind the stand. You know there's so-and-so from that book, or there's that guy from the DVD series, or there's that guy that's got his own, you know headlines his Vegas show, and I remember showing it to Stephen Bogatsi, who's a brilliant comedy magician and who's been doing it for decades and doing magic for decades, and I've got a feeling I don't know for sure, but I know Archer pretty well and they've got similarities. They're not people who are rushing to a magic dealer to buy new stuff. And Stephen loved it and the rest of the weekend or the rest of the week, he just dragged every well-known pro over to watch the thing and he just dragged every well-known pro over to watch the thing and he just stood like five feet behind sniggering and laughing that everyone had just had the pants fallen off them and that is, uh, you know, just a real kick to be able to do it.
Speaker 1:Um, so, yeah, what those moments and like you said normally these tricks you are, you have, uh, the vanish is what I call an apology vanish. So it is and look, it's vanished. And you see nothing like like just a light smile from the people and you never mind that. Look inside my wallet, inside an envelope inside, and then they go wow, and then you get a great reaction. But you know what? There's?
Speaker 1:There's two parts to that trick. If something vanishes in your bare hands, that should be unbelievably strong. And if you then think something that they are absolutely certain, you could say to them how much money do you bet that you still have the banknote or the card? And they would say all the money in the world, I'm absolutely certain I have it. So when that thing vanishes, the reactions you get are every bit as good as you will get at the end of the routine.
Speaker 1:And that is the. You know, knowing that you've almost banked hysteria already, and you think I don't even know where it's going to appear. It's going to. You know, in a box, in a grapefruit, in a block of ice. You know, across the street, mailed to them three days later, anything you want it to be and that's to come. That is the exciting thing. Oh, and one more thing you can use Switchbox and you can also switch out stuff if you want to do like a bill revelation, and you can even do that dirty mentalism that you're so very fond of. So you can go and peek it. You can do all that stuff. So, yeah, I love it. I don't know if I made that clear enough. I do.
Speaker 3:And it has one of the best trailers that I think I've seen in ages. So please go and watch the trailer, because it's worth it just for that.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah, it was an absolute hoot doing the trailer, and then the absolute chaos. And do you know what? When we're finished here, I'm going to upload to the Trickster Boom YouTube the outtakes video, which is equally worth watching and is absolute carnage. As you'll see, there was a little bit of AI used and we got great results, but the stuff that wasn't great is equally brilliant, in hysterical and terrible ways.
Speaker 3:Well, that's something that I'm going to be watching after this, then that's good. But, yeah, do go check out Bandit and check out the Trader. It's very, very good, but it does lead us to number four. So what was in your fourth position?
Speaker 1:So this is a weird one. So I listened to Archer's podcast and Archer introduced me to a new technique to subvert things, which is tricks I'm not going to do but I bloody love. And if I get to spend all this time on a desert island, I want to do it. And that is Tom Stone's Benson Burner routine, which, if you don't know it is a Benson Bowl routine. Routine which, if you don't know it is a Benson bowl routine. And if you don't know a Benson bowl routine which is, I imagine, a lot of you it is slightly similar to a sort of a chop cup routine, but you're doing it with a metal bowl and slightly might have some ice cream in. That's what I always assume all bowls are used for. And then you do several phases of magical routines with routines with a uh where a ball in tom's routine it's a sponge ball disappears, reappears, um, and does all that good stuff where it is uh, vanishing and reproducing underneath the bowl under impossible conditions, very magical, very visual. And then where tom's trick ends, uh is normally you'd have a final load. A big thing is there and Tom does have a big thing, but it's a big thing that is unbelievable where seemingly hundreds of sponge balls come out of this bowl, hundreds and hundreds filling the stage, sweeping everywhere, I imagine, sweeping out to sea and never to be seen again for me on the island, the island. But, oh my god, I have seen that trick so many times and tom is a friend and he's a brilliant magician and everything he does is fantastic and I could have picked any of his routines. But, um, what, just watching, watching that trick, it's also got something that I don't have in any way and I think it'd be on the as soon as I've got eternity on this uh, desert island. Um, I could blooming well practice all close-up magicians. So I, I'm gonna. It's a slight sort of uh, detour close-up magicians.
Speaker 1:If you do predominantly card tricks, most of the card magic you do will be with your elbows welded to the side of your body. And if you do coin magic, you've got a little bit more flair. You see them sort of move. They've got a bit of grace. They're moving around because there's a thin secret with a lot of coin magic, so they've got to move, they've got to stick and move. So you see a lot of card magic. It's stiff and they don't move around, and coin magic they do.
Speaker 1:But that is also true of Tom's routine, the energy and the focus, which is also method related. But when Tom Stone, they would say if the magician looks at something, then he will guide how the spectators look at it. It's never truer than when Tom Stone looks at something because he has got a terrifying gaze. When that man looks at the object at the bowl, everybody looks and the movement he's just. It's phenomenal misdirection, the routine, like there is with everything he does he has got, and just his movement, his stagecraft, his presence, everything is a lesson. So also the sunshine will dry out the sponge balls very quickly, as I imagine I'll have to wash them out regularly. But yeah, I can't see myself doing it because I do not have. I don't have. I do feel weird guilt about too much movement in a magic trick. I think that's just I spent too too much time doing closeup magic and, you know, even occasionally doing sort of standup spots.
Speaker 3:I'm just a man welded to the spot and I think we could all it all needs to be a little bit more, get a little bit more fizz, move around more are you someone who, so, like you said, you probably wouldn't do this kind of trick, but are you someone who would try and find a way to make this suit you in some way?
