Latest / The Magic Guys / Melbourne Magic Debrief #276

Transcript

Melbourne Magic Debrief #276 · The Magic Guys

• 0:01
  They're guys. They do magic. They are the Magic Guys.
• 0:10
  The Magic Guys. Yo, ladies and gentlemen, welcome to episode 276 of the Magic
• 0:14
  Guys. We're trying to cram in the last two minutes that we started this stream
• 0:18
  late, so I'm talking really fast. And to my left, we got Nick K.
• 0:21
  I'm Nick K. I'll talk even faster. We have Doug Kahn.
• 0:25
  I'm going to talk slow for a minute to tone the beat down. How are y'all doing?
• 0:31
  We don't have time for that. We've got to speed through real quick.
• 0:33
  Good to see everyone live in the chat. Nick, who we got?
• 0:37
  We got Scotty Link in the chat, who says he's going to come and visit Melbourne
• 0:41
  one day. Buddy, I would love that. We have Herbert. Good to see you,
• 0:44
  pal. We also have Tim Askin.
• 0:46
  Guys, as you know, this is a live podcast, giving you guys the opportunity to
• 0:51
  ask your questions, shoot us information, whatever you like.
• 0:54
  And as well as that, we also do take voicemails in the form of speak pipes.
• 0:59
  And we're going to kick off this week's episode with a speedpiper, right, Josh?
• 1:04
  Yeah, today we got one of our viewers with a nice question, very similar to
• 1:08
  some of the themes we've been talking about in the last few weeks.
• 1:11
  But this speak part comes in from our magician friend, Patrick.
• 1:16
  Hi guys, it's Patrick again. Hope you're well.
• 1:19
  So yeah, when we are scouting out a venue, say we're just hanging out in an
• 1:25
  area and we're looking for people and people to interact with,
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  what kind of group dynamics are you guys looking for what kind of balance of
• 1:36
  types of people how are they dressed how are they behaving how are they interacting with each other,
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  that gives you a lot of little green signals to say hey these guys would be absolutely game,
• 1:48
  for me to go up and perform something without interrupting we've obviously got
• 1:53
  the obvious things like if there's a couple and,
• 1:57
  one of the particular people in the couple are looking a little bit upset like
• 2:01
  they're about to get dumped maybe don't go over and show them a 52 like stage
• 2:05
  ambitious card race maybe avoid that but
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  when we're in busier venues with a lot of ebb and floor and movement of people,
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  maybe a bar restaurant type what are you guys looking for,
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  again love the podcast guys.
• 2:23
  Thanks patrick thanks for sending that through so i'm i'm hearing the question
• 2:27
  in two two ways just to confirm so i think we should answered in two ways i
• 2:31
  think one is like if you're just at the bar chilling like and you want to approach a group versus
• 2:37
  doing like being paid to be there so,
• 2:40
  maybe we'll speak to just being in the bar and wanting to show some strangers
• 2:45
  some magic that you're not paid to be there first,
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  i think so let's cover yeah let's cover like all the bases so whether let's
• 2:53
  start with that like if you're if you're doing street magic which could apply
• 2:56
  to some people or yeah if you're just in the bar and you're going to try and show someone magic.
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  What's something that you would look for i mean one obvious thing is look for
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  people who genuinely look happy like if you're not paid to be there but you're
• 3:10
  going to try and approach some people to practice some new stuff,
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  like an easy any i can spot it from a mile away a group that looks like they're having fun,
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  is going to be an easy in you know it's going to be less friction,
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  i would suggest a group that looks like maybe they're a little bit bored is
• 3:29
  a good group to hit because they're not having fun and you can be the fun now,
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  you know? Yeah. Yeah.
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  Jumping into a group that's having a good time at a bar is,
• 3:42
  probably all right, but you never know what they're having a good time about,
• 3:45
  right? So maybe breaking into that is a little more challenging than,
• 3:49
  say, a group that's, you know, just sitting there twiddling their thumbs.
• 3:53
  Yeah, I really agree with that because I think that you're there as a value
• 3:56
  add more than anything. If you're employed to be there or not,
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  like your job as a magician is to make someone's day better.
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  So if people are having a great time, you probably don't really need to bother
• 4:06
  them or involve yourself.
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  You might be invited over and by all means go there and make a friend but i
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  think for the most part i think that is a great idea like when folks need a
• 4:15
  smile you know give them yours all right i'm going to comment that since you guys just dissed my idea.
• 4:21
  I'm let me just let me just double down i'm not saying people that are like
• 4:26
  yeah what's up bro and i'm not saying that group i'm saying a group that just
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  genuinely looks happy and like yeah they're making small talk with one another
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  and a little bit of you know,
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  i'm just saying that's a very easy way to, hey guys, what's up?
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  I'm doing some magic. Would you like to see some? Boom. Yeah, I would love to.
• 4:44
  That's as a beginner, especially you're going to get an instant.
• 4:48
  Yes. Like no one's going to be like, no, how dare you? We're mildly having small
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  talk here. Can't you see like, they're not going to worry about that.
• 4:57
  Okay. What about like if a group is, is if, if they're all on their phones,
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  is that like a, yeah, easy,
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  I'm going to decision to go up and talk to them or is that a well let me let
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  me it's a great question and let me speak to that by saying take a moment shoulder
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  surf them because they could be perusing a,
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  online menu and if that is the case respectfully leave them alone because you
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  distracting them from placing an order actually starts taking the money out
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  of the venue so give them an opportunity
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  to place their order first.
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  That way, no one's really going to have an issue with you. And I think that
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  speaks on both fronts, because even if you were being paid to be there,
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  you know, a lot of times we approach tables and I say, hey, guys, welcome to X venue.
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  If you're feeling introverted, there's a QR code right there on the table to
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  order your food and drinks. Otherwise, I can have somebody come over and take your order.
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  And just saying that alone is is very, very healthy.
• 5:58
  Yeah, I think. Oh, yeah, that's it. Yeah. Nick's stomach is doing well today.
• 6:03
  If you can hear that, that rumble.
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  There's a bit of drill drilling happening in his building which which we were
• 6:10
  just saying i'm i can't believe that stuff doesn't happen more often where we
• 6:13
  get interrupted live with with these sounds but listening to this post post
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  live you're not going to hear anything which is great,
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  but yeah if you're paid to be there obviously it is your job to go up to everyone
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  no matter how you feel about it,
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  obviously people are actively arguing like you could probably assume,
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  you might have to come back, you know, you don't have to say, hey guys, just check in.
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  Do you want to see my coins, cards or award-winning stuff? Or you don't have to say that.
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  You could probably come back later. But for the most part, you pay to be there.
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  I think, you know, you have to go up to everyone and just be fine.
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  If they do say that they're just having a conversation and to come back later,
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  like if you've asked them if it's a good time or am I interrupting conversation.
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  That sounds right, Nick. Yeah, because a couple of weeks ago,
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  we did talk about our approaches. And I think that one of the healthiest things
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  to do is to give people an out and say things to the effect of,
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  welcome, my name is Nick. I'm here to do some magic.
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  Is now a good time for magic or am I interrupting important conversation?
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  And they'll go, no, now's a great time. And you go, great. And you can get into
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  your routines. But if they're like, actually, we just haven't seen each other
• 7:19
  for 19 years. We just want to have a cocktail and chat to each other.
• 7:22
  I'm like, absolutely. If you guys change your mind, just give me a wave. I have gas.
• 7:29
  I love it. Doug, when you're starting a busking show, do you just yell and wait
• 7:34
  for the person to make eye contact? Or is it like a specific type of person?
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  I mean, for me, it's pretty simple. It's, hey, watch this trick.
• 7:41
  You know, and I just do that a thousand times till they watch the trick to stop my first people.
