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Brainstorm: The Creative Card Magic of John Guastaferro Vol. 2

As promised - here is my review of volume 2. For those who know, I already reviewed volume 1 of this series. If you haven't read it already, it can be found here - http://www.talkmagic.co.uk/ftopic6396.php.

Available from:

UK - Alakazam Magic - £28.99
http://www.alakazam.co.uk/cgi-bin/sh000001.pl?REFPAGE=http%3a%2f%2fwww%2ealakazam%2eco%2euk%2facatalog%2fsearch%2ehtml&WD=brainstorm&PN=DVD_27%2ehtml%23a1173#a1173

US - Elmwood Magic - $34.95
http://www.elmwoodmagic.com/?nd=full&key=1677

You can find it in many other places, as well - these are just two shops that carry it.

Difficulty:
3-5 of 5
Like Volume 1, this dvd has something for almost everyone. I wouldn't call this a beginners' dvd, so I would say that a decent amount of card handling skill is needed. There are some advanced moves here, so be prepared.

What You Get:
Performances and explanations of the following-

Party Animal
A Triumph routine with a surprise twist. What I like about this effect, is that it gives a story line to the effect. John's handling uses the slop shuffle - and it works here. Just like everything else on these dvd's the moves have a purpose, and his presentation gives justification and meaning to EVERY move he makes. A spectator signs a selected card, and is then lost in the mix of the "party". The cards mingle back and forth, mixing over and over again (face up into face down). In the end, the party must be cleaned up. With the help of another spectator, the party is cleaned up and the deck completely rights itself - except for the party animal. The signed card is seen face up in a face down deck. For a surprise kicker, the card now has a different back!

Nice variation of an existing effect. It doesn't break new ground, but the presentation makes it a perfect trick for a party/bar situation. A tiny bit of setup and some basic card handling skill is all that is needed. Not a killer, but still a good effect.

Difficulty - 2-3 - Some basic handling ability is needed. Nothing that will bust knuckles. Standard fare for anyone who is already into card work.

Clairvoyance

Sadly, the reaction from the audience on the dvd wasn't nearly as good as this effect deserved. Considering the spectator does almost all of the work, this effect is a fantastic, impromptu display of real mind reading. A spectator shuffles the deck as much as he/she wants. Handed a group of cards to look over, the spectator picks one card from the group and then shuffles the packet to lose it. The packed it put back in the deck which is then cut a few times, the shuffled twice by the magician.

What makes this effect COMPLETELY baffling, is that after all of this is done, the spectator can change his/her mind. They can literally pick ANOTHER card from the pile they first looked through. While this wasn't utilized in the performance, the possibility for it makes this effect take on a whole different level.

Magician then says he wants the selected card to be the last card they see. Looking in the spectator's eyes, the magician shows a few cards at a time, until the spectator says they see their card in the group. Without showing the cards face up or looking at them, the magician looks into the spectators eyes, and names their selected card.

This trick uses the Faro - which unfortunately for means I can't perform this anytime soon. Still, the concept is great and the effect is totally worth it. Looks like I'm going back to learn the faro.... kill me now. I just can't get it. But that's a rant for another time.

Strong effect - capable of slaying an audience, I think. I'm sure people who know the handling have been doing effects like this for years, but since I'm not well-versed in this kind of handling it was new to me. Great trick, and I look forward to finally getting it.

Difficulty - 1-5 - If you know the faro, you're golden. If you're like me and you can't do the faro - the trick is impossible to pull off. Your faro doesn't have to be COMPLETELY PERFECT, but you need to know how to do it well. This trick also relies heavily on presentation, so you need to concentrate on how to perform it, just as much as the handling.

edit - I have since learned how to faro (to a reasonable degree - and I use this effect quite often)

Intuition

Small Packet effect - can be used by itself as a strong trick - or can be linked to the Out of the Blue routine (which makes it even stronger).