Speaker 1:yeah, I have thought about it. So I mean, uh one, I have thought about it, I thought, is there an ipaddy way of doing it? And um, and I've sort of uh, sort of got some sort of thoughts on that, because, the truth is, the thing I love most is the finish. I think that you know I like Benson Bowl routines, but I certainly didn't have any desire, but that finish is phenomenal and memorable and you can see it on YouTube. You can see if Tom's ever live he often does it.
Speaker 1:It's a phenomenal trick. But if I could possibly find a way to make it work for me, it's got a healthy reset and I'm a man with plenty of spare time so I could do it, but that is the only thing. But if I've got all this time on the island, then if I've got a couple of hours between shows for the basketball or the football that's my audience then I'll definitely be able to reset it. So, no, it's an absolute beast of a routine, but I think if you watch that trick, you will remember it for a very, very long time.
Speaker 3:And I think a bowl would be very helpful on your island, which is good. You can have your porridge out of that or whatever you can eat.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, no, I'm not going to do to do. I've already worked out what I'm having on the desert island, because that was even when you said it even is. It's just a conceit for this thing. I immediately panicked and thought where am I getting toast and ribena from? But yeah, that's um. Um, I have to bring a blackcurrant bush as well as my, my additional item but it does lead us to number five.
Speaker 3:So what did you put in your fifth spot?
Speaker 1:this would be interesting without revealing methods. Uh, glyphs and I will give you a. A rough description of glyphs is, uh, it is the finish to a, to a routine, where something that is thought of appears written on a scrap of paper. Um, pretty much all we can say, isn't it really? But I've always loved that method and I explored it myself years and years ago with my own thing, and it is an excellent monster. And every time I think about that prop, I think of different ways to integrate and to use it. And it is, it's expensive, but it is a phenomenal tool. And, um, mustafa, who put it out, is a lovely guy and does, um, and create some really great stuff, but, yeah, it's. Is it a tool for everybody? This is the part where your menace is. For the pros, I never really got along with that thing, partly because I'm now a magic dealer and I realized that was a great lie. Um, and I'll gladly take anyone's money, but, um, it is a, a phenomenal trick. Um, if you, if you've got the money for it, I absolutely advise it. And, um, I'll give you a little routine that I'm not going to do, but I've thought about it a lot. And if you do have this or similar. This is a routine that gets away from it being mentalism, which is weird, but it's true. So I'll try and explain this without revealing too much.
Speaker 1:So you're going to do a chop cup routine and you say I've got something underneath this cup. I want you all to try and guess what it is. And then lots of people guess and you make a note of what their guesses are and you push them and you say it might be larger than the cup. Any ideas what it is? And you get some daft answers someone says a speedboat, someone says a salt cellar, somebody where you go, okay, great. And then you narrow down and one of those is chosen and then you say do you know what you're wrong? Um, it's, uh, you know. I said it might have been larger than the uh, than the cup. It might have been, but it wasn't. It's just a little yellow piece of paper.
Speaker 1:Then you do a chop that routine where, um, uh, that little scrap of paper reappears, disappears, vanishes underneath this cup in impossible uh conditions, and at the end, um, you produce, um, let's say, a lime and a lemon underneath the chop cup. And people go absolutely crazy and you say well, what was. You said at the beginning it would be. Uh, it'd be cool if there was a speedboat under there. Do you know what I'm going to try and do? A speedboat and you snap your fingers, nothing happens. Uh, you lift. Well, you lift up the cup and it's just the yellow ball there still. You try again, try again, and then it was aboat. And they pick up the piece of paper and they unfold it and it says speedboat on it. So now you've got a kicker finish to a one-cut routine that seems to make sense. It's still a magic trick and not a mentalism thing. And yeah, I'm not the chop-cut guy, but I think that's a fun novel routine.
Speaker 3:Well, now Noel Coulter, devil's advocate, is in the room, because you have just picked an item that is a utility item and you just mentioned that that routine. Had you said that is your go-to routine, I'd have let that go. But you said you don't do that routine and it's an idea, so you are only allowed to do one routine with your prop. What would that one routine be?
Speaker 1:Okay, I do a. Well, I know what I do with it. I do a word association game. It's interesting.
Speaker 1:I use technology with the ipad and, uh, always the concern is that will will one tell them half the method for another, and that's always my concern. So I want to try and make that as, uh, that line, um, impossible for them to connect one to the other. So I play a little game of word association, uh, so I say, um, let's say the event is in in London, at Talbridge, and I say, um, okay, we're gonna play a game of word association. I'm gonna write down London as my general word to start the thing off. And then the phone gets passed around and I say think of something that you connect with London. And then then, halfway through that little journey, I'll say you can interpret however you want, because I don't want them to constantly be in a circle of beefier London car park travel, congestion charge, but you can give them a nudge to go off in a more fun direction. And then they do, and at the end I say, whatever it is, I'll be able to generate that from the iPad. And then they come up with a weird object and I say, okay, look at the screen and say, siri, please generate a cast.
Speaker 1:Let's say, generate Tower Bridge. Let's say generate Tower Bridge. And then you see the iPad processing and doing boop, boop, boop, boop, boop, boop, boop, boop that's a technical term for lots of things flashing past and some eye tracking and some other good silly stuff and then at the end it goes ding, sorry, out of stock. I say, oh, so sorry, I owe you Tower Bridge. Honestly, I've got a voucher for you. That's a consolation. I'm going to pull out an envelope. So then on the screen you can see Outstop with a red sticker and an envelope. So they've got a voucher. I produce the envelope with the sticker on it and then there's a piece of paper inside and it says I owe you a Tower Bridge. No one else do that.
Speaker 3:That's mine, everyone else do. No, that's uh. I think that's great, that's a really good routine. And what's interesting is you earlier on you mentioned about sort of maybe you're not the biggest fan of mentalism, but it almost doesn't feel.
