Alchemical Reactions

I’m going to open up a whole new world for some of my readers in this post. Not my younger readers, probably. But if you’re 40 or above, there’s a chance you haven’t yet indulged in one of the pure joys of youtube: the reaction video.

People will say to me, “Why do I want to watch someone watch something?” I understand. That was my feeling as well for a long time.

Think about it like this… Have you ever made a new friend, or started a new relationship. And you’re like, “Oh my god… you’ve never seen The Usual Suspects? Oh, man, you have to. It’s so good.” And then you make plans to watch it together and you sit down with your bowl of popcorn and you fire up the movie and five minutes in the other person is texting on their phone or they’re falling asleep. And you get irrationally angry about it. You’re thinking, “I’m going to punch this piece of shit in the throat.” That’s because we like watching people experience the stuff we like.

With reaction videos you get to watch people who are engaged with the content experiencing things you enjoy, often for the first time.

My reaction video awakening happened maybe 18 months ago when I was searching for a comedy clip on youtube. The first one I hit on was a couple of guys watching that specific clip. And I laughed so much more watching it than I would have if I was just watching the clip itself. I enjoy stand-up, but if I watch it by myself I don’t do much out-loud laughing, even if I think it’s funny. But watching other people watching it gets those mirror neurons firing and makes it so much more enjoyable. It’s probably especially valuable during this time of social distancing.

Here are some of my favorite reactors on youtube.

For stand-up comedy, I like the guys at Frankenstein’s Lab. There’s the guy on the right in the hat who leans back, and the guy on the left who leans forward. That’s all I really know about them. But I love watching them have their shit cracked up. Here’s their latest.

For older music I like the channel India Reacts. She’s a sweet soul who gets very moved by the music she listens to. Here’s her reacting to “You’ve Lost that Loving Feeling” by the Righteous Brothers. For some reason this has become a very popular song for people to react to on youtube. Most of the music I see people react to online are songs that have been so played out for me that it’s hard to appreciate them anymore. Hearing them through the perspective of someone who is less familiar with the song gives me a renewed appreciation for them.

And finally we have No Life Shaq. He reacts to comedy, rap, and hard rock, among other things. He’s ridiculous and charismatic and fun to watch. Usually at least once every video he’ll toss off his headphones and walk around because he’s so excited about what he’s watching. He continuously says, “That’s tough!” about everything. From what I can gather, tough = awesome, excellent, inspiring, amazing, thought-provoking, terrible, crazy, upsetting.

Below is him reacting to Chop Suey by System of A Down and a George Carlin routine.

In general, it’s a pretty joyful genre of youtube videos. I can easily lose hours to it if I’m not careful.

The Juxe: Honk Beep Beep Honk Toot Beep

There are very few funny songs that I can stand to listen to more than a couple of times. Once the joke has worn off, I’m usually kind of done with it.

However, I’ve easily watched this video 50 times. It features two of my favorite comedic performers, Carl Tart and Drew Tarver, as their singing duo, Memphis Kansas Breeze, tackling their three favorite subjects: beer, women, and big shiny trucks.

Five For the Weekend

The entries for the contest mentioned yesterday have started coming in. It’s been cool to see what you’re going to be working on this month and getting your trick recommendations has been great. I’ve already identified a few tricks that I was unfamiliar with that I will definitely be tracking down, and I’ve also been reminded me of some stuff I already own that I need to take for a spin.

Some of you who already have a lot of Weber’s material have entered because you’re interested in the ebook, but you’ve also said you don’t want to be in the drawing for the prize package because you don’t want to take that away from someone else who doesn’t have much or any of Weber’s work. I appreciate that gesture. And if anyone else is in that position, just let me know in the email with your entry and I’ll put you down for the ebook, but not in the drawing for the giveaway.

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The Jerx Did It First

From my post on 3/17/2020

I mentioned on Sunday that I would use a few posts this week to tell you ways I’ve built off the virus situation to get into a trick.