• 7:46
  I wanted to comment a little bit. We were talking about bars and corporate work.
• 7:50
  But if you work in a restaurant or some environment where there's a family kind
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  of atmosphere, I always would start my shifts there looking for a family group. It's an easy in.
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  You'll get a lot of excitement at the table. That generates the energy that
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  will make other tables want you at their table and make the snowball easier
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  to grow, you know, moving from table to table.
• 8:13
  Yeah, that's actually really smart. Yeah. On the street, though,
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  it's just tell people what to do.
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  That's the biggest thing is direct the show. Don't ask them.
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  Don't let them make decisions. Tell them what to do.
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  Hey, watch this trick, and either they'll watch it or they won't.
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  That's what i yeah easy that's so smart yeah restaurants the family is the win
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  because they want their kids to have a great time and boom you're in,
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  i would say my little contribution if you're trying to do street magic and your
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  fear is that people will say no even though you should,
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  thicken your skin and get used to that because it will happen less than you
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  think and just an easy group to look for is just like,
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  not a couple not a single person by themselves but like a group of like four or five people,
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  that are like just they're not on their way to somewhere but you can see them
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  and they're kind of like uh just chatting away and they look social,
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  very easy to go up and and like nine times out of ten boom,
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  someone in that group likes magic same dynamic if that group's a family
• 9:16
  the likelihood of them saying yes to or stopping to watch a trick is even greater so
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  you know i've got my radar 50 feet down the street when i'm street performing
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  i'm not looking at the people right in front of me i'm looking at who's coming
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  down the road 50 feet away so i know a family's coming i'm gearing up to hit
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  them when they when they're in in the area.
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  As opposed to wasting energy on other you know people in between them yeah and
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  have and have a good uh short sharp intro that lets them know what the hell you're doing,
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  you know don't be like hey guys how are you today my name is josh what is your
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  name like you're just giving him way too long to like get freaked out and run away.
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  I love, I love what our boy Adam Axford has been doing lately with this intro.
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  We've had him on the pod now. He's blowing up on Instagram. He's great.
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  And he just approaches people raw while they're walking. Like his goal is to stop them mid-walk.
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  And he literally just says, fellas, doing magic for a thousand people in Sydney.
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  Can I share a one minute trick with you? like boom i know exactly what he's
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  trying to do and i'm interested you know,
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  so smart so smart and herbert thank you for the demonic $6.66 donation once again my friends,
• 10:32
  He says, for Nick, Tobias Snickers, I feel like that's a Discord joke,
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  and I like it, and I'm here for it.
• 10:41
  Some expensive Snickers. Melbourne Magic Festival. Firstly, Nick,
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  we all want to know how the hell your shows went.
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  How did they go? Well, the shows went well as far as the creativity and everything else.
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  Numbers were a little low this year, and I think that just might be a sign of
• 10:56
  the times. No one was particularly selling out, which is a little unfortunate,
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  but look, we're one week down and we're just shy of like 9,000 tickets sold.
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  So there's still one more week to go.
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  So yeah, like 8,000 something tickets. So like, it's all pretty good,
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  but it's also a very big festival in the same breath. So, you know,
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  here's some of the things like with regards to ticket sales,
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  we'll cover all that. There's a whole bunch going on.
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  So thankfully I made it to the first week in which my show was there.
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  It's now officially done. There's one week remaining and I get to now enjoy the rest of it.
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  I get to see all the shows. I get to have all the fun. I still get to hang out
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  with my buddies and go from there. So I thought that there's a lot of folks
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  that have been asking about it. And also before I go any further,
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  is like, thank you to everyone who came to see it.
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  Folks from Discord, you know, like David Rhodes, who actually helped me write
• 11:49
  my routines, flew in from Canberra to come and see the show. So big shout out to him.
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  And other folks who are just around the podcast, but like, oh,
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  hey, listen to your podcast, big fan.
• 12:00
  I'm like, great, you know? So it was really, really nice to have the notion about community.
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  So I thought it would just be nice to touch upon anyone who is like perhaps
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  looking to come and see the festival or to actually be a part of it,
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  whether it be this magic festival or any other magic festival for that matter.
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  So I made just a very small dot point type thing that could help you guys get
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  through it and for us to discuss about. So should we get into it?
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  Let's go. Let's go.
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  So just for reference, I finished doing a run of shows over four days of my show, Pieces of Me.
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  The intention of my show was to develop routines that I've been sitting on for
• 12:41
  a very long time and to bring them to life.
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  So in the spirit of that, let me just be gassy for a sec.
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  In the spirit of that, I wanted to do,
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  Here's the thing. You can find a lot of comfort performing things you've been
• 12:56
  performing for the past decade, and that's all well and good.
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  But one thing I had to really do is really embrace my humanity leading into
• 13:03
  this show and just do stuff that I knew wasn't going to be the greatest thing,
• 13:09
  wasn't going to be hyper polished and be vulnerable.
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  And that was one of the hardest things for me to have to kind of accept,
• 13:15
  but I really had to like meditate on it and just go, yo, So let's take a moment
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  here. You can keep doing the things you've been doing for the past decade,
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  and they're going to enjoy that.
• 13:25
  But in the same breath, there's some people out there that only ever had a tight
• 13:30
  20 minutes for their entire life.
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  And they had careers for like 30, 40 years. And eventually they just petered
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  off and got lost to the sands of time.
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  And that's going to happen unless
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  you give routines space to breathe and grow and fail and get better.
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  And all those things and so like in the spirit of that that was i think one
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  of the most important things to do for the festival.
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  And let me just say that's super inspiring i can love that man like every bit
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  of that warms my soul and makes me want to be a better me,
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  tell us more nick k well i was gonna put that towards you guys because i know
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  that there's things that we've been doing like i've been doing this routine
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  a thousand years and i've got all these new routines that i create constantly
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  but i it's like you only have so much time at,
• 14:20
  a one hour gig that you're booked for or whatever it might be and you you want to obviously like,
• 14:25
  give them your tried and perfect routines but it's so hard because,
• 14:30
  a part of you will go like i know this crushes but i'm going to do some stuff
• 14:34
  that's going to damn near seem amateurish and going to present me in an awful way,
• 14:38
  and if it's one thing we've said several times in the podcast is that every
• 14:42
  performance is an audition so you kind of have this fearful moment of like,
• 14:46
  oh crap, I'm going to be presenting that. And so,
• 14:51
  There are some folks in the comments right now, my buddy Gareth Bell,
• 14:54
  who came from Tassie to see the show. He said, watch Nick's show on Friday.
• 14:58
  It was superb. Very, very kind words. In fact, some of the things he saw on
• 15:02
  the show, he didn't believe they were like genuine chosen moments from my Q&A act and so forth.
• 15:08
  He refused to believe it. And then we were catching up after the show.
• 15:12
  And after a deep conversation, he had a bit more appreciation for what I was creating.
• 15:18
  So here's the sort of thing that I want to say, like if you're going to lead
• 15:21
  into it, you can either one, go there and display all of your perfect polished
• 15:25
  things. And there's nothing wrong with that because if your intention is to
• 15:29
  establish yourself in a different location, that is the way you would do it.
• 15:32
  And then there's the other side of that where it's like I come to this festival,
• 15:36
  to allow all of my new creations to breed and grow and so forth.
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  And the audience book can walk in there fully aware of that,
• 15:44
  that these are all brand new creations and you guys are seeing the birth of it.
• 15:49
  And I say that because there's people like Simon Coronel, FISM winning Simon
• 15:54
  Coronel, who would do the same show for like six years straight with just individual
• 16:00
  little changes, same routines.