Speaker 1:I mean, it is a prediction, but it almost doesn't feel like a prediction well, I do love mental magic and I think that that's what that is, because I I think that, as weird as it is, you could do that trick and I could add layers to it. But I kind of like the fun bit certainly as a general close-up magician looking for laughs of playing the word association, because let's say you played it silently and you absolutely could Don't say anything. Shush, shush. Go over into the bathroom and think of what word you'd associate. You could do all that.
Speaker 1:The trick would be stronger but guess what? It would be tortuous for the audience of six minutes of confusion and just silence. But it's a lot more fun if somebody says, let's say, someone says I've had this before, In fact I said London and the next person immediately said Black Bogies, which is gross, but the rest of the group laughing a lot about the underground. I had to sort of steer them back into shape. But you lose that laugh and those weird moments if you don't have, if you don't, by making the presentation and making that a fun sort of journey that's shared and that's shared out loud makes it more fun, less strong as a mentalism trick, but more fun along the way.
Speaker 3:Well, I think it's a great presentation. I think that's really really fun and I would say, yeah, very no in terms of a presentation. I think that's really really fun and I would say, yeah, very null in terms of a presentation, but it does leave us to number six. What did you put in your sixth spot?
Speaker 1:Another trick, of mine, that's okay, I mean it's weird, isn't it?
Speaker 1:If there isn't enough ego involved in the fact that you're even asking me that I'm then topping off the icing sugar of my own creations. It's a trick that I think is largely invisible. Uh, in magic, for a couple of reasons, uh called card tricks are extinct. That I put out forever ago, um, and is an absolute banger, and I did it a lifetime ago with a member of the Alica fam, um, who uh did the design stuff for it, I don't know 15 years ago more. It's a brilliant, brilliant, brilliant trick. And I say that there is ego with that and it's weird to say that about your own stuff. But I mean it is great. But it's also so achingly simple and it might be, I think, my favourite trick I've ever come up with, because it is a very simple plot. The plot is this Someone chooses If you want to do all the fun stuff I do I talk about car tricks are dying out because people aren't coming up with car tricks, which certainly at Magic Convention is a ridiculous novelty, as they're everywhere like rats. But with this you say people aren't coming up with car tricks, they're trying to run an appeal, they're trying to generate some interest in putting some money towards this appeal. Can we raise car tricks from this like a charity appeal. And you get someone to agree. You say, oh, thanks very much for your support. And I give them a sticker. And I give everybody in the group a sticker and it says I love card tricks. And it looks like the classic New York sort of I love New York, so it's I heart New York.
Speaker 1:Then I do a card trick. Someone chooses a card and I do a card trick. Someone chooses a card and I fail to find it. So far, tell me when you've seen this before. It's exactly. I fail to find it, which is 80% of the tricks that me and Roddy come up with. And at the end you say, well, let me try one more thing and I make a little fan with the cards and I wave it towards the guy and he looks down at his sticker and he no longer says I love card tricks. It says seven of hearts card trick, which is the card that he chose.
Speaker 1:And it's a very simple trick, very simple method, and I've done it an absolute ton over the years and it is, if you stop me, it's always in my wallet as um, as a little, a little quickie. Um, and yeah, it's a really simple trick and it feels almost an old-fashioned throwback trick, um, and I get messages for it. We didn't have it for a long time, uh, and I'd get messages from people who bought it at blackpool, you know, 15 years ago. So, oh my god, please can I get it? And, uh, if you've seen the trick, I think you want it. Uh, and, and you know what? There isn't even a demo. There's no demo on the website. Um, it's just, uh, it's just a text description and it's got old-fashioned text to explain the trick. But you will be doing it. I'd say, three minutes after reading the instructions. It is very, very simple.
Speaker 3:So this is one that I had years ago. I'm one of those people that you said and I think it was Liam Montier, actually, that put me onto it and recommended it and exactly what you just said. It's such a simple trick to execute, but it's one of those really weird moments when you perform it for for an audience member, sort of a bit like mini book pro, really it certainly has got a bit of misdirection.
Speaker 1:I've always been fond of those misdirection moments because I think that when you do it, if you become moderately accomplished at doing magic or sleight of hand or whatever your little thing is, you're always looking for that little bit of a top-up like how can I get better? Well, that's always performance and misdirection stuff. That is where you'll feel more nourished and with this trick it's a spoonful of nourishment in that you're not doing a spoonful of nourishment, uh, in that is, you're not doing a lot. Uh, misdirection, we did a little bit. But the joy and the reactions, uh it is.
Speaker 1:If you do restaurants or you know if, even if you don't do anything like that, but if you do restaurants, every time you do a card trick, I get people all the time saying, oh, do you know what you get? I love card tricks. I love card tricks. I love tricks and just banging out these stickers for a bunch of people at the table and it's fun, certainly, like it's maybe not a corporate, slightly weirder, but if you're doing TGI Fridays or similar, it is fun. Everyone's got these.
Speaker 1:I love card tricks, stickers and in fact I know a guy, a mate of mine, that does um it with a multiple selection and every time he gets the card right, boom, you get a sticker and people are losing their mind over a very simple thing and at the end you can't find the last card. And uh, and then the sticker he's wearing the whole time says, um, seven hearts card trick on it. So, uh, yeah, very simple trick, but um, a big fan. And also it proves I can think of tricks that aren't, uh, technology themed or but he has. But it has also got a weird joke to start the thing off. So maybe that is slightly similar to all my other stuff.
Speaker 3:Well, I think it's a great choice and again, hopefully, if it's one that people haven't heard of, please do go check it out. I had genuinely no idea that this was one that was still available.