Before I give my first example, let me suggest a bad way to do this sort of thing: Patter.

“These [sponge balls] are actually coronavirus microbes. Watch as they go from my hand… to yours.”

Well…

I’ll cut him some slack because it’s for kids and kids are dumb so maybe they’ll enjoy this sort of thing.

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My favorite feedback from the April Fools Day redesign was this from reader, JS.

I got the sensation of whiplash this morning. My mind was anticipating the small moment of joy that I feel when visiting your site. And instead when the magic cafe colors came up I got an overwhelming sense of depression. It really drove home my feelings about the two sites. The Cafe is a real bummer. There’s something depressing about a site that has eight ads for a “comedy bell” on its front page.

Ahahahahaha. Thanks, JS, that’s sweet. And accurate.

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If you’re not on their mailing list, Vanishing Inc is having an online magic convention this Sunday. I’ll definitely be checking it out. I’m a big Danny Garcia fan, for one. And the lecture promises: “chat and fun competitions along the way.” Chat and fun competitions?! I love chat and fun competitions (I record every episode of Ellen). And who are better arbiters of fun than Josh and Andi?

In their announcement for this “convention” they say: “You'll be able to interact and chat with the performers while they are live.” Okay, but please don’t, alright? No one cares about your dumb questions that grind everything to a halt. In the history of the Penguin and At the Table live lectures, not a single good question was asked by the audience. And those performers were lecturing for hours at a time. These people are doing 20-30 minute spots. They don’t have time for your horseshit.

Oh…whatever. Do what you want. In fact, take over the chat feature with dumb questions on my behalf. “Is roughing stick non-toxic?” “Do you think roughing-stick tastes good?” “Hypothetically, if you ate a roughing stick, would you call the doctor or just wait it out?”

Check out the details and sign up for access here.

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On Monday I have something special for you. It’s the world-premiere of a new trick from friend-of-the-site, Leigh Herbert. It is unlike anything you’re doing. No cards. No coins. It’s not mentalism. It’s something very different. I can’t say for certain how strong it plays because I’m currently spending 23 hours a day boiling myself in Purell and I haven’t tried it out in the real world yet. My best guess is that it’s the sort of thing that will hit really hard for some people, but even for people who don’t bite on the premise 100%, I think they’ll still find it a fun moment of magic. I have a feeling it will really capture people’s attention, as what you are doing is a very primal sort of effect, but in a modern way.

When people say, “What would you do if you really had magic powers?” This is one of the things you would do.

I’m psyched he’s letting me share it with you here.

Better with Weber Contest

It was sixteen years ago this month, back when i was writing my old blog, that Michael Weber wrote me an email that said:

“I enjoy your blog, despite my better judgement and sense of taste.”

This was back when people still needed to qualify their appreciation for my work. Hey, that’s fine. That’s still the attitude a lot of people have. “Oh…, well I guess I occasionally visit that and put up with his foolish for that once-in-a-blue-moon good idea he has. But as a serious student of magic, my favorite writer is definitely Henning Nelms.” Sure, okay. Meanwhile, your copy of Magic and Showmanship is under a mantle of dust; the cover practically snaps shut when you open it because it’s so tight from disuse. And if I look at your laptop there’s a ghostly image of the Jerx logo burned into the screen because of how much time you spend here. It’s okay, I won’t tell your secret. You’re a dummy just like me.

Anyway, I mention Weber because he, along with Tim Trono, have been supporters of my work and this site for as long as it has been around. And they’re both generous, good guys. (To me, at least. They may be absolute monsters in person.) With pretty much everything they release, they send me a copy to play around with, even though I’ve told them I’m happy to pay my own money for it.

Sometimes I end up with more than one copy of their effects. Either because they’ve sent me more than one or because of the convoluted way I procure magic. I have a couple friends who buy all my magic for me (with my own money) and then send it along to me wherever I might be staying. They handle the finances for The Jerx, so it’s just easier that way. I have a standing order with them to just buy anything Weber and Trono put out unless they hear otherwise from me. So sometimes I’ll buy something through one of my proxies, and then receive a copy from Weber/Trono as well. Sheesh! First-world anonymous magic blogger problems!