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  Maybe he might add one or remove one, but just does the same thing again and
• 16:06
  again and again, but then produces something that allows them to tour the entire
• 16:10
  planet in the end and you have to give,
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  space to grow and i just thought i would present it to you guys do you find
• 16:18
  yourselves ever in situations like that where you're willing to go you know
• 16:21
  what i really want to get this off the ground it's going to take time,
• 16:24
  because for me right now it's like okay i've got this working,
• 16:28
  now i just need the flight time because the like because this routine i've created
• 16:33
  i'm really happy with it but i can't wait to see what it looks like in 10 years,
• 16:37
  have you guys experienced things of that nature.
• 16:41
  Wow, that was a perfect moment to end your question when the drilling starts.
• 16:46
  That is an artist, my friends.
• 16:48
  Man, like, yeah, I mean, how many times do I bring up the Brisbane Theatre of
• 16:52
  Magic? Like, it is my playground to trial new stuff all the bloody time.
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  Like, even, not even parts that are my show.
• 17:01
  Like, just, like, the last show, no, two shows ago, there's a part in the show
• 17:07
  where we warm the audience up. Like, the host warms everyone up.
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  And I was standing there going, you know, I'd be funny right now is if when
• 17:15
  everyone, when everyone applauds at him, we should throw money.
• 17:19
  And so a few months ago, I started like running up to the stage and just throwing
• 17:24
  like two, $5 notes. And then he would ad lib off of that.
• 17:28
  But, but two weeks ago, I was like, wouldn't it be funny if I just had a money
• 17:31
  gun and I just showered him with cash.
• 17:34
  So I jumped on Amazon that night and I bought myself a money gun and passed it.
• 17:40
  And some fake money and we've done four shows now two shows also it must have
• 17:45
  been three weeks ago anyway and so now when he gets to this particular moment,
• 17:49
  where he jokes about throw money up on the stage if you want and blah blah blah
• 17:53
  i run up and i just shower him with money and you know he's been doing that
• 17:56
  same intro for over a year now and only now i'm just like oh let's,
• 18:01
  make it better and i now i just have this stupid money gun which is over.
• 18:05
  Which is tax deductible and oh i can probably give you a live a live viewing
• 18:10
  of this here we go and boom and,
• 18:14
  that's just one example you know i've been doing the multiple card find in my card act,
• 18:19
  forever and i thought it's just what it is and just two days ago i was like
• 18:24
  holy crap there's a way i can make this actually poetic and more unique to me
• 18:29
  if i do this thing before it and And I end by doing that same thing as a callback.
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  I'm like, God damn it. So, you know, yeah, I am a massive believer in it.
• 18:39
  And it also, right, it also keeps you present and like enjoying what you're
• 18:44
  doing and stops you from getting an autopilot. So yeah, I couldn't praise that
• 18:49
  more than anything else.
• 18:52
  Keep trying to be better and change shit and try new stuff and be vulnerable.
• 18:55
  And yeah, who knows? Street is great for that.
• 18:58
  Street performing is the ultimate playground to fail on yes you know i reflect
• 19:04
  back to how many times my act has changed over the last 30 years it's it's a lot yeah of course.
• 19:12
  You know tim asking was asking what kind of feedback do you get and i think
• 19:17
  that this kind of speaks true to street performers because typically you would
• 19:20
  be sharing a pitch so you've got friends that might give advice.
• 19:24
  What I will say is that as far as giving advice goes, we have a bit of a code
• 19:28
  that we say on our side of the planet.
• 19:30
  And what we'll say is, hey, I have notes if you want them, because there's nothing
• 19:35
  worse than getting unsolicited advice. And sometimes you are very aware that
• 19:40
  like, I know this didn't work. I was trying something.
• 19:44
  I don't need your feedback. I was about to cuss. I don't need your feedback. I got my own.
• 19:48
  So some people will offer their advice.
• 19:53
  Me personally, I prefer to record all my shows. So I set up a camera at the back of the room.
• 19:58
  I have several old iPhones. I record, I get home, I watch the act,
• 20:03
  I make a couple of notes, I make some adjustments.
• 20:05
  I'm unsure about what will work and I'm willing to try that.
• 20:08
  Now, the beauty of having that community to help you is kind of great.
• 20:12
  So for example, I have this multiple Q&A type thing. And one of the things that
• 20:16
  was suggested to me was, why don't you have everybody stand up? And so I did.
• 20:20
  That was a bad idea. Because in theory, it's like a great idea.
• 20:23
  Now in an arena, a few folks standing up would be great.
• 20:27
  But in an 80 seat theater where folks at the front are standing up,
• 20:33
  it's actually disconnecting you from the rest of the audience in the back because
• 20:35
  I was above everyone and everyone was below.
• 20:38
  And so they were just looking at the backs of people's heads and so that wasn't
• 20:42
  as wasn't a great thing but i did it and i don't regret it because i learned
• 20:46
  something that when people stand up in certain environments for you to have
• 20:49
  a clear visual indicator which i am all about,
• 20:53
  in an in an arena setting where it's tiered that all kind of makes sense and
• 20:56
  you can do your revelations in this type of manner but again whether or not
• 21:02
  like it was right or wrong like i was willing to test it and i was willing to
• 21:05
  be vulnerable and i was willing to take something away from it.
• 21:08
  But here's where the dichotomy kind of comes together for me.
• 21:12
  If you're doing like four or five shows, the first show you do is a bit of a
• 21:17
  test. Got to be real about that.
• 21:19
  And then you'll review your show and you'll say, I got this routine.
• 21:24
  I really want to do it. It's just not going to work in the room.
• 21:26
  So I pulled routines out of my stuff.
• 21:28
  Basically did an entirely different show come second show.
• 21:32
  After that, I went, okay, this works. And then the new routines I was working
• 21:36
  on started to polish up a little bit, but here is the thing.
• 21:40
  Opening show, you forgive yourself. Second show, typically on a Wednesday,
• 21:45
  because shows start on Tuesdays, you don't mind that the numbers are low.
• 21:49
  And you might screw up one or two things, right?
• 21:52
  Thursday, you'll do a good show, right? But the numbers won't be massive.
• 21:56
  And then for me, Friday was my last show. And I'm going, here's the thing.
• 22:03
  Wednesday shows wasn't great. I didn't go home feeling amazing about it.
• 22:07
  But the next show on the Thursday was great. And now my fear is this,
• 22:11
  the only thing that makes you feel good about doing a bad show is doing a good one.
• 22:16
  And I've only got one show left.
• 22:18
  So if this show sucks, I'm going to feel like crap for quite a while.
• 22:24
  And that's one of those things that you put this itty bitty pressure on yourself.
• 22:27
  Because you're like, this is my last chance. I've got to do this right.
• 22:31
  You are going to feel that pressure. Have you guys ever experienced anything like that?
• 22:35
  Hmm i felt that pressure doing tv stuff i'm like if i do a shit performance
• 22:42
  now i'm gonna have to keep fucking watching this.
• 22:46
  Like it's gonna live on forever yeah theater magic not so much because i know
• 22:51
  like there's always a next week or a next show but,
• 22:56
  yeah but yeah i'm always hard up myself like when i come away from a gig when
• 23:00
  like a big moment i'd planned on didn't land or something,
• 23:04
  and I moved on probably to something else but in my head I'm like God damn it,
• 23:08
  why didn't I have the foresight to realize X, Y, and Z in the moment and but yeah,
• 23:14
  you know by the next day i'm sort of i'm over it because otherwise i'm going
• 23:19
  to go insane what do you think doug yeah i feel you know uh,
• 23:24
  i guess i i feel i've felt that way a few times i've overextended myself like
• 23:27
  magic conventions maybe performing material that isn't you know it's a little
• 23:32
  more technically challenging more for like fast company,
• 23:36
  and you can expect to fail at some of that stuff sometimes so right you got
• 23:40
  to roll with the punches and be able to take it on the chin,
• 23:45
  I guess it all depends on who you're performing for, how much they're paying you. Yeah.
