Shuffled, borrowed deck

[MichealMachek]

I'm not sure why, but I have an incredibly weird fascination with wanting to be able to walk around with almost nothing on me, and still be able to pull off a full magic show anywhere, anytime. I sent this question into the Theory 11 staff and they suggested posting it here. I'm trying to put together a set list of material that I can do with very minimal stuff jammed into my pockets. So far I have about 15 minutes of card material that I can do with a borrowed deck, It consists of things like ootw, cannibal cards, a few things from the royal roads. I recently decided to buy an iPhone so that I could load a couple apps on there to carry around too. I'm restricting my pockets to my phone, my wallet and 1 regular deck of cards. So I'm looking for recommendations of effects from Theory 11 or from the wire that fits my criteria. I could also do something that involves my shoes, hat, clothing, rings, or anything I could wear on a daily basis. But i'm wanting to have most of everything involve a regular deck of cards. I haven't really found a strong closer for me, I've been using premonition from ellusionist which is pretty good.

 

[RickEverhart]

First of all I would not limit myself to only Wire and Theory11 magic. That's just crazy.

Rubber band material is fine and doesn't take up space. Crazy Man's Handcuff's, band through thumb, Touch, broken and restored, band up nose, Traveling Cash.
Copper Silver Brass doesn't take up much space.
Ring magic - Garrett Thomas or Gregory Wilson
How about a wallet routine?Inside your wallet you could carry a few packet effects, a quadflex bill, business cards with (out to lunch principle) etc.
Carry a little notepad and a sharpie and perform a magic square or some other type of mental magic.

I'm just tossing out some ideas.

 

[Jacob L]

Agreed, don't look for stuff JUST on this site. There are PLENTY of other sites that carry good magic; Magic Geek being one of my favorites.

Rubber band magic is great, Dan Harlan has a DVD called Band Shark that's packed with material.
Coins: Digital Dissolve or Hopping Halves, Scotch and Soda don't take up pocket space at all.
Rings: Also look at Ring Master by David Jay, some killer stuff on there as well.
Wallets: There are a ton of gimmicked wallets out there, or just do what Rick said and keep some magic in there.

If you want things that you can "wear" on you: Dresscode is great, and Unbuttoned on the Wire seems pretty neat. Self Tying Shoelace is awesome, so is Timeless by Liam Montier. Also Jeff Kaylor's UCCU lets you perform miracles with a borrowed deck by having complete control of a card while they shuffle.

I would get Greg Wilson's "Off the Cuff" and "On the Spot" DVDs for impromptu magic with borrowed and everyday objects. If you get those dvds down, you can literally show up with practically nothing on you and wow the bajeebies out of people.

ACR can be a pretty strong closer. I've had people freak out from the Braue Pop Up move, and I usually will just stop there instead of continuing. If you want other closers with cards, there is an ungimmicked version of Anniversary Waltz I'm sure you can find, Devastation by Geoff Williams can garner some great reactions if it's played up well enough.

I feel like if you totally turn away from gimmicks (with cards, coins, whatever) you are almost hurting yourself because there are some incredible effects out there that yes use a gimmick, but it blends in really nicely and allows you to perform things you couldn't otherwise.
Hope that helped somewhat!

Jacob

 

[RickEverhart]

Thanks for jumping in Jacob, I'm grading a massive amount of quizzes right now and couldn't get too detailed. Yes, I meant to put gimmicked wallet but was in a hurry. Definitely go with a gimmicked wallet and then throw other effects into it. It will all fit in your pocket and you could definitely do a small show just out of your wallet and a deck of cards.

Another one I just though of that people absolutely love is Banachek's PK pen.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uoVpiq_WqcQ

I carry this thing everywhere and it fries people. It even writes normal as well.

 

[Jacob L]

No problem Rick, I love helping out.
I have yet to find a gimmicked wallet that appeals to me as a whole. But I do like the ultra Telethought wallet and the one that lights the business card on fire as you take it out (Hot Leads I think?)
That pen trick is pretty sick. I'm currently working on Greg Wilson's "Biclette" for my pen routine, just can't find the right materials at the moment.

 

[RickEverhart]

I use Ultra Telethought Wallet 2. It is insane...but it is more of a business card wallet not a wallet that you could carry other effects in.

 

[mayniac]

Look up Harry Lorayne's material for a bunch of impromptu card magic that laymen love. His Classic Collection volumes (there are three of them) are filled with it. They are a fairly large amount of money to drop on a book, but I think it's totally worth it. Also, I've heard very good things about his four dvd set.

Check out Cameron Francis's Moment's Notice e-book series (there are six of them) as well.

 

[Jacob L]

I use Ultra Telethought Wallet 2. It is insane...but it is more of a business card wallet not a wallet that you could carry other effects in.

Yeah understood, but a great way to pass out those cards nonetheless.

 

[Geraint2k2]

I did a 3 hour gig with just a phone and a deck of cards last month. Went incredibly well.

When I first started performing I didn't drive and had to catch the train, so I always wanted to minimize what I took with me.
Here are a few ideas for you to look into .... stuff that i've done for like 5 years.

Card suggestions :
- Two card Monte ( it's a must ... super easy to perform and gets great reactions ).
- Ambitious card routine ( which you can add things to, like card to mouth, or card to shoe ).
- Multiple selection find ( you can make up your own if you know a few ways to reveal cards ).
- Lapse by Daniel Madison ( from his lecture notes TWO - www.danielmadison.co.uk )
- Advocate by Daniel Madison ( get that from www.danielmadison.co.uk )
- Loaded 1 and 2 by Calen Morelli ( it's on his f9 dvd set ).

Mentalism
- Stigmata by Wayne Houchin (My first ever mentalism purchase ).
- Fate - pick it up on the wire for $4. You don't need any apps and can use borrowed iphones.
- Chris Kenners Rising Card App for iPhone ( get it from the app store. Search Rising Card )
- Take a look into Dee Christopher's stuff on his website www.mindlapse.net, he's got some great impromptu stuff.

Wallet stuff
- impromptu card to wallet
- keep coins in your wallet to do Justin Millers Silver Dream ( impromptu version ). Justins lessons on sleeving are invaluable, and he teaches a great retention vanish.
- Alan Rorrison has an in the hands coin matrix which is incredible. (http://www.alanrorrison.com/)


There is honestly loads out there, but that's the sort of things that suit my style, and they're relatively easy to learn, providing you know the basics.

I'm like you though, I carry my phone, deck of cards and wallet, and sometimes a flipper coin, but that's it. I try to make everything I do as impromptu as possible.

Good luck

 

[D ICE R]

Depends on what you are trying to achieve. You stated that you want to do a full show, so I assume you mean standup?
If that is the case I would definitely look into Mick Ayres' work. Basically every two years or so he releases a complete show that he preforms a thousand times. Basically he does 5 nights a week at a Disney hotel and each book in the Act Series uses no more than a deck of cards and the odd extra prop.

I would recommend looking at S Lie, it is billed as a one hour show (fully scripted) and all you need is two decks of cards. (One for most of the performances and one for the final effect as it uses a stacked deck).
Even if you skipped the last effect you would have a solid 45 minutes.

 

[eostresh]

Sounds like you have already got a lot of great advice on this so I'll just add my own two cents. When I first started out I made the concession of carrying my own deck. I did this because most laymen won't carry a deck with them at all times so if you want to do card magic....bring your own cards. That said if someone did have a deck I could perform most of my card material from a borrowed deck.
Next thing I did was took inventory of everything I carried with me day to day. At the time(bear in mind before moving to Korea I was a pretty outdoorsy guy) it