Speaker 1:It wasn't for years we didn't even have it, and then I had some made for lectures a few years ago. So yeah, it's on trichardboomcom. No video, you'll have to use Theatre of the Mind. But if you can take me and Jamie's word for it, well, don't take my word. I'm a magic dealer and it makes me no better than Andy Gladwin, but if you are. But yeah, trust Jamie and trust the other people that love it as well. Williamson says you know he absolutely adores it and you know he's a man of good taste.
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Speaker 3:But it does lead us to the tail end of your eight tricks now. So we're on number seven.
Speaker 1:So what did you put in your seventh spot is again dipping back into archer's playbook, I'm going to go with um, a trick that I'm unlikely to do, uh, but I absolutely adore it, and that is, uh, tim conover's version of cylinder and coins. Um, you're thinking that's not an old trick, and you're right, it's not. But I, tim Conover's version of Cylinder and Coins. You're thinking that's not an old trick, and you're right, it's not. But I remember watching Tim Conover who, if you don't know, was a brilliant magician and mind reader who died I should have found out, I'm going to say, 15 years ago, absolutely God. And he is a. If you know your magic, if you know your sort of mentalism, you'll know about him. He's phenomenal.
Speaker 1:He came over to an IBM convention and he did a set. I can't remember what he did as his first routine, but he did two tricks. One was a coin bending routine where the um, uh, where, where the finish was utterly remarkable, uh, where I, I was fooled so badly, uh by uh. So he did a coin bending routine and the end in the glass, from the all the coin that was selected at the beginning was chosen from a glass and at the end all of those coins were bent at the end of the routine and it was so strong, so much fun, so much energy. He was a brilliant performer and in his close-up show, or maybe on the same day, he did Cylinder and Coins and I remember, like you know, I'd seen it before.
Speaker 1:If you don't know Cylinder and Coins, I mean how it's? How do you shorten this? Ah, go check it out on YouTube. If I say it now, you will think this sounds terrible, but if you watch, you know, watching him do it is. It was utterly phenomenal and there are lots of versions of it out there. I'm not a fan of any of the others really, but Tim's oh, luke Jermay's got a phenomenal version as well. But Tim Conover is an absolute god and, yeah, loved his, um, his presentation for it and it just felt so magical.
Speaker 1:It's up there with like the top three tricks I've ever seen, because it's a trick all about forensic details, um, you know it's, um, it's a weird trick and it's people talk about cups and balls and you're not really a magician until you can do, uh, the cups and balls properly or you know whatever the quote is. In many ways this is like that if you love coin magic, which I don't in any way, but but it's a good lesson in magic and storytelling and you've got beautiful objects, I imagine by the time at the end of my time on the desert island, uh, I would have learned to whittle a wand. I could sew the little leather cup. It might be a problem catching the beast too before I could produce into leather cup, but let's assume that some leather is donated to the last person that was on the island. I'd have learned to make my own props. Now a desert island produced custom cylinder and coins. Uh, would be a desirable item.
Speaker 3:A nice big leaf. A nice big leaf with some string. I am unfamiliar with this version, so I've seen other versions of cylinder and coins. What is it about this version, then? That makes it one of your top three tricks ever?
Speaker 1:I think it's because it's a trick that I never really cared about before. And to change a magician's mind and I'm fairly set in my ways about. I think it's because it's a trick that I never really cared about before. And to, uh, to change a magician's mind and I'm fairly set in my ways about things I like Um and with this trick. I watched it and I thought it's, and he's immediately changed my mind the clarity, the fact that every phase was surgically clean.
Speaker 1:Often with coin magic it's like the movie Speed, where if the bus stops in speed or gets below 50 miles an hour, it explodes and everyone crashes. And coin tricks are the same. If you stop for more than a split second or slow down, someone will say that coin's in the other hand, mate. So you've got to keep moving the other way around. That is structuring the routine and knowing that that's going to happen, knowing that they will be coming for you because of the thin secret that is behind a lot of coin magic. So then you think well, in that case I need to structure it, knowing that they're coming and knowing that they will be looking for those things, and I need to find ways to throw them off.
Speaker 1:And that's what he did. The structure was brilliant, all the shows, all the fairness was in there. It was just, it had all the things and at the end of it I thought I love that trick now and I started going into it thinking I could never care about that trick now. And I started going into it thinking I could never care about that trick. And to change my mind in eight minutes is remarkable.
Speaker 3:I think what's interesting about your list so far as well is and we've discussed it quite a lot on the podcast before. Certainly Andy Nyman mentioned quite a bit about this is you're not someone who shies away from a prop that looks like a prop.
Speaker 1:Yeah, no, I'm absolutely. I love my favourite thing and I know we all use this, or certainly is so in magic. So the classic thing.
Speaker 1:Let's say you're doing a coin trick and a line we've all heard which is these are my grandfather's coins or some sort of thing like that. Like I always think that doesn't sound very believable, so I'd like to shine a light on it and make it sound even more ridiculous. You know, gary curse does the same thing, saying you know, these are, uh, you know chinese coins from the uh, from, you know, from the uh from the market that says American Idiot Sorists, whatever it is. It's just I didn't say that exactly. Don't sue me, gary, but something like that. So making a joke and making it clearly ridiculous what the object is and how you got it. So you know a destination box.
Speaker 1:You know, again, I'm walking up with a big object and I'm not, I'm not trying to say hello, excuse me. So can I just pop that on the floor. I'm going up there, I'm banging that down the table and saying I want all eyes on this, because this is the focus and that is doing what we should all be doing more, which is bringing more theatrical sort of stage performance into close-up magic, rather than doing what I said earlier, which is being middle-aged man with his elbows against you know, the side of his body, just sort of nervously asking someone to choose a card or to go through the motions. You know, I feel all of us need to be bigger and make it. You know it's what you're doing is miracles. It should be miracles, not just oh cool, I'll give you that. We, um, we won't aim bigger.