• 23:52
  Yeah. A good example, I guess I could give is like, in 2019,
• 23:57
  I did Australia's Got Talent.
• 23:59
  And my audition act is something I've been doing for a long time and was really
• 24:05
  excited to do it. And it went well.
• 24:08
  But the semifinal act, I was kind of pushed to do Rubik's Cube work because
• 24:14
  of Stephen Brunage being so famous for doing it in America.
• 24:18
  They're like we'd love to have someone in australia doing it but really i'd
• 24:22
  only be doing cube stuff for like a year or two and my god do i wish i could do the cube stuff i do now.
• 24:31
  On that audition like when i watch that back now i'm like oh fuck like there's
• 24:36
  so much room for so much funnier and better stuff but i'm doing such a stock
• 24:40
  thing so like now and i remember i was sick that night,
• 24:45
  and like there's so many things and like so now it's so hard to i i can watch
• 24:50
  it but i really don't send it to clients or anything you know it's hard to watch,
• 24:56
  and i should have had the foresight to be like nah what's something i do all
• 24:59
  the time that i can like that's already been through the thousand hours machine but yeah,
• 25:05
  but um and that's and that's the thing right so when you find that comfort zone
• 25:09
  it is so difficult to like want to venture out of it and be vulnerable And that's
• 25:13
  like one of the things that I really had to accept on this, on this journey,
• 25:16
  like just really getting it out there.
• 25:19
  And I don't regret it for sure.
• 25:21
  And a part of me goes like, well, I, you know, this routine I wanted,
• 25:26
  I've been thinking about for like 11 years.
• 25:29
  And I finally went, I'm going to do this because it's taken so many reiterations.
• 25:33
  The most current one is a solo act. It's a Q and a that I could do by myself
• 25:38
  with no help from anybody, you know, it packs into lunchbox and plays enormous.
• 25:43
  You know, I can, I can arrive at a corporate event, borrow their whiteboard
• 25:47
  and do everything I need to do. Like, it's just a wonderful place to be. But again.
• 25:53
  There is something wonderful about watching a performer who's done those hundred
• 25:55
  thousand hours for sure but man it's so hard to be that person going like this is so crazy new and,
• 26:03
  it's just going to get better as time goes on and then like especially with
• 26:07
  stage the opportunities to perform stage stuff versus performing roving stuff
• 26:11
  or close-up stuff they're just,
• 26:14
  the opportunities aren't there as much it's just like that you know so So.
• 26:20
  In the same breath, one of the things I also took away from the festival is
• 26:25
  that take the opportunity to watch other performers.
• 26:29
  I think that watching every show and watching the way that they do things,
• 26:33
  it could be inspirations for ways that you would probably choose or never choose
• 26:36
  to be. That's all well and good.
• 26:38
  But it's good things to watch. Not to steal things, but just to watch,
• 26:41
  observe, and understand.
• 26:43
  Because seldom do we as magicians have opportunities to even see other magicians,
• 26:48
  unless you're someone like Doug Conn, who has the privilege of,
• 26:50
  you know, rolling out of his backyard into Vegas and seeing… It's so nice.
• 26:54
  Look out. Yeah, which is such a blessing. but you know watching people's openings endings,
• 27:00
  being able to take notes so to speak and offer you know the hand of friendship,
• 27:05
  these are really special moments you know like we have one of penn and tellers
• 27:10
  foolers hernan meccano who performed this amazing,
• 27:15
  coin routine with a little like bento box of the hole in it on fool us and so
• 27:20
  he's been at our festival his show start today and,
• 27:23
  it's such a pleasure watching this guy work man like you know he's we did his
• 27:27
  lecture just yesterday and it was just like knowledge and,
• 27:31
  it's just unbelievable i'm watching him perform buddy it's it's so great i saw
• 27:36
  this cat rocker room of 90 people with one glass and one kennedy half dollar 90 people,
• 27:43
  and they were losing their minds over it.
• 27:46
  You watch that and go a good magician does more with less but a pimp you know,
• 27:53
  so that's why I think watching other magicians should be inspiring entirely thoughts.
• 28:00
  Yeah, I think you nailed it. Like watch as much shows in general as you can, not even magic.
• 28:07
  And not to, you know, pick pieces you like, like a menu, like just to learn
• 28:15
  the cadence and showmanship. And yeah, for sure.
• 28:19
  Like still today, from going to Magic Live last year,
• 28:23
  one of the standout moments for me watching all the shows we watched was just
• 28:27
  that little detail of colin cloud show where he found a way with lighting and a sound effect to like,
• 28:35
  break the fourth wall and talk to the audience yeah and then go back,
• 28:41
  and then go back into his show like i've never seen let alone a mentalist i've
• 28:45
  never seen someone figure out how to be in a show and then like pause the show
• 28:50
  and talk to the audience in such a clear way it was so clever and
• 28:56
  yeah watching shows like has so many sometimes a little epiphany moments where
• 28:59
  you realize things that are just,
• 29:02
  so clever and that you know things that that you've not thought about so,
• 29:08
  yeah watch shows and they're tax deductible if you're a performer because it's
• 29:11
  educational oh shit i got a lot of deductions this year yeah.
• 29:19
  Oh yeah as nice as it is you know to have these shows in vegas i would suggest
• 29:23
  being able to see these smaller shows and intimate venues would be more,
• 29:27
  useful and you know to the average magician that's a that's a blessing to be able to to do that.
• 29:35
  I guess like what else is like that in the world i guess there's the fringe
• 29:39
  festivals you know you go to fringe so i would encourage that's if you're trying
• 29:45
  to see a bunch of shows all in one i yeah like in brisbane that's,
• 29:50
  not really an attainable thing that's why when i go to vegas i'm like great
• 29:55
  let me soak it in yeah definitely definitely the fringe festivals the anywhere
• 30:00
  theater festivals things like that,
• 30:02
  speaking of which doug have you seen mind to mind's resident show in vegas no i have not,
• 30:10
  i'm tardy to that event i've been invited i have a comp i just haven't made it out there yet,
• 30:16
  i feel like we need a report on that i mean there's a lot of hype going around and and like,
• 30:22
  well i'm sure it backs it up but yeah i would love to hear about,
• 30:26
  i'll try my best to get out there i did just share a short of theirs they were
• 30:30
  doing magic in the casino card trick pulled the crap out of me kind of hard
• 30:34
  to do these days but they they spoke me doing a card trick for vegas matt,
• 30:40
  the gambling celebrity just tell erin that it's it's for work that you have
• 30:45
  to go see the show she won't go i'll have to go by myself i'll find a plus one magician to go with me.
• 30:52
  Reach out to patent he's always up for a good time patent is in that show he
• 30:56
  does close-up pre-show he's the one that invited me out there yeah so right
• 31:02
  i've just been traveling a lot and i've been to,
• 31:05
  doing some medical stuff i haven't had really a lot of free time to go gallivant
• 31:08
  around but definitely on my radar to get out there yeah nice,
• 31:13
  yeah we're gonna see what that's like,
• 31:16
  so one of the things i want to make mention now is how to get the awareness
• 31:20
  of your shows so obviously you go through you know other marketing entities
• 31:24
  where you might advertise on your facebook you might do things of that nature
• 31:27
  but there's also like this notion of cross promoting so
• 31:30
  one of the things i want to compliment is our buddy liam jumpets,
• 31:34
  we did an episode interviewing him he was our wrestling slash magic friend oh yeah he,
• 31:40
  he wrote a brilliant show which he was exactly as we're talking approving upon
• 31:46
  it you know like the first time he did it he shaved six minutes off it then
• 31:49
  shaved an extra three minutes off it and tightened it and tightened it,
• 31:53
  great show very very well received there's a show called abracadickhead great
• 31:57
  show and yeah and and in fact at at her nun's,
• 32:02
  lecture he actually said like what's his show about it's like oh it's like an
• 32:05
  autobiography and it's like what about this kid like he started magic when he was 17 he's now,
• 32:10
  you know like 28 like it's like what in 11 years he's gonna write an autobiography he's gonna be crap.