At any rate, I decided to take some of these brand new duplicate items and create a dope-ass giveaway for one lucky reader.

For the most part, Weber and Trono release their stuff on the down-low. That, obviously, appeals to my way of doing business too. So I won’t be giving away too many details on these products as they’re generally not things that are broadly advertised or sold in most online magic stores. You can search for more info and find some more details. Also if you’re not already on their mailing list, I would recommend getting on it. Email psience.mail@gmail.com and ask to be put on it. They didn’t ask me to say this. In fact, I’m not even sure they’ll be happy I did. But if that email address is still there, then they haven’t reprimanded me for putting it out there.

Here’s what the winner will receive…

Here is the brief description of what you see there:

Knowing: A mentalism demonstration where you know which of a number of objects your spectator is thinking of without asking any questions.

Lucky Day: Know someone’s lucky number without them ever saying it or writing it down. Keep it in your wallet, next to that aspirational condom you’ve had in there since 2011. (These are my descriptions. Not theirs.)

Crazy (and New Tops): Updated handling and gimmicks for the classic Crazy Cube effect. This includes the “New Tops” upgrade which makes the prop look almost identical to an old film canister. So now it appears more like a normal object.

The Truth: Michael’s take on the liar/truth teller and which hand plot.

The Seer: Michael’s peek business card case.

The Weber Wallet: Not a peek wallet. A shogun-style wallet with routines.

So there’s $600+ of magic and mentalism on the line here. And at least a couple of these items are not available any more.

“How do I win?” Hush a moment. I’ll tell you, but first let me tell you my rationale for why I’m conducting this contest the way I am. Everyone is bugging out these days with everything going on. It looks like for the next month, at least, we’re going to be on a partial lockdown in the US with similar situations happening in most other countries as well. The overwhelming majority of us are going to be fine, so our focus should be on how we come out on the other end better than we went in. The purpose of this contest is to get everyone thinking about that and to create a little gift for everyone who enters.

How To Enter and Win

Just follow the rules as written below. This contest is also a test of your ability to follow rules. If you mess that up, I’m tossing your entry.

Here’s how you enter. Send me an email at thejerx@gmail.com with a subject of: Contest.

The body of the email should contain these three items:

1. In one sentence, tell me a goal you’re committed to working towards this month. Something you’re going to learn or teach yourself or something you hope to achieve. This goal must be specific and measurable. “I’m going to learn to play guitar” is too generic. “I’m going be a better dad,” is meaningless. “I’m going to learn to play House of the Rising Sun on guitar,” or, “I’m going to spend an hour every evening with my kids,” are measurable goals. Your goal can be magic related or non-magic related. Could you just make up a goal you have no intention of following through on? Sure. But that wouldn’t be in the spirit of things.

2. Tell me about one of your favorite magic tricks that you perform regularly. Give me a basic description of the trick, where it can be learned, and then tell my why you like it. Be detailed, but don’t talk my ear off. And try to give me something I might not be familiar with. I want to learn about some stuff that might have slipped under my radar. Maybe it’s buried in a book/magazine/dvd. Or maybe it’s something that never got a wide release. Or maybe it’s your own unreleased trick. (If so you’ll have to give the method Hey, I’m looking to maybe learn some new stuff here. Not just hear some fan-fiction about a trick you can’t really do.) Don’t say ambitious card, or sponge balls, or something like that. I’ll just toss your entry. In fact I’ll physically print it out just so I can crumple it up and put it in the trashcan.

3. Tell me how you want to be referred to. This could be your full name, first name, initials, a secret code-name. I don’t give a shit. Just let me know.

Try not to include anything else of importance in your email as I will likely be filtering these out and won’t get to them for a few days.

Here’s the reason I need #3. I’m going to take everyone’s response to #2 and put it in an ebook that I will then send out to everyone who enters the contest. So while there will only be one winner, everyone who enters will get something out of this.