Magician displays a packet of cards, front and back. He is holding 4 aces and 4 queens. Placing the queens on the table, he mixes up the aces, face down and asks a spectator to choose one. After the ace is replaced, to be as fair as possible, the spectator is asked to mix the cards up, losing the selected ace among the others. Taking the aces back, the magician gives the queens a chance to "See" the aces. Picking up all of the cards, the magician explains how the queens are going to use their womens' intuition to find the selected ace. Showing each queen one at a time, the magician places the face down aces back onto the table, showing the queens one more time. Remarking how the queens' eyes are open, the magician says one queen will close her eyes to reveal the selection. Spreading the queens once more shows that one queen has turned face down. The face down queen matches the suit of the selected aces. Immediately spreading through the table pile, there is now one card face up among the aces - the QUEEN!!!! Turning over the face down card among the queens reveals the selected ace!

Strong effect, and it does work as a standalone trick. What's nice about this is it can be done with a normal deck (you can't do Out of the Blue, however). It's a nice variation of a twisted sisters concept, to me. IT has the added advantage of being examinable at the end.

Difficulty - 2-3 - You need to have a good Elmsley and good control of cards. It's not a knuckle buster, but you need some strong chops. Also requires some prep work, but nothing that makes the cards suspicious or stand out in a normal deck.

Out of the Blue
A killer finish to the Intuition plot. Here the magician takes the aces and queens - displaying the queens one by one, again - and turning them face down on the table. With the aces in hand, the magician says that the faces aren't important. It's the backs that are magical. With that, the magician counts through the cards and shows that one card now has a blue back. With a snap, the cards are spread to reveal two blue backs and two red backs. With another snap, the cards are spread again, showing three blue back and 1 red back. Squared up, the cards are twisted and with a snap, all of the card backs turn blue. Showing the faces of some of the aces, the magician remarks how if the aces are capable of changing their backs, couldn't they also change their faces? In an instant, the cards are counted through again, and now the aces have changed into queens!!! Picking up the table pile, reveals that the four red-backed aces were on the table the whole time!!

Incredible effect. This, combined with Intuition makes for a powerful multi-phase routine. These two little packet effects pack a TON of magical moments - mind reading, impossible transpositions, color changes - it has a bit of everything. Another thing that makes this really killer is that once you run through both routines, the cards are completely examinable. It's nice to see a big effect like this with ungimmicked cards.

What I really like about this effect, is how the first routine helps to solidify the image of the cards to the audience. having seen an entire effect using the same 8 cards, the color change really knocks them for a loop. Great trick.

Difficulty - 2-3 - Same as Intuition. Elmsley is a must.

Snowball Aces
This is a variation of John's own Tidal Wave Aces from Volume 1. In many ways, it is also a superior effect. (Tidal Wave Aces is still very good, though)

The effect plays out almost exactly like Tidal Wave. Magician openly shuffles a deck of cards, outjogging four face down cards among the face up deck. Spreading through the cards, he pulls out the four chosen cards to reveal the four aces. This is a nice, quick ace production. What makes it cool, is how it's a decent effect. You won't get any jaw-dropping reactions, I don't think - but it's really not what you want. The ace production serves merely as a nice distraction and set up for the REAL effect.

Taking the four aces, the magician turns them face down and asks a spectator to hold onto them for a while. The magician then tells a tale of how he was performing this trick in the winter time, and his cards accidentally fell in the snow. The ink melts off of the cards, leaving a COMPLETELY blank deck!!! The cards are fanned and both sides are displayed. Magician openly shuffles through the cards, proving the cards truly are blank. Waving one of the blank cards over the aces in the spectator's hands - the magician takes them back and shows that the faces of the aces have turned blank as well. Holding the cards up, the magician then tells how he held them up in the sun. And as the snow melted, the magician turns over the top card, and an ace has returned, turning the second over, another ace returns. Instantly, the entire deck has returned! The deck is spread and all of the faces have come back.

This is a nice variation of a Mental Photography effect. While not examinable, it still hits pretty strong. This would work well in the middle of a routine where you could switch a deck in to perform this, then switch it out to do something else. Nice effect.