• 32:16
  And then he said i saw it and his story was beautiful and it was an amazing
• 32:20
  show and it really really was so fully props to lj for putting together absolute
• 32:24
  killer show like it was very very good,
• 32:27
  and i hope it crushes and you know does the rounds at the at the fringe but,
• 32:32
  at the end of his show because he had like projection screens and so forth he
• 32:35
  would like say like oh here's some of my favorite shows after the show and he
• 32:38
  would throw mine up there and be like go see this that you really really kind
• 32:43
  of him to do that to cross promote and you know,
• 32:45
  you know you can do things like that you can finish your show,
• 32:49
  and you there could be flyers every second seat for your buddy's show to help
• 32:54
  promote that you could also print flyers with your flyer on one side their flyer
• 32:58
  on the other and split the cost of printing you know so there's little things
• 33:02
  like that that you could be doing,
• 33:04
  um to help promote that you know if you buddy up with someone so take that upon yourselves because,
• 33:09
  as well as doing your own shows, there's opportunities where you will share
• 33:13
  the stage with many magicians.
• 33:14
  One such example is the gala show.
• 33:17
  So we do a stage gala where, you know, 15 plus acts will perform,
• 33:23
  you know, a quick five to seven minutes sort of stage act.
• 33:26
  And then the other, and then we'll do a second gala the week after,
• 33:29
  which is what we just did last night, which we will do a closeup magic gala. So.
• 33:35
  Those are great opportunities for you to perform in front of hundreds of people.
• 33:38
  And at the end of the show, as people are walking out of the theater,
• 33:42
  have your flyers done right there. Start handing them out. Push it out there.
• 33:47
  Just those little moments of exposure showing what you do, they're very,
• 33:51
  very valuable. So take it upon yourselves to do things like the galas.
• 33:55
  We also have a nightly show called The Best of the Fest, in which you have one
• 33:59
  MC, three acts, a little 40-seater, and you do the exact same thing.
• 34:03
  You get up, you do a 10-minute spot, you flyer your show, you try and increase
• 34:08
  your ticket sales from there.
• 34:09
  Or even if you do it with a discount code as well.
• 34:11
  So those little things of getting those moments of exposure are really good.
• 34:15
  Fringe festivals also do the same kind of thing. If you were to do the Adelaide
• 34:18
  Fringe Festival in the middle of Rundle Mall, you can sign up,
• 34:23
  do your show, flyer it, and then hopefully get some ticket sales in the evening.
• 34:28
  I remember when I was doing Adelaide Fringe Festival, there would be people
• 34:31
  who would say, I always try to book myself after your act because you do,
• 34:36
  I do a street show, Good and Proper, to promote the magic show I was doing.
• 34:39
  So they know that people are going to stick around after my set and their crowd build is already done.
• 34:45
  So those are the types of things you want to look at with regards to getting
• 34:48
  the exposure for your show and just buddying up and helping each other out because it is a community.
• 34:55
  And one of the things that people freak out about is when they come here we had folks from,
• 34:59
  from all over from wa from new zealand and they were just like the community
• 35:02
  here is crazy like you guys are so homey like you're so there for each other
• 35:08
  that's like this is what we do this is the way we do it you know so.
• 35:12
  That's my advice for at least getting some exposure getting some stage time,
• 35:18
  and my advice is that when you do these galas and when you do these best of
• 35:20
  the fest don't do stuff you're working on do stuff you know is going to crush
• 35:24
  and draw people into your show so pro tip any thoughts on that.
• 35:30
  Yeah that makes sense if you're showcasing showcase the best stuff and nick
• 35:34
  is awesome i think that pretty much sums up what i just heard,
• 35:37
  I'd love that the acts network together and promote each other in environments
• 35:41
  where it's possible to do so.
• 35:44
  I also, I also think it's super smart to get out in front of the venue and market
• 35:48
  the show with, you know, a little closeup magic or, you know,
• 35:51
  shaking hands, saying hi to people.
• 35:55
  So, yeah. You know, sometimes just standing around the ticketing booth is great.
• 35:58
  You know, you can say like what I used to do when I was doing comedy festival,
• 36:01
  I would say, you guys are going to do a show like a cool, I go,
• 36:05
  you know, here's a flyer to my show and i put a stamp on the back of it with
• 36:07
  like a discount code and i go like yeah if you want i can show you what you're
• 36:11
  in for and then i'll do a quick one minute routine,
• 36:13
  because if you're interested in coming here's a flyer it's a two for one to
• 36:16
  two for one tonight you know if you guys want to come please do but if not you
• 36:19
  know hopefully catch with the next one,
• 36:21
  and they will go buy a ticket that night you know because they're getting yes
• 36:24
  did you spend some money on paper,
• 36:27
  to market your shows for the melbourne magic festival i did personally yes Yes.
• 36:34
  I had the show being produced by the festival, so I didn't have to do a major
• 36:38
  investment, but I certainly took it upon myself to flyer and do things of that
• 36:41
  nature for myself. Yeah.
• 36:43
  And what does that look like? It's a flyer that, is it just a flyer?
• 36:47
  Is that all you had? Yeah.
• 36:50
  I was just printing flyers and posters and, you know, putting them up in areas,
• 36:54
  and maybe a couple of letter drops and stuff in my area, things like that.
• 36:58
  Yeah. All right. Yeah. Cool.
• 37:02
  I wonder if you could go put them on like automobiles in the area,
• 37:05
  go, go put flyers in like windshields and stuff like that.
• 37:08
  Yeah, it can do for sure. You know, like people like LJ, I mean,
• 37:12
  LJ was performing in a, I think it was a 300 seater, you know,
• 37:16
  five nights a week, you know, and he was, you know, selling a lot of tickets.
• 37:20
  And so we, if you drive through our town right now, you will see kind of like
• 37:24
  where all the big posters, all the billboards are.
• 37:26
  Like there is, there's, there's LJ right there, you know, big,
• 37:30
  big blue poster with him on it. Like he's really giving it a crack,
• 37:34
  you know, and it's a good, very good show. Very, very good shows.
• 37:38
  Yeah. I absolutely loved it. So, so those are really good moments to tinker around with.
• 37:43
  And then there's like, look, gigs
• 37:44
  aside, like the festivals aren't about necessarily winning all the time.
• 37:50
  The real wins that you get. And what I mean by that is like,
• 37:53
  oh, you know, maybe, maybe you won't go there and make like a ton of money,
• 37:56
  which is not always what it's about. But what you do get is like all these opportunities to meet people.
• 38:01
  A lot of people come there scouting you know people for ships and things of
• 38:05
  that nature this does happen you know and the wins that you get out of it like
• 38:10
  like you gain friendships,
• 38:12
  you know there's there's people who come internationally to be a part of this
• 38:15
  you know we have heard a nun who's come down we've also got magical magical
• 38:19
  katrina who just arrived the other day she's doing shows there she's doing like
• 38:22
  a kid show and an adult show which she was doing i think at the Hollywood fringe,
• 38:27
  where she actually did that act here in Vegas.
• 38:29
  She did like 12 minutes at wonder ground, the magic spy show.
• 38:34
  Yeah, that's correct. Yeah. How was the act?
• 38:37
  It was a work in progress at wonder ground, but you know, I didn't hate it.
• 38:44
  I admire anyone who finds a unique point of view and takes a swing at a home
• 38:47
  run. And Katrina's doing that on the regular.
