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The Effect

First, the blurb from the box. You should note that this is a 3 DVD set.

The middle of the Nevada desert. Four hundred square miles of nothing. Not even streets. Just 50,000 people attending the world’s largest art festival.

It’s survival magic and there are no spectators, only participants in the most extreme conditions imaginable.

Welcome to Burning Man and Magic at the Edge.

Since the dawn of time, magicians have sought inspiration in the most unusual places. Burning Man is one of the most inspiring environments for performance magic in all the world.

You’ve seen Mr. McBride featured on A&E’s Mindfreak, Star Trek, Deep Space Nine, and VH-1’s Celebracadabra. Now you can see Jeff in action performing his magic at one of the wildest places in the world, the Burning Man Art Festival.

But this is far more than just a performance video. It’s a teaching video, an exploration that searches for the very heart and soul of magic. Here is an inside look into the lifestyle of one of the world’s great magicians and how and why he seeks inspiration.

Magic at the Edge offers magic for all skill levels, with commentary from Eugene Burger and Jeff’s wife, Abbi McBride. They share their philosophies and techniques on performance. They teach you how you can add more meaning to your existing routines and use magic to teach powerful lessons. Polish the magic you already perform and experience the wisdom of these masters of the art.

Content

Disk 1 – Magician 24/7
EFFECTS: Tribal piercing – magic wishing rainbow – rainbow to dollar – wishing rainbow/rainbow to rose – magic bubbles – Hindu rope rising card – the bead and string mystery – world’s fastest hands – no smoking – the pod belt – trash blendo – McWallet. DISCUSSIONS: Magician 24/7 – audience participation – flight time – 21st centrury street magic with Eugene Burger – Definition of a magician. BONUS: Meet Jeff McBride – the shaman’s drum – McTip 1.

Disk 2 – Survival Magic
EFFECTS: Houdini straight jacket – magnetic cards – heart connection – prisna’s dancing cane – the shark fin pin – samina’s into gold – trash to treasure – business card connection – McQuick tip trick – McMint DISCUSSIONS: Travelling with props – less on – interview with sensei Strange. BONUS: Mystery school – assistant’s revenge – McTip 2

Disk 3 – Art Attack
EFFECTS: The Chen Lee McBurger Water Suspension – water in the newspaper jinks – listen to the mustn’ts – hermetic stargazer – spellbound – spellbound moves – burning man in the hand – the fire ritual. DISCUSSIONS: About burning man – simplicity. BONUS: Kabuki’s magic – McTip 3 – TV commercial – fire circle

Cost

Approx £60 from a variety of outlets. This DVD is being pushed at the moment by all of the popular magic magazines.

Difficulty
(1=easy to do, 2=No sleights, but not so easy, 3=Some sleights used,
4=Advanced sleights used, 5=Suitable for experienced magicians only)

1 to 2

Review

I've been reading more and more books recently and many of these contain contributions by Jeff McBride. Whilst I don't necessarily agree with many of his views they have been at least been thought provoking.

So when I saw this DVD in Mike Danata's studion it was one of those impulse purchses.

The valuable bits on this DVD are few and far between and are mainly focussed on presentation. To be absolutely honest, I didn’t find any of the routines to be anywhere close to being jaw dropping and I very much doubt that anyone with a little experience will add ANY of these routines to their performance.

The content comes across as very 'cheezy' and is almost embarrasing to watch, let alone think about performing. The routines featured are mostly basic with a lot of use of a TT and rainbow ribbon, flash paper and 'gifts' (paper flowers, paper hearts, beads etc.) to give away to people as part of your performance. Furthermore, there is a lot of repetition of these 'basic' routines with just a little variation between them.

Explanations are labouriously long considering their simplicity and this is mainly due to Jeff and Mrs McBride going into the cosmic and spiritual explanations of each routine and sometimes covering the same ground twice over.

Overall

Quite simply the worst DVD that I've ever bought. The more I watched .... the more that I loathed the content.

If you're expecting Jeff and his stage routines and card manipulations then this is definately NOT the DVD to get.

3 out of 10 as a reward to myself for actually watching all 3 discs having considered ditching them after the first.