Difficulty - 2-4 - Basic card handling ability is needed. Some aspects can be tricky to pull off smoothly and will take a bit of practice. More than sleight of hand skill, you need to be confident in handling the cards. There are some moves here that require you to be sure of yourself. If you stumble or stutter, you can be spotted pretty easily with this one.

Tailspin

A REALLY strong NFW-style effect. Far superior in that it uses normal cards and is completely examinable at the end.

Spectator picks any four of a kind, which is taken from a normal deck. The deck is placed on the table, and the magician explains how he is going to turn their cards over one-by-one. With a snap, one of the cards turns face down. The cards are squared up and when spread, two card have now turned face down. With another snap, the cards are spread to reveal three face down cards. The cards are squared and with a quick snap, the cards are counted showing four face down cards.

Magician reveals that the cards haven't actually turned face down - they've just disguised their faces to LOOK like the backs. Magician then shows four double backed cards. Then he thinks "Hey, if they can disguise themselves THAT well, maybe they can pretend to be an even better four of a kind!" Rubbing one card on the face of another, it instantly changes into an ace. Running the cards through his hand, the magician counts through them, showing 4 aces!!! The first four of a kind has vanished!! Magician then picks up the rest of the deck and shows the four aces again. "But you didn't want the aces, did you?" Turning them over and handing the spectator the four aces, he gives a quick snap - and the spectator turns the cards over to reveal their original four of a kind!

Strong effect - and a great ungimmicked NFW-style effect. This has a nice advantage over some of the others I've seen, in that the clean-up becomes an effect in itself. This leaves you completely clean at the end, nothing to hide, nothing out of the ordinary. It's a killer effect that blends in perfectly as a continuation of a 4 ace production. Outstanding trick.

Difficulty - 3-4 - Strong elmsley is needed throughout, and you need a sure hand for the finish. It's nothing terribly difficult, but you need to have smooth control and movement of the cards throughout.

Synergy
A nice four ace production where each ace helps to find the next.

John starts this out by using the Long Distance Spinner to find the first ace - but you can produce the first ace in any way. From here, the spectator is given the first ace - and as the deck is riffled the spectator can slide the ace in, face up, at any point. Asking if that's where they want it, the deck is then spread down to the ace. Amazingly the card right above the face up ace is the second ace!!! This is a nice little move that works so well and really baffles people.

Taking the two aces out of the middle of the deck, the magician then says he will make the next ace jump from the deck as well. Tabling the deck, the magician can riffle it and with a quick swipe (or other move, if you prefer) a face down card instantly appears between your two aces. Pulled from the middle the third ace is revealed. Taking the three cards, the spectator is asked to hold out their hand. With a quick riffle of the deck, the magician explains how the fourth ace, which is invisible, has just jumped from the deck onto their hand. Despite the frowns and obvious skepticism of the spectator, the magician explains that the other 3 will make it show itself. With a quick wave of the aces of the spectators' hand, a card appears face down on their palm!!! Turned over it reveals the fourth and final ace.

Ace productions are a dime a dozen. Most of them are similiar in many aspects, but some have a few added nuances that make it a bit stronger than the rest of the crowd. This is one of those. It may not get the proper response that it deserves, but it's still a very strong 4 ace production. What pulls it from the pack, is that it has quite a bit more audience participation than a standard sequence, which I like. The second phase alone makes it worth it - and it's a method that can be used in any number of effects. For that reason alone, it's worth learning this effect.

Difficulty - 1-3 - Depending on skill level, this can be amazingly simple or tricky. The LDS is pretty much the most advanced move in the effect. I don't particularly care for it, so I don't use it. You need some basic card handling ability to hide some of the moves.

Bizarre Prequel
A very strong, 3-phase routine built to work seamlessly with Paul Harris' Bizarre Twist. This works really well as each phase strengthens the impossibility of the effect by diminishing the amount of cards used. It also really helps set the stage for the AMAZING twist at the end.