Speaker 3:I've got sidetracked, but you get the idea I think you're absolutely spot on there and I think that is what's sort of unique about trick, trick, boom, and certainly you that I've noticed. You seem to come up with a concept that is interesting, or a hook or a joke or something that draws the audience in to what you're doing, and then it's almost like, not, this trick is secondary, that's not, that's not the case at all, because the trick's always phenomenal. But you can tell that you're always about the, the premise and the idea, and the, the storytelling, of course, not overtly storytelling, but in the style of what you're doing and the props that you're using and and the things that you're you're putting across yeah, absolutely no, I think the novelty is so much and you know I want, I want to have one of the categories you know darwin autist says in strong magic about.
Speaker 1:You know, any of your um routines must have anything you do if you think that, uh, it's, if you want it to be yours, if you want to have, you know, say that, say that you created. It must have one of three things improve the method, improve the presentation or well, one of the other ones. But you've got to do something to it and so it could just be, you know, let's say you're picked on triumph earlier. Let's say you're doing triumph. Don't do the story about the drunk guy um in the pub mixing it up. Or if you do, color that in, who is this guy who like, like, convince me of, of, of this story?
Speaker 1:I think that magicians often are bad storytellers and don't absolutely commit to the. I know I'm guilty of this but, like you know, I sort of fancy myself slightly, sort of doing acting, but as soon as it comes to magic I've got so much guilt. And that's not your card, is it? Oh, I was so sure it was your card and I suddenly become the worst daytime soap actor in the world. I think we should, all you know, try harder and sell what you're doing more. Actually commit to it. Of course, I have got a method way of doing that, which is my tricks do go wrong. Yeah, so that's how I do it method. I don't know why I got on that point, but anyway, they're valid points, but not necessarily in the order you were expecting them in.
Speaker 3:Okay, well, that brings us to number eight. So what was in your final position?
Speaker 1:Well, this again is another little ego stroke and that is the trick that I did on pen and teller, full us, which has got the weird name wzrd, which means wizard, um and um.
Speaker 1:It is a trick that I am fiercely proud of, um and the uh. The journey that I went on, uh with it, creating it and solving the method issues and then doing it on Fool Us, and then having to go to another process to take a trick that had a good method and lots of clever things but to take it from being a trick to in inverted commas fool the boys to a trick that you could do on television with jokes and performance and all of the other beats that we should be aiming for. Like it tested me to to to do it and I'm very proud of the trick and I love doing it. I still do a parlor shows and formal closeup shows. I love the fact that it is it's sort of is it mental, magic-y sort of thing that's going on and it's a fun presentation and just I like, I like the trick and I like the journey I went on and obviously pleased with the result that I'm not full of us, but yeah, no, that's if you're not seeing it.
Speaker 3:It's on YouTube on my website um noelcoultercom and uh all over youtube so normally I would ask you to synopsize it, but I do think it's right that we should let people watch that. So I'm going to go down a different avenue with this one when it when it comes to expanding on it. So how did you come up with the effect that you were going to do on pen and tell a full loss? Why did you go for that one in particular?
Speaker 1:uh, that is interesting. Um, so I I've been on full loss, uh, years before. I've certainly filmed for it. Um, and for various different reasons, uh, that got cut. Um, and I was on the very first episode. I wasn't on it, it got cut, but you get the idea, I was filmed for the very first episode. In fact, johnny Thompson, I was the very first person that Johnny Thompson offered a position on Full Us to be one of the contestants. That's a great story, right up to the moment I get cut.
Speaker 1:So if you let me fast forward, I think it was 10 years from I think they they did two series in the uk. Then it stopped for a couple of years and then they came back in the us and they banged him out, seemingly a series a month, but they, they certainly cracked through. And then, um, I had I'd met johnny thompson, um, uh again, uh, uh, maybe a session convention, yeah, session convention. And uh, and I showed him the trick and he was like, oh, my god, you gotta do full us. And I said, um, oh, yeah, no, I'd love to, I'd love to, and then so I got um, uh, I think that's, I was drunk and just I was like, yeah, great. And I remember getting, uh, back to um.
Speaker 1:After the convention I sent an email to Johnny Thompson. There was a man in his senior years at that time and I said um, hey, johnny, can you, can you put in a word for me, because you know you really like the trick and I'd like to be on the show again. I feel I've got unfinished business. And he said absolutely, I can put in a word now. You, you know. And I said anyone listening can imagine what I was hoping for in the email that I was cc'd into. Johnny's email said to the producers hello, producers, I'd like to introduce you to Noel Qualter, who was on the show before or filmed for it before, but was cut anyway. He's got another trick. He'd like to tell you about it. He was a brilliant magician and a lovely man.
Speaker 1:But I remember that time thinking, what am I now? I just, I do, I just look like I've asked my friends to ask. But I remember that time thinking, ah, what am I Now? I just, yes, I do, I just look like I've asked my friends to ask them out. Really, he hasn't really helped to sway the opinion. It was mild endorsement. So I then I knew the trick was very fooling because it's mad. There's a lot that's insane about it in many ways. So I then asked Piff, who is a celebrity friend of mine from Vegas. I said to Piff would he help with a little video, because I want you to follow us.
Speaker 1:In fact, this is a hot tip for anyone that wants to do it. I assume that they're always filming a new series. So let's assume that even in 10 years, when people listen to this, that they're always filming a new series. So let's assume that even when, even in 10 years when people listen to this, they will still be filming a new series. So, um, but if you want to do it, don't just film a uh video of you. You know where the camera's pointing at your groin and you've got your hands by your sides doing uh, you know a car trick? Um, bring it to life, which is what I did. So I had I, uh, I.