Yes, I know it requires a bit of work to enter the contest. But that’s a good thing. That means only the people who really want to win will go to the effort. So if you are interested in the prize, then your odds just went up, because I’ve eliminated everyone who is too lazy to submit an entry. I’d rather have 20 thought out entries than 1000 where people just had to submit an email address.

I will be accepting entries until this Sunday, the 5th, 11:59 p.m. EST. A winner will be picked next week at random. But, if your entry exceeds my expectations in some manner, then I may give you an additional chance to win. Essentially giving you an extra “ticket” in the virtual raffle.

New Look

This post doesn’t quite make sense now, but it did on April Fools day of 2020 when the site was redesigned in the style of The Magic Cafe (if you can call that a style). There’s a screenshot below and the text of that day’s post beneath it.

Sadly, I have to postpone the contest I mentioned recently for one more day. My friend who has the prizes on hand was just able to get me the photos of what we’re going to be giving away a little while ago, so I will definitely have that post ready for you tomorrow. I’ve come up with a contest that will benefit everyone who enters. And yes, it’s really going to happen. This isn’t some dumb April Fools prank. I don’t even like April Fools Day. Especially not the way it’s practiced online. It’s always just a bunch of corny ass bullshit that no one would ever believe. It’s just a waste of time and energy.

On a completely different subject, I wanted to use this post to announce the new look of the site going forward. Last Summer I got together with a 14-person design team and we spent three weeks discussing ways to bring some new life to this tired, old website. For the past eight months they’ve been banging out those changes. We went through 116 designs until everything was perfect.

I gave the designers three criteria:

1. It has to be both beautiful and sophisticated and ooze class.

2. It has to feel like it’s on the cutting edge of design. Not something that looked like shit 20 years ago and then hasn’t been updated in the interim 20 years.

3. The color scheme should definitely not be gross and nausea-inducing.

I think it’s safe to say they hit it out of the park.

Do you like it? You don’t have to answer that. I already know you don’t. You love it. You’re welcome.

Mailbag #21

The contest I mentioned in yesterday’s post will actually happen tomorrow. Sorry for teasing your little nutties like this.

Is Haim Goldenberg a supporter of yours? Or are you Haim Goldenberg? He pretty much just took your Coronavirus Magic Day #3 post and is now marketing it as a trick called CAMfabulation. I hope you’re getting a taste.—CA

A number of people wrote me about this. Look, It would not surprise me in the least if he read that post and decided to put his handling out as a download. Nor would it surprise me at all if he just came to the idea himself. It’s not so unique an idea that other people wouldn’t have it as well.

I’m not looking at it as anything nefarious. I just see a situation where the readers of this site got the basic idea earlier and for free because I’m a sweetheart.

My issue with Haim’s version is that the prediction is in an envelope. I’ve tried the trick with a prediction in an envelope. The reactions are nowhere near as good as when the prediction is in view from the beginning. Even just holding a dummy billet in my left fingertips throughout the whole process and switching it in for the accurate prediction when opening it up gets a better response than a prediction in an envelope.

Trust me. I’ve been performing variations on this for years. I first mentioned a version of this effect five years ago on this site, and I was doing it for years before that. If the prediction is completely hidden, then it needs to be complex, not something you could have just scribbled off camera. However, if the prediction can be seen in some manner then you can get away with writing the prediction yourself in real time.

Your audience will tell you this, by the way, if you use a hidden prediction. There will be a moment of surprise and then they’ll say, “Wait… did you just write/draw that off screen while we were talking?” It’s a very straight-line solution. But, if they feel they were able to see the prediction the whole time, then you have something that is much more difficult to backtrack.