• 38:52
  Maybe too regular. Yeah. And this is the thing, right?
• 38:55
  So for me, like some of the best moments I had, like it's the friendships,
• 38:59
  it's sharing new ideas, you know, the networking, potential future bookings,
• 39:03
  collaborations, and just being around people and being inspired is equally as fun.
• 39:08
  There is a very surrealist type performer. His name is Dane Certificate.
• 39:12
  And for me, every moment I spent with this guy was the best part of the festival.
• 39:17
  We were in the green room. Everyone had bailed. and you know shows finish at
• 39:21
  like nine or ten we were there to like past midnight just the two of us you
• 39:25
  know we were doing stuff where he like does he's like a whole act like with ice and,
• 39:30
  and snow and stuff like that and so like we were just getting crazy man if anyone's
• 39:34
  been like scoped at our discord go look at the post and roast i got a couple
• 39:37
  of ideas that we were working on that night,
• 39:40
  it was like crazy late so check out the two like the couple of things we came
• 39:44
  up with this whole like crazy idea with like a piano accordion,
• 39:47
  it is just it's just wild man and then we start thinking about really crazy
• 39:51
  ideas so for example there is.
• 39:54
  Nicholas j johnson who's been on the show before he's known as australia's honest
• 39:57
  con man we have this act and everyone like even her nun you know who's come
• 40:01
  all the way from argentina to see the act he was backstage at the time and i was like,
• 40:06
  hernan quickly gary's on stage come come see gary he's like gary i'm like come much gaddy,
• 40:11
  so gary the magician is one of those wacky waving inflatable arm flailing tube men.
• 40:18
  And we just put it on the stage and then we turn it on and then he's just doing
• 40:22
  this the whole time like just doing the wacky like it's just green wacky waving
• 40:27
  thing and then we'll do like self working tricks.
• 40:31
  While he's doing it like he'll do like a self-working card trick while this
• 40:35
  like stupid wacky waving and flailing thing and it is 50 kinds of funny,
• 40:41
  because it's falling over people and it's like and then you know and then like
• 40:44
  because it's like they're holding the cards and And like his big head comes
• 40:47
  over and was like, oh, sorry, pick another one.
• 40:48
  I saw the card, you know, like, it's just, it is so funny. People were like,
• 40:53
  just giggling the whole time this routine was happening. He did like a book test type thing.
• 40:59
  And then, and then after the show, we're sitting around and we're like,
• 41:02
  we came up with like nine more ideas you could do. We could do like escapes,
• 41:05
  we could do this, we could put a blindfold on him. We can do like all this stuff.
• 41:09
  You know, one of the, we got somebody to like hold his hands while looking into his eyes.
• 41:12
  Like it was just so weird to watch this like self-working card trick with this
• 41:17
  giant wacky waving tube man all the while, you know, like he's just side of
• 41:22
  stage with a microphone, just being hilarious.
• 41:24
  Like it's just 50 kinds of funny. And that's the thing, like no one really would
• 41:29
  have thought of that all too much.
• 41:31
  Um, and then we'll go in like, oh, you could like finish the act with like maybe
• 41:33
  something inside of the fan or then like it releases confetti.
• 41:36
  So you can finish your act and then it rains confetti. You could do like a,
• 41:39
  you know, like a snow act at the end of it. You know what I mean?
• 41:41
  Like a snow storming China type deal.
• 41:44
  So there's always really funky, like crazy ideas that we had.
• 41:48
  And this is what you do when you just hang out with the guys.
• 41:51
  Going to these festivals, events like this, and being able to hang with like-minded
• 41:55
  individuals who are, you know, as passionate as you are about putting a show in front of people.
• 42:02
  That's maybe the biggest benefit of all. if you know you're,
• 42:06
  i would say maybe new to the game you know maybe if you're a grizzled veteran
• 42:09
  this isn't as important but,
• 42:12
  definite benefit to doing these kind of events for sure,
• 42:16
  and then you know after each show we all end up at this this sports bar it's
• 42:19
  called kicks you know and we get right we get we get pizza we get a couple of jars,
• 42:24
  and we sit around with jam magic like the year before we had eric leclerc come
• 42:28
  down and tobias dostell and tobias dostell has this bum bag,
• 42:33
  which is hours upon hours of awesome in there and just sitting with that guy
• 42:38
  he'll be like oh here's another idea and here's another idea and we just start
• 42:42
  playing with stuff and sharing ideas and thoughts and,
• 42:45
  you know like it's just it's a very open respectful community like no one's
• 42:50
  there to and the thing is and if you are going to be someone who's going to
• 42:53
  be like that like you will get,
• 42:55
  nipped in the bud immediately you know like and you will be corrected on yo
• 43:00
  we don't do that here you know,
• 43:02
  i'm really proud that like we have that in our melbourne magic community i really really am so.
• 43:08
  That's where the magic is man the moments in between and you know what it's
• 43:11
  the same as like magic live right like lectures are cool you go in there it's
• 43:14
  dark you tend to fall asleep sometimes i get it but where the memories are made
• 43:19
  it's at the alligator bar you know,
• 43:21
  it's sitting around a smoky room with a bunch of card guys like that's that's
• 43:26
  where the magic really happens and that's very much what the festival offers
• 43:30
  as well it offers that convention type moment.
• 43:34
  Man like my highlight from magic live last year like the one thing i'm that
• 43:39
  was worth the entire trip for me was,
• 43:43
  learn yeah pascal but teaching me how to anti-farro was worth the price of flying there,
• 43:52
  like and he wasn't even attending the convention he was just hanging out in
• 43:57
  the bar jamming with everyone and i couldn't be happier yeah and i had nothing
• 44:02
  to do with the convention.
• 44:05
  Anyway i feel like street performing is that way too if you're in a good pitch
• 44:09
  you're hanging around you know a bunch of other yahoos like-minded hang out
• 44:14
  hang out after work talking about the art you know in between shows,
• 44:20
  passing notes yeah yeah.
• 44:23
  I miss if there's anything about street performing i miss it's that it's the
• 44:27
  camaraderie on the pitch with the other artists like i don't I don't miss performing
• 44:31
  out there as much, but I do miss that part of it for sure.
• 44:36
  And you know when you're watching someone's act and you just little things you
• 44:39
  know like even just yesterday like before the gala i was hanging out with with
• 44:43
  my buddy clement who has a magic shop in sydney,
• 44:46
  and he was like oh can i show you some stuff and then i was like yeah i guess
• 44:49
  i'm working on it so i want your advice i'm like absolutely so he was performing,
• 44:52
  like in between a couple of us and there was a phase where he was about to do
• 44:57
  the magic he said stop one sec i go say this line it's funnier and he was like,
• 45:01
  that's a great line i'll write that down you know and i'll just go now keep going like,
• 45:05
  it was just you just have those little moments where you go through it you know you know erica van lee,
• 45:10
  who who's down from uh is she still performing in vegas erica van lee,
• 45:16
  that name does not ring a bell is it a female magician so erica van lee was
• 45:20
  a female magician who was doing shows right after mine at the festival which
• 45:24
  is one thing i'll just make mention real quick because i did this so not to be a detriment to her
• 45:30
  but make sure that because i've been in situations where,
• 45:33
  there's been people performing before me that they tend to either one go over time,
• 45:37
  and then after they go over time they're just talking to their friends and hanging
• 45:40
  out and it's like yo my show starts in 30 minutes yeah can you please get your
• 45:45
  stuff off the stage because i need i need to get ready i gotta do my lighting
• 45:49
  cues i gotta do my whatever you know so,
• 45:51
  that's one thing to keep in mind and i definitely did that with respect to erica so.