Wow. That must have been a bummer...

I am most of the time impressed with McBride's products, but he seems to have lost something over these recent years.

Thanks for reviewing.

I havn't got these and have been wondering whether to part with my moolar or not.

I do like the look of 'The bead and string mystery' that is on the promo and am now wondering whether this can be found as a single item or in a book perhaps.

I'm guessing this effect isn't entirely new? DAT you gave all the effects 1-2 difficulty so it must be pretty simple to achieve, it looks like a cool piece of magic to me... you could easily change the patter to suit your own style.

anyone...

MATTrix wrote:I do like the look of 'The bead and string mystery' that is on the promo and am now wondering whether this can be found as a single item or in a book perhaps.

Would it be anything like Nana's Necklace? See the thread at http://www.talkmagic.co.uk/ftopic4223.php and the subsequent comments about Grandma's Necklace and even good ol' Reggie Scott!

dat8962 wrote:Whilst I don't necessarily agree with many of his views they have been at least been thought provoking.

I couldn't agree more, here. McBride is a gifted individual and I have great respect for the man. His whole, "be a magician 24-7," attitude though, well...

And, McBride is cheezy - he's as cheezy as they come (Kraft cheese and macroni has nothing on McBride).

But, he is one of the nicest guys you'll ever meet. Several years back, I attended "Houdini Days" in Appleton, Wisconsin. There were many big names there and Jeff attended each and every one of the lectures. Not only that, he brought extra paper and pencils for anyone who needed them. He's just a giving guy, easily approachable and sociable. He's the best amongst us, really, on so many levels.

Still, I cannot go along with his point of view. At the time, I was making my living delivering pizzas. While this may be a laughable way of making a living, my average was $20.00 an hour...That is really good money. In Jeff's lecture, he explained that he likes to do sponge balls on the pizza delivery guy's box, while he stands at the door.

I wanted to stab him in the eye with a fork. Look, Jeff, the pizza guy doesn't give two sh*ts about your sponge balls, he wants a good tip, paid quickly, so that he can go to his next delivery and hopefully get a good tip there, too.

Jeff McBride is cheezy, there is no doubt about this. But, to start including spirituality in his DVDs? Sad, sad, sad.

Mike.

Well - what can I say.........

Firstly, Jeff uses the example of performing a coins across routine on the pizza guy's box and performing a tipping trick with a TT to a taxi driver that picked him up for the airport at 05:30 in the morning. I instantly thought that he musn't have ever had a pizza or taxi in the UK.

He does come across as a genuinely nice guy and I would agree on the 'new age' thing as there's a lot of it on this DVD.

I enjoyed the brief clips of his stage performances including the Kabuki magic which is very much theatre orientated and interesting to watch but it's his close up on this set that I have issues with.

Onto the bead and string mystery. If you buy the DVD for this effect alone then you will be severely disapointed. It's an old effect that you will most probably find in a book. It's a very very basic effect and in terms of difficulty would come in at less than 1 .

dat8962 wrote:Onto the bead and string mystery. If you buy the DVD for this effect alone then you will be severely disapointed. It's an old effect that you will most probably find in a book. It's a very very basic effect and in terms of difficulty would come in at less than 1 .

Just for the record - you can get this with plastic beads at my local magic shop for the princely sum of $1.00 (or, 50p if your British!).

Mike.

Thanks for all your pointers, I like the look of Nana's Necklace Mandrake but I'm sure there's more to that effect than the 'bead & string mystery'; another item on the ever growing list if things to buy.

I live no where near a magic shop so this bead & string mystery is actually becoming a mystery, I've had a scoot around the online places trying to find this but to no avail can anyone shine a light on where I can pick this up for 50p!?!?!

I've got a similar trick whereby you use an elastic band and it melts through, very simple mechanics I'm guessing it's going to be similar principles.

MATTrix wrote:can anyone shine a light on where I can pick this up for 50p!?!?!

Woolworths, ASDA and perhaps the Party Land party supplies stores - its the sort of thing sold in the kids party favours/cheapo toys section. (Not that I go there often of course, except heavily disguised.....)