I've long taken your advice to invest in my happiness to heart and I think it might bear repeating on the blog.  For those of us who are able to work remotely and thus have no disruption to income, but will not be spending money on entertainment in the near future, we might consider donating that money to the artists we enjoy who are especially hurt by the situation.  Now more than ever is the time to show our support in a financial way. —CC

Yes, definitely. Those of us who haven’t been significantly affected by this situation financially should do what we can to sort of spread the wealth in whatever way we can. Especially to those who weren’t at a job with a regular paycheck and thus wont be getting unemployment benefits—freelancers, gig economy folks, that sort of thing.

That reminds me… are there any web designers out there who would be interested in redesigning this site? I’m pretty much happy with the way it is, and prefer to keep it simple. But your creativity may exceed mine in this ares and if you have an idea for some way to change it up while maintaining the simplicity and the esthetic of it, I’m open to hearing pitches.

Do you think magicians are going to have to reconsider touching people? —AG

This isn’t really an issue for the social magician. You should already have some sense of the boundaries of the people you’re performing for, so once we get back to normal, you should perform within those boundaries. There are some people who wouldn’t be comfortable even touching hands before all of this, so obviously I wouldn’t do anything that involved touch with them. Then there are other people who are much more liberal with their physical touch. Those people may be fine with anything: hand holding, close whispering, putting hands in each other’s pockets, swapping gum, hugging, touching various body parts, whatever. Sure, you may want to re-establish your boundaries with them when this is all over, but I think anything is still on the table. If you’re not good at picking up on people’s comfort level, then you probably should just keep to yourself.

For the professional, it’s a different story. I forget who the mentalist was, but I believe it was someone well known. He would pull a coin envelope out of his pocket, have something put inside, and then ask the spectator to lick the flap while he held it. His dirty fucking pocket envelope! It’s astonishing the lack of insight some performers have.

The simple rule for the professional performer (even if there had never been a virus outbreak) is that if you wouldn’t cross a physical boundary with a stranger in a non-performing situation, then it’s not something you should do in a performing situation. You might say, “Yes, but it’s my art, and to do it as I want to, I need to hold their hand and caress their cheek.” No you don’t. You almost certainly don’t really need to touch anyone anywhere. You’re a magician, not a proctologist. If you feel you absolutely have to touch someone for an effect, then get permission before you identify your spectator. What I mean is, I’ll see performers bring someone on stage and then be like, “Is it okay if I [hold your hand, touch your forehead, etc]?” But at that point you’re essentially coercing the person into going along with it using social pressure. And frequently the audience can tell the person feels super awkward. It’s so much better to just eliminate that before you choose someone. “For this next piece I’ll need a volunteer. Before you raise your hand, just know that for this to work I’m going to need to invade your personal space a little and rest my hands on the top of your head. So if that would make you feel uncomfortable, don’t volunteer.” That may feel like an unnecessary step to some of you, but I think by getting it out of the way early on, you don’t have to interrupt the flow of the effect once you’re in it, because you know the other person is down to clown.

Look, no one likes ratcheting up the physical interaction with people in a trick more than me. For god’s sake, I wrote about fingering a girl with a D’lite on your hand so you can make light shine out from her vagina. But I was saying that’s something you could do for someone you already had that level of intimacy with. I wasn’t like, “Here’s a good idea for you trade-show performers.”

Fred Durst Did It All... For This?

I know you’re thinking that’s a really dumb joke and that nobody more than ten years older or ten years younger than me will even get it, and even if they do, it won’t make them laugh. But actually you’re wrong. It’s actually a good and smart joke that will bring much laughter to nice people. AMBA, The Academy for Magical Blog Arts sent me this trophy in recognition of what a good joke it is.

Okay, look, I wasn’t even supposed to be posting today. Get off my back.

My time is being spent working on the newsletter that’s going out tomorrow. When I went from a quarterly newsletter to 10 times a year, I anticipated each one to be about 12 pages. But this one has gotten much longer and taken more time than I anticipated. Supporters will be receiving it tomorrow evening.

Also in tomorrow’s post I will be announcing a contest. Usually nothing on this site is super time-sensitive, but in this case you’ll only have a couple of days to get your entry in, so make sure to check back soon as it it’s going to be a good one.