Speaker 1:I did the trick using my TV head of thinking how can you make what could be a very dry card trick? Bring it to life. And that's why I had fundings. I had jokes in it. I filmed the pitch video I sent to them almost could have been shown on telly. It was. But yeah, so that's really it's getting them excited about it. But yeah, it was something I was very, very interested in.
Speaker 1:Uh in, and thinking, all right, can I take a trick that is, you know a clever but dry trick and can I shine it up?
Speaker 1:And and we should all do that we're all imagine thinking all right, whatever your routine is, if you're, if you think I've got that slickest, ambitious card in the world, it's six phases, and then there's this amazing finish. Whatever you do, how do you take that trick? And even if you're not doing a telly show, what would you do? What would you make it better? Because when you change the word to television, what you're really saying is how do I make it easier for the audience to understand, how do I make the plot simpler and streamlined, and how do I make the finish even more impossible and uh and magical? And that's what, even though your goal was to make it for this fantasy tv show. They're good lessons for all of us. No one needs to see endless phases. No one needs to see endless phases. No one needs to see a repetition. Not all these things let's focus on how can you improve every magic trick, how can you make it TV ready for a TV show that maybe never comes.
Speaker 3:Well, that's good advice for all of us and it's a pretty phenomenal list. We started with Mini Book Pro, then Destination Box Bandit, the Benson Burner by Tom Stone Glips which I'm not going to have said that right Card Tricks Are Extinct, the Cylinder and Coins. And we ended with Wizard. What a very eclectic mix of card to impossible locations mentalism, that's not mentalism. Stickers and TV magic.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it is a weird list, list, but then I'm a weird guy sort of uh, what you'd expect?
Speaker 3:well, the good thing is, it could all get a lot weirder now, because we have our three items. We have your banishment, your book and your item. So let's start with your banishment. What are you getting rid from our industry?
Speaker 1:Cover your ears. Mentalism, not just specific, not specifically one trick All mentalism.
Speaker 3:Okay, thank you everyone. This episode is not airing now. Okay, tell us why.
Speaker 1:Oh, I'm going to run long. So in theory, mentalism is perfectly serviceable. We should all. Everyone needs to stretch their act out, but I've never known mentalists incapable of doing their own time. To do an act of time, you say you've got six minutes, it's 12 minutes, you've got 12 minutes, there's an hour, it's all. In order to be a mentalist, you've got to be a good talker. The problem is, all mentalists are too happy talking and will just talk and talk and talk. I mean that sounds a bit rich as I spend an hour talking nonsense here, but often it is so forensic. And I've got good friends who will unfriend me after this. They're brilliant mind readers Luke, who is temporarily sacked off, mind reading brilliant, chris Rawlins and Lipkin and all these other people that do mentalism, and I have to say I guess I'm putting them all on the same island, just far away from me. I love them all dearly but I hate mentalism, I despise it.
Speaker 1:And I remember there was a guy at the Magic Circle who am I just going to listen to this? And he was a new guy there and I hadn't watched his audition. And he said I am sort of doing mentalism. And I said show me something. And in full disclosure, I was just trying to be the guy that I'm not, which is the more smiley, encouraging hey, show me something, let's have a look. And he said I don't have anything more. I packed it all away but said next week I'll bring loads of mentalism and we concession. And then I said to his face a man I'd met seconds before, to be clear I don't want, I don't want. Please you can show me tricks.
Speaker 1:I love magic. I love magic more than anything. I can't watch mentalism. I could watch one under the special auspices that it is. Doesn't happen. You know you're new to the magic circle and I want to be a cheerleader for you, but as soon as it starts, I've forgotten already what the parameters are. Think of this. Fold this up, hold on to this. I'm going to talk for eight minutes at you and now I'm going to reveal the thing. Now. I love mental magic. That's cool, that can stick around. But all mentalists get really stinky about mental magic. I blooming, love it. Mental magic is great. Um and um, but mentalism as a whole, uh, can get on a boat to the other side of the? Uh, the island, um, other side of the world. I really do hate it.
Speaker 3:I just got in my head like at the end of Avengers, when everyone just starts fading away into the air, into death. Derren Brown has just gone.
Speaker 1:And of course it begs the question will Trick Shack Broom have any mentalism tricks? Yes, and obviously I will lie through my teeth and say that I love mentalism. We've got some bangers to come. We have I just you know what Part of the reason is. I do do a little bit of mentalism because, like I said, everyone needs to stretch out their acts. Sometimes I'm very keen, if I'm doing dirty dice, to say the philosophy dice say you look like you don't believe me either. Let's try it with you. Let's try it with you, you don't believe me either. That I know what number you're thinking of on the dice. Let's try it with you. And 42 people later, um, they go all right, I buy it, mate, you, uh, you know those numbers on that dice. Uh, or die. So, um, and my acting, like I said, when I'm doing magic, it's shocking.
Speaker 1:I remember years ago a guy booked me for he said why don't you do mentalism, mind reading? And I said yes, because that's what it says in the books. Say yes and worry about it later, which, I'd argue, isn't always good advice. So I went and I said all right, fine. I said you know what I'll do. I'll do some close. This is terrible advice. I'll do some close-up magic, first for the first hour to build some rapport, and then I'll do some mind reading for the second hour, once I've built that rapport. Anyway, an hour and 45 minutes passed with me doing ambitious card and omni deck and whatever else, and the booker came around and said here, mate, have you built enough rapport yet? Which was fair comment, and I then had to do some mentalism which I just didn't have.