• 45:55
  Like that's an important thing so erica used to be an assistant who worked alongside
• 46:01
  so many people i think she worked alongside jonathan goodwin also worked alongside
• 46:05
  like chris angel doing stuff for his his acting assistant and then she decided
• 46:10
  to do her own thing and she was being she was a student of shimata and
• 46:13
  you know was gifted the parasol act,
• 46:16
  which she does in beautiful magic you know she does really beautiful manip and
• 46:20
  a whole bunch of other stuff and yeah and her routines are great you know,
• 46:24
  and, and again, I have notes, you know, at the end of it.
• 46:27
  Cause again, she's like, it's a new show and I wouldn't mind getting it on a
• 46:29
  ship. And I'm like, well, I got notes.
• 46:31
  And she was like, the show, I said, show is great script. I have script ideas.
• 46:35
  I have script ideas to add strength to everything you do.
• 46:38
  You know, a buddy of mine was doing this routine. You probably know it.
• 46:41
  It's this kind of like square, looks like a coaster, right?
• 46:45
  And then what happens is he puts, it's like a shot glass and then a glass.
• 46:49
  And as you're holding it, you put the coin in it. It just kind of shoots into
• 46:53
  the thing with your glass. You've seen this device before?
• 46:56
  That is Copenetra is the name of that device.
• 47:00
  Yeah. It's basically a bunch of rat traps in a thing. Yeah. Now my buddy's presentation.
• 47:05
  It's a great trick, actually.
• 47:07
  It's a great trick. But my buddy's presentation for it was porridge.
• 47:10
  And so I was like, you know, he was presenting it in this very strange way.
• 47:16
  And then we came to this sort of thing. It was like, oh, it's about hard rubbish
• 47:20
  and the idea of giving things that have been discarded new life.
• 47:23
  He's like, so I found this thing. I don't know what it is. I think it's like
• 47:25
  the handle of a cupboard.
• 47:27
  And I think this is like a thing. And then I found this glass,
• 47:29
  which I assume was for beer because it came with some shots.
• 47:33
  And I said to him, like, because he's doing comedy magic and most of us know
• 47:37
  that. comedy magicians aren't good at either.
• 47:39
  And so I was sitting down with them. I was just like, yo, like, yeah.
• 47:45
  And I was just like, yo, if you're going to be funny, like this,
• 47:47
  make it funny. Like say, this is some, I found this on the side of the road.
• 47:51
  I found this. So what I'm kind of saying is that this, this routine is trash.
• 47:56
  It's absolute rubbish, but I hope you like it. And then you do the magic and
• 48:00
  it's endearing in that moment, but the way you're doing it is rubbish.
• 48:03
  Like so presented as rubbish you know so that's one of the things you can kind
• 48:08
  of do with that so having those moments we can share things totally awesome,
• 48:14
  Yes, now we're sharing our mime capabilities as we sit here in silence.
• 48:20
  Moment of silence for that last commentary. Well, look, okay,
• 48:26
  so, you know, as we go the last 10 minutes, we kind of wrap this up.
• 48:29
  I think that just taking a moment to appreciate, like, why you would do it.
• 48:34
  One, take a moment to work on your material.
• 48:36
  You know, you don't have to do all new Flash material, but if you're gonna,
• 48:40
  like, you know, for me, I tried all new stuff.
• 48:44
  Some of the things I was working on did not play to the room quite well enough
• 48:48
  and as a result I decided that I was going to sub out a couple of things
• 48:52
  and hyper focus on improving one or two routines at most really hyper focus
• 48:57
  on that so that was the main thing I kind of focused on which I'm really proud
• 49:00
  of which is why I now have this like Q&A effect that we've I've mentioned so
• 49:03
  many times in the pod prior,
• 49:05
  I got to make beautiful new connections I got to share my magic and my thoughts
• 49:09
  and ideas with like proper international killer performers i got to hang out
• 49:15
  with really cool audience members there was people who.
• 49:18
  You know came and saw my show and they were like you know great show loved it
• 49:20
  and they say like oh i was jonathan goodwin's assistant like i met this lovely
• 49:23
  lady helen you know and then i took a selfie with her and i'll send it to goodwin
• 49:27
  like immediately he was like oh helen bless tell her i say hi like,
• 49:31
  those were great you know so take a moment, like watch lectures,
• 49:35
  jam with people, introduce yourself to people.
• 49:38
  If the, if, if it's happening in your town, be hospitable to the people who've made the effort here.
• 49:43
  Like, it was such a pleasure to walk up to Anand and say, Hey,
• 49:46
  thank you so much for coming down. It's not easy to get here.
• 49:51
  You know, hang out with like the kids who were starting magic for the first time.
• 49:56
  You know, like we have a junior championship that, that happened the other day.
• 50:00
  Take an opportunity to go and support them, you know, like go watch the show, show them some love.
• 50:05
  You know, we have these producer passes that are gifted to us,
• 50:08
  which give us the ability to sit. It's like, you basically like wait for everyone
• 50:12
  to go in. And if a seat's available, you go and take a sit, you know,
• 50:14
  and you can watch the show for free.
• 50:16
  It's a privilege you've paid for, for being part of the festival,
• 50:19
  do that type of stuff, take notes. And like, by all means, jam till two in the
• 50:25
  morning and get kicked out of the bar.
• 50:27
  That's where all the magic is. Those are those are the beautiful moments that's
• 50:31
  where the fun's to be had so,
• 50:34
  get around that yeah man and you're about to go and do it all at magic live in yeah,
• 50:42
  yeah got 20 days to rest up i suppose get in a shape so i can destroy my body
• 50:48
  drinking and having fun are you and eric doing that calendar thing that you
• 50:52
  talked about last year calendar thing,
• 50:56
  Where you get in shape and you shoot a calendar. Oh, yeah.
• 51:01
  Yeah, we're going to do that if you were coming because you've got the camera
• 51:03
  skills, but that would be a great idea.
• 51:07
  We joked last year about like getting in shape, like using Magic Live as a means
• 51:12
  of getting in shape and then shooting an actual calendar, like getting a bunch
• 51:15
  of people, magicians, and then doing a calendar shoot at the pool,
• 51:20
  at Magic Live and doing that every year would be hilarious.
• 51:25
  Yeah. So what you're saying is you decided not to get in shape because I'm not going to be there.
• 51:34
  I mean, you're looking in shape anyway, but I mean the fact that you're not
• 51:37
  doing it, I don't think me not being there is no other cameras available.
• 51:43
  Well, in truth, I am down nine kilograms.
• 51:46
  So I am definitely in shape. And not to pump my tires up, but I've been complimented on my figure.
• 51:56
  While being at the festival saying like, hey man, lose the money.
• 51:58
  I'm like, yes, because I was genuinely preparing to take my shirt off and be
• 52:02
  by the pool at Magic Live without people throwing up in their mouths.
• 52:06
  I think people would pay for a Nick K calendar. Like every month,
• 52:09
  there's a different magic prop hiding your junk. That's a great idea.
• 52:15
  Maybe a Magic Guys calendar. Oof. Yeah. That dicey. Yeah.
• 52:21
  I mean, we've got to send one to Herbert. but he basically is paying his off
• 52:25
  in installments, $6.66 a week.
• 52:30
  This podcast conversation has gone to trash. Well, let me jump into this, right?
• 52:34
  So here's some of the fun moments. Here are some of the fun moments you can
• 52:37
  be a part of when you do a festival, right?
• 52:39
  You do sometimes generally have this like fear of missing out type of mentality, right?
• 52:43
  So for example, the other night we were doing Best of Fest and one of the performers
• 52:48
  was doing this very interesting presentation where they took like a mineral
• 52:53
  bottle of water and they put a piece of wood on the top of it.
• 52:56
  And the idea was that like we all rubbed our hands and we generate this very
• 53:00
  small charge but if everyone does it we get this decent charge and we kind of
• 53:03
  like do this and then we go to push the piece of wood over.