Phase 1 - full deck
Magician removes the four jacks from the deck, placing them on the table. The spectator selects and signs a card. The jacks are now used to guard her card. The select card is placed face down between the jacks - with two on top and two on the bottom. The cards are then sandwiched in the spectators hands. Half of the deck is riffled at the spectator - and then the full deck is riffled at the cards. Putting the deck down, the magician then pulls the cards, one-by-one, from the spectators hands. All four jacks are removed and tabled - and to everyone's surprise - the selected card is gone!! The magician says your card is safe and sound - spreading the deck to reveal the selection face up in a face-down deck!!!

Phase 2 - five cards
To make it easier to follow, the deck is put away and the magician now uses only five cards - the signed card and the jacks. The selection is turned over and sandwiched once again. Using two of the jacks as "chop sticks" the card is sandwiched face down between them. Tabling the two remaining jacks, the spectator is now asked to hold onto the edge of the face down card as the magician holds the two jacks. Suddenly, the magician pulls the two jacks away to reveal that the signed selection has disappeared!!! Spreading the table jacks shows the selected card face up between them!!

Phase 3 - three cards
This phase is Paul Harris' Bizarre Twist. Using two jacks and the selection, the magician sandwiches the selection face down between the face down jacks. With a twist, the selection now turns face up between the jacks. This effect is repeated - the selection turning face up again. Now the killer finish. The selection is sandwiched face down once again, and with a quick twist, there is now a blue backed card inbetween the two jacks. The card is turned over to reveal your signed card!!!

Anyone who knows Bizarre Twist obviously loves the effect. John's prequel works just as well, giving two strong phases that work perfectly as a diminishing cards routine into the original. It also makes the revelation of the blue back card even more powerful, since the audience never saw it throughout the entire routine. This is another shining example of John's approach to routining. He builds upon a classic concept and makes it more powerful and stunning in the process. All three phases work perfectly, each one more powerful than the next, making a killer card routine.

Difficulty - 3-4 - This takes some more advanced card handling to pull off flawlessly. There are quite a few moments where you need to handle the cards in a specific manner to make them appear a specific way - so if you're not that sure of yourself in that area, you might want to practice this for a while before performing it for an audience. This isn't really a beginners' effect, so if you're new to cards, this might not be for you.

Jazz Fusion

John's variation of the Jazz Aces effect. His particular handling requires some "gimmicks" but it can just as easily be done with a normal deck.

Magician pulls 4 jacks from the deck, and lays them face down in a box formation. One jack is designated as the "leader" and is pushed to the front. The other three are placed in a row. The magician patters about creating a black hole, using 4 black spot cards. Outjogging them from the deck, the magician asks the audience to remember one card in particular.

Magician shows the 8 of spades - which is placed on top of the leader jack. One of the jacks from the back row is visually pushed into the middle of the packet. With a snap, the 8 of spades jumps back into the packet, and the jack has vanished. This effect is repeated with the remaining jacks - each time the spot card returns to the packet and the jack vanishes. Showing the four spot cards one last time proves the jacks have vanished.

The magician wonders "what happened to the jacks". The audience immediately thinks they have now gathered face down with the leader jack. Shaking his head, the magician says, "no, that's the mystery of the black hole. We'll never know what happened". The magician then turns over the four cards to reveal 4 cards with question marks on them. The jacks have vanished into the black hole forever!!!

Nice handling of a Jazz Aces routine. I don't really like the black hole concept, but as I said before, it can be adapted for ANY kind of storyline/patter.

Difficulty - 3-4 - Not too hard, not too easy. You need a good count, and some sturdy handling chops. Nothing in here will kill you, but it does present a REALLY clever method to be used elsewhere.

Gemini Prediction
This is probably the strongest effect on the dvd. The handling is devilishly clever and it's not that difficult to do, but it has the power to SLAY an audience.

Magician has a deck of cards, and tells how he's going to do a "pick a card trick". He then pulls out a few business cards and lays them on the table. He then says how the audience is going to go to dealing school. And begins to explain how it is done. As the magician deals the cards down onto the table, a spectator takes a business card and is asked to place it on top of the pile at any time. The remainder of the deck is then placed on top of the business card and the deck is squared up. Now, the spectator begins dealing cards down onto the table, stopping whenever they want. A business card is placed on top and the rest of the deck is placed on top. This is repeated with two more spectators - for a total of 4 business cards placed randomly throughout the deck. The magician then spreads the deck on the table. Asking the audience to watch him like a hawk, he pulls out the business card and the card right next to it. Doing that, he squares the rest of the deck and places it aside.

Wanting to see how lucky the audience is, he turns over the first card.... it's an ace!!! This hits the audience hard, and now the magician is really pumped!!! This is one lucky crowd!!! Picking up the next card he says and this is the ace of.... uh-oh!! The card is turned over to reveal a king. The magician quickly turns over the other two - a four and a five. Stepping back, he looks disappointed, saying "I knew this was going to happen". The audience looks on, thinking the trick has been messed up. Suddenly, the magician leans forward and says "No. I KNEW this was going to happen!" Revealing he wrote predictions on the backs of the business cards, he turns them over to reveal each card MATCHES the playing card it was paired with - number and suit!!!! This revelation will FLOOR an audience, without a doubt. As a final kicker, the magician shows that there was one business card left. It too has a prediction. A spectator turns it over and finds nothing written on the back of the card.

When asked, the magicians says he knew it would be blank - and as he spreads the deck the audience gets it. The ENTIRE deck is blank!

Super strong effect - no it's not examinable in the beginning, but it doesn't matter. Killer mind reading effect with a powerful ending. Also of note is that this does not involve a deck switch. The handling is incredibly easy (you only need to do one "move" throughout the entire routine, and even that's not actually a move).

Difficulty - 1 - This effect is so incredibly easy, it's almost funny. You need absolutely NO card handling ability to pull it off. If you can deal cards, you can do this trick. However, the only drawback is you need an audience that can follow directions. If you have someone in your audience who you think might try to screw you up, then don't perform this. If the spectator doesn't follow the instructions, the trick is ruined. Having said that, there really shouldn't be a problem. All you're asking them to do is deal the cards like they would in any card game. I just wanted to make sure it's known that the effect relies on how well your audience follows instruction.

Overall:
Again, no bad tricks on this volume. One thing I truly like about John's work is how he thinks about routining. A lot of dvd's of this nature just show tricks - which isn't bad. You learn great tricks, but you're left thinking about which effects to put where in the set. With the Brainstorm dvd's, some of that is done for you. Many of the effects (especially on Volume 2) will leave your deck in exactly the needed setup for the next effect. Instead of tossing a bunch of tricks onto a dvd and showing how they're done, John has carefully pulled these effects together to form a smart, well-planned, cohesive routine. From start to finish, you can perform this exact set and slay an audience. But again, John has managed to do something else with his effects.

More than just copying his effects and running out to perform, each effect is so clearly devised and well executed that you can immediately start adapting it to your own handlings and patter style. For instance, I love the Jazz Fusion trick, but find the patter behind it to be a bit out of my style. With the handling taken care of, and a few substitutions, I can adapt this to my own feel and presentation.

Another great thing here, is the little nuances and moves you learn here and there. New ideas, old ideas with new applications - it's all here. One tiny little move from one effect can open a floodgate of ideas for future effects. That's one of the hidden prizes of this series.

That's what sets these two dvd's apart from most, I think. So much thought and creative effort went into these. It's obvious that John has a great deal of respect and love for the arts, and it shines through like sunlight. His teaching method is clear. You are never confused or left behind. He covers every detail, making sure every aspect of each effect is explained properly. As with the first, you're expected to know the basics, so don't look here to learn the Elmsley.

I can't recommend this series enough. I have seen on his site that he now offers a lecture notes book, which I will most certainly be checking out. If you're looking to become a serious card man, this set is a perfect addition to your library.

10/10

Demitri,

Fantastic review there. You know I said I wasn't buying anything until I had De'vo's XB DVD? I might have to dip into my pocket one more time to get this set!

My bank balance is suffering because of you!



Cheers!

Yes, your bank balance may take a slip - but your trick repetoire will be so much stronger!!!