Speaker 1:But the first thing I so I pretty much said to the group, this is a long time, it's probably 20 plus years ago I said I'm going to read your mind now and, like an I like a, a proper feel came over the room of the group he lives with. It changed everything. I was like, here we go. I just had to say it right, all right, they're on board. Then I did invisible deck, but I did it sort of straight with you know, uh, uh, like the like a proper mind reading trick, and I said, um, it's a, uh, uh, it's a red card, isn't it? Uh. Well, as I said, yes, they were just thinking of a card rather than doing the elimination. It's a red card, isn't it? And they went absolutely mental oh, my god, yeah, now, if I did that as as a close-up magician, it would have got smiles and I had so much guilt about the fact that not even a trick, I mean, I just took a punt and thought, well, it doesn't matter, in the end it'll be fine. I could have done Michael and Mars a cherry-coloured card or whatever. I said it's a red card, isn't it? They're mental. And I said, settle down, it's not that impressive. There's only two colours, two suits.
Speaker 1:And I realised that even when I was given the mentalism gift. I then was so keen to bury any goodwill that had been built up that I had to sink the ship immediately because of guilt and the fact that I couldn't even act like I was happy and delighted, but clearly happy and delighted, but clearly, of course I knew it was a red card, um, but I had to to bury it. So I think probably a lot of it's down to me and my lack of a of the convincing acting and and I know how strong it is, I know people love it and I really do I think as a close-up magician, I do get a proper bug when, uh, when I hear people reacting more to mentalism, I understand it's stronger if it was real, but, spoiler, it's not. And when people see the you know, close Up Magic Trick is built with lots of component parts, but often mentalism is a lot of talking and a very thin method at the end and yeah, anyway, and yeah Anyway.
Speaker 3:Well, that's a lot of angry people right now listening to this, throwing things at the radio or whatever they're listening on Don't contact Ginger Boom.
Speaker 1:Send it to sales at Alakazam.
Speaker 3:So we have just banished the likes of Luke Jermay Derren Brown, simon Lipkin onto your island, so at least you can have a little party.
Speaker 1:They'll never be short of a few words. They'll have a cracking time.
Speaker 3:Well, that leads us onto your book. So what did you put in your book position?
Speaker 1:Well, I've only listened to a few of the podcasts, but I'm going to do the same cop-out that a a lot of people do, which is I'm not a massive book guy, which is terrible. Uh, videos and dvds I. I bought pete and jen's house. I must have done with the amount of videos and vhs's and all that. I watched everything, hundreds and thousands of these things. I probably had the largest. I mean, this is the weirdest brag, largest collection of sort of vhs, magic tricks, things. I bought all from alexander, bought hundreds and hundreds and hundreds, uh, and then I had no room for the books. I know the answer was by the books as well, but I haven't got the attention span, haven't got the um, uh, so I haven't read. I bought a lot of books, I've got tons, got them all. Um, I haven't cracked the spine on them. They're all absolutely fine, they look great. I'm not reading them.
Speaker 1:What I want, and what Roddy wants as well, is we want to be fed inspiration, because I don't want to do versions of other people's tricks. I want to come up with mad interpretations. So I know what all the classic plots are, or, if not all of them, loads of them. I know the tricks that have been out there. So I like to put a spin on things. So my book is going to be the Demon Magic catalogue from Davenport's, which I have read many, many times, and it's full of bananas tricks and it just has a description which is before the internet. That's the world that we were in.
Speaker 1:If we love magic, you bought tricks, never mind screaming about I want a live performance, I want this, that and the other this.
Speaker 1:You might be actually a Dem if you went to Dandles, but you just have a description in a magic catalogue and spoiler they weren't always accurate. There was a little bit of spin in the advert and when you had those moments I thought this is, I love reading about these mad tricks because you read it and you think this is, even though I'm never going to do that trick, or it's long out of production or this weird wooden cabinet they're talking about I'll never do, but maybe I can do that with a cardboard box and maybe, instead of it being brass buttons that they're doing, maybe it gets changed and they are bitcoins and they are metal tokens or you know, like changing the object instead of it being a cigarette, it could be a Sharpie maybe. And looking at old stuff and reading those descriptions. Part of it is nostalgia as a kid and reading that and being so excited about it. But it's a big, fat, thick book with hundreds and hundreds of tricks loosely described, with some illustrations that may not be accurate, to the miracle that you see.
Speaker 3:Yeah, this is one. I think we've had this one before on the podcast, but one of the things that Roddy said in his episode when he referenced you was that you're really good at feeding his creative outlet with some of the ways that you take objects and mash them together and make up something bizarre and out there, um, and then he just starts running with that idea. Is this how you sort of create those ideas?
Speaker 1:yeah, pretty much. I mean, you know, we'll do it back and forth and sometimes like, uh, roddy's a great method guy, uh, he's better than I am for sure. Um, so um. Often it will start with, uh, what I would call a joke, but um, it's, it's a, a, a humorous conceit, um, um and so um.
Speaker 1:And then I'm always chasing those. So I think of those as sort of credits for the uh, for the imagination fruit machine. So I just go right, we'll fire that one in. And then what happened is me and Roddy will get distracted for a day and they're just talking about that. Yes, kat, I disagree, he's a mentalist, he's a mentalist and he doesn't approve. He is a mentalist because he wants to destroy everything, don't you, bobby? But to put these credits in the fruit machine for imagination and fun and mad things, and um, and what will happen is sometimes, I, we will start banging idea around that we go yes, and then that, and then that, and we start and it's, it's two o'clock in the morning, we're both bleary-eyed and we're really tired, and then the last words out of our heads will be cool but wouldn't we what if we could turn a snooker ball into into a grapefruit, and uh, then the next day, whatever mad things we talked about the night before, completely forgotten and we have to go with the new idea. So I've now made a document full of uh, our really good but bananas ideas. Where are pursuing them, because otherwise they would just disappear into the ether. Like keep records I know it says keep a notebook by your bed. Everyone says that no one does it Just whatever it is, record it. Make sure you record all of your ideas. Give you a whistle-top, some ideas on creating your own magic, because I've mentioned these things before but they really do work.
Speaker 1:Every time you watch a trailer, obviously Alakazam. As soon as you watch the Alakazam trailer, when it's about before the trick is revealed what the actual thing is happening, when you're starting to get an idea of the objects that are involved, stop it, pause it and think what's the trick. And if the trick is different to what Jamie's created with the trailer, then congratulations, you've got a trick that's got nothing to do with Alakazam and it's your own creation. So I regularly will stop a trailer before it gets into the meat of it, thinking what's this, what's going on here? Because it's a fun little game of it thinking what's this, what's going on here? Because it's a fun little game and you think I wonder what this is. You know what's it. What Is there another interpretation of it? I can see these objects involved. What's the trick going to be? Try and guess.
Speaker 1:Another thing I do regularly is because I do a lot of technology magic. I will put iPhone joke into Google Image Search and you can do the same thing with anything, and I'm not. Am I stealing the joke? I sort of am. So, for example, one of the things you'll see a lot if you search for iPhone joke or technology joke for an iPhone, is the iPhone 72. It'll just be a large number in an iPhone and it'll be a really long iPad, a really long iPhone.
Speaker 1:Well, we're magicians and we've got methods for those things. So maybe that's a really long. You know, we've got you know appearing polls and we've got all those things. So like, whenever I look at those things. So if a joke has some merit, so if you were able to produce an eight for iphone and say this is the iphone you know, 912, right, and if it looked like a, you know it looked convincing, that's a good trick.
Speaker 1:Um, also brackets.
Speaker 1:We might possibly do that at some point. So um, um, but any of those things. So look for, uh, stop, the trailers, look halfway, um, uh. Or look on image search for joke related to the magic that you're interested in. So you can put in card magic joke onto image search and if you find a joke, if that joke is already smile-inducing, let's go crazy and say it's actually funny what you read as a little visual thing, well, guess what? We're magicians and methods don't matter. You'll always be able to find out a way to do those tricks. So if you chase the conceit, chase the humorous sort of part of it. That's why you know. I remember with iDeck, at one point you said now you need to give them, you know, the iPod shuffle and you're shuffling the cards. Really simple, simple joke. But at the time I see grandparents. But you used to click shuffle on your iPod to shuffle the songs and it made sense and it was a reference to our world of shuffling objects and a reference to something that was in pop culture at the time.
Speaker 3:Well, completely unrelated to that Alakazam's BIG phone, which is the production of a giant phone actually comes out next month. No, absolutely, that's 100% true and a great way. I've never, ever thought about. I've often thought about reading the description of a trick and, before you read, the method and stuff like that, trying to come up with your own way of doing it, but I've never, ever thought about doing it with a trailer. I think that's really smart. It's like the modern day way of of doing what people used to do with those catalogs.
Speaker 1:That is exactly what it is, as soon as you start to see what the beats of it are. If you see, you know a couple of keys on the table and a and a sharpie thinking oh, I bet that's the trick. I do it all the time. And your idea might be if it's right, great congratulations, you win. If it's wrong, that's also fun, Like it's a no-lose situation.
Speaker 3:Well, rather sadly, that leads us onto your item. Let's see what you've put in your item position.
Speaker 1:Well, you already nailed it earlier, it's an iPad which is sort of like partly for magic and partly because I've got really bad eyesight and I need a big telly to see and I'm never without the iPad whether I'm doing a gig or if I'm just real life. I'm going to love the iPad. I was going to say a barbecue. Whether I'm doing a gig or just real life, I'm going to love the iPad. I was going to say a barbecue, as I'm utterly obsessed with smoking meats and things like that, but I've got a feeling that live fire cooking will not be a problem on the island. Possibly catching the food or in every other way will be a problem, but let's assume that it all just gets delivered to me. I would definitely be doing some cooking on a barbecue, but other than that, it is the dull but accurate answer an iPad.
Speaker 3:Well, I think that's a great choice, and that means, of course, you'll be able to come up with more tricks with the iPad, which will be good for the rest of the community.
Speaker 1:That is true, I will. No, I'd be very happy. I don't know where the wi-fi is coming from, but um it's uh, assume that's included.
Speaker 3:but um no, I'd be absolutely stuffed without the ipad well, if people want to find out more about, you know, if they want to find out about trick trick boom, if they want to find about the future releases, where can they go?
Speaker 1:I would strongly compel them, uh, to go to trick trick boomcom and sign up to our mail list, um, where you'll be the first to hear about our exciting and new things. Uh, that'll be coming down the pipeline, including some of the mega stuff, um, that'll be coming out pretty soon, but yeah, uh. And then, um, I'm still on, am I still on twitter? Yes, and or x, whatever it is now, and um, uh, but yeah. And then, trick to bring facebook, all the socials. Trick to bring the instagram. It's all trick to bring stuff, but yeah, so that's trick to bring.
Speaker 3:When you'll find us, um, and we will uh steer you to miracles and not just because noel's here, but genuinely some of the things that they've got coming out in the future. I I just had a little laugh there because one of them is mentalism related but some of the things that have got coming out really are pretty damn phenomenal. They are amazing. Thanks, dude. So you know no pressure, but thank you so much, noel. We have actually been trying to get Noel on here for ages, so it's good to finally have this one recorded I made time on my schedule.
Speaker 1:Uh, no, it's, I'm not a busy man, um so, um, no, it's. Uh, that's my delight to do it. Listen, I'm uh part of the extended alka fam on the facts that I largely probably bought peace house.
Speaker 3:Um good, amazing. Well, thank you again. Please do go check out Trick Trick Boom. Do go check out Noel's performance on Fool Us, and Card Tricks Are Extinct is a phenomenal trick, so do go check that out as well. And, of course, we will see you again next week with another episode of Desert Island Tricks. Goodbye.
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