• 53:08
  And so the wood's on there on this bottle right and then it just like it just leans,
• 53:12
  and just doesn't fall man it just it just got to here and was like i'm on i'm
• 53:20
  not going anywhere for three minutes,
• 53:24
  silence and we're all did this waiting just just waiting waiting for this thing
• 53:30
  to happen and we're like ah fall already,
• 53:34
  just wasn't happening and so i'm sitting there as the emcee going like i've
• 53:38
  got to do something about this so i'm side of stage at this point so i reach
• 53:41
  into my my jacket i pull out some cards and i'm just throwing cards inside the stage,
• 53:46
  and i'm and i and i'm missing and I'm throwing it with everything I got.
• 53:50
  I got one guy, this lovely man I met from New Zealand, Tim, got him right in
• 53:55
  the leg. He was like, ah, just piffing these things. Like if I piff them any
• 53:59
  harder, I'm going to take out someone's eye type of thing.
• 54:01
  Then I spring the deck over the entire apparatus.
• 54:07
  Yo, it lands everywhere but the stick. The stick is just sitting there on the
• 54:12
  edge of this bottle, just sitting there strong. And I got to the point where
• 54:16
  I was like, you know what?
• 54:17
  I'm going to have to do something drastic. So I take off my shoe and I throw
• 54:22
  my shoe with everything I had.
• 54:25
  The funniest thing about it was that like, do you just see that they're watching
• 54:28
  this thing, try to bend. And then this shoe just comes out of nowhere,
• 54:31
  hits the bottle, hits the stick, it goes flying across the stage.
• 54:35
  But it was this kind of moment where it was like, here's the bottle.
• 54:37
  And then it was like, bang, and just shoe was in place and everything else was just vanished.
• 54:42
  It landed on the table, like so perfectly presented.
• 54:46
  And those little moments in between are like the most fun stuff,
• 54:50
  because sometimes you do, you do these shows and then these stories become the
• 54:53
  stories of legends you know.
• 54:56
  There's stories that i went like there's it's a it's a much longer story but
• 55:01
  there's been times where,
• 55:03
  my buddy does a dove act and then the doug flew the dove flew off and it wouldn't
• 55:07
  come down off the raft like off the rafters and so he was like come on buddy
• 55:10
  fly down fly down and he was like ah screw it and he threw his latex stuff at it,
• 55:14
  and it literally went like bang bang bang bam and then sat right next to the
• 55:17
  other dove so there was like a latex dove and a real one just sitting there
• 55:20
  like i'm not coming down screw this fantastic,
• 55:23
  yeah because it obviously like saw the act in the fire and doves coming in it
• 55:27
  was like no i'm not getting involved i'm gonna stay up here,
• 55:31
  this is like two or two two or three acts later you start hearing this like this,
• 55:36
  dove noises you look up and the dove is just nailing just totally like just
• 55:43
  totally giving it to the latex dove you know what i mean,
• 55:47
  and yeah and see and these are the stories that like just happen at the festival
• 55:52
  you know what i mean like when you're a part of it,
• 55:55
  you will leave the theater and then they'll be like oh did you happen tonight
• 55:57
  what happened tonight oh my god this happened you know and it becomes the story
• 56:01
  of legends like it's just one of those things there's,
• 56:04
  so many stories of that nature that you yeah you want you just want to be you
• 56:09
  want to be a part of it you want to see it those sorts of crazies just will happen.
• 56:14
  Wow well let me end with this little story on the weekend i created somewhat
• 56:18
  of a legend story that will live out in the outback of winton queensland where
• 56:23
  i was performing for this on this cattle station property for this 70th birthday,
• 56:30
  this husband and wife live out there massive property the driveway took 20 minutes
• 56:34
  of driving to get out of like it was just insane,
• 56:38
  Anyway, real Aussie folk, and
• 56:40
  I'm there and I'm performing, it's like 60 people and I do some roving.
• 56:45
  And like the birthday boy, the 70-year-old guy, really hospitable,
• 56:49
  but like a little bit standoffish with me.
• 56:52
  Like I think he thinks, you know, I think he's a very godly fearing man and
• 56:57
  he thinks maybe what I'm doing is a bit on the devil's side of things.
• 57:01
  Like just a little bit, like he's just a little bit, like he'll watch,
• 57:04
  I'll do something magical. He'll be like, ha ha ha. oh, and then he would kind of leave that group.
• 57:09
  And like during the show I was doing, he was actually like, they paid me to
• 57:14
  be there, but he spent the whole time I was doing the show behind his own bar
• 57:19
  serving people to kind of like,
• 57:22
  to make sure he's like not pulled up on stage or something. I don't know.
• 57:25
  Anyway, pretty much throughout every group I went up to, I was opening with
• 57:30
  a one coin routine. So I was always seen rolling this 50 cent coin down my knuckles.
• 57:37
  And the next day I went back to the property because the Crack Up Sisters,
• 57:43
  a pretty famous duo, acro group of larrikin women, these two ladies, so good.
• 57:49
  They went out to perform and I went to go watch them. So I went back to this
• 57:52
  property and they do whip cracking and balancing stunts.
• 57:56
  Anyway, the guests started coming up to me. They're like, oh.
• 58:00
  Did you put a 50 cent piece in Mick's jeans?
• 58:04
  I'm like, that's a weird thing to say. Yeah, probably, you know,
• 58:08
  just laughed it off. And then another group came up to me.
• 58:11
  Oh, did you put 50 cents? He's been up all night asking people,
• 58:15
  did they put 50 cents in his jeans? Because he's convinced you made the 50 cent
• 58:20
  piece that you were performing with appear in his pants.
• 58:24
  Like, that's an odd thing. Yeah, whatever. Anyway, every single person I asked has been told by Mick,
• 58:31
  that I somehow planted this 50 cent piece in his jeans which he swears there's
• 58:37
  no possible way it could have gotten in there this is a new pair of pants and
• 58:41
  apparently he freaked out when he found it at night now,
• 58:45
  i have no idea what he's talking about this was not me at all but this is one
• 58:51
  of those things that i'll go along with forever because,
• 58:54
  it made such an impact on him that he couldn't stop talking about it so when
• 58:58
  i saw him that day the next day i just went up to him rolling a 50 cent piece
• 59:04
  i was like Oh, hey, Mick, how's it going? He's like, hey, you stay away from me, mate.
• 59:09
  And it was the funniest thing ever. So that story now will live on in Winton,
• 59:13
  Queensland, even though it was just a very weird coincidence.
• 59:19
  It's those coincident moments, sometimes the things that just make it awesome, you know.
• 59:26
  So with that being said, we have a guest on next week.
• 59:30
  And that performer you were talking about, how do you pronounce his name again, Nick?
• 59:37
  Which performer, buddy? The gentleman with the coin in the glass that could
• 59:41
  entertain a room with many people. Hernan Maccaño.
• 59:46
  Yes. In 10 days, he will be performing at the Brisbane Theatre of Magic.
• 59:51
  So for any Brisbaneites listening, You have a chance to see this gentleman perform,
• 59:56
  next week on Saturday, which is going to be awesome.
• 1:00:00
  This has been another week of the Magic Guys. And look, let's leave our final
• 1:00:03
  word with the Doug Meister, I think.
• 1:00:06
  We're going to leave it there and see you back next week with a wonderful guest.
• 1:00:12
  Did I press the button? I'm going to press the button.
• 1:00:16
  I'm trying to press the button, people. Hang on. Here we go.
• 1:00:21
  After 57 years on the planet i've come to the conclusion that three cats might
• 1:00:27
  be one too many i don't know.
• 1:00:34
  Thanks for listening it's time for us to disappear now disappear now but we'll
• 1:00:40
  see you again on the next episode of the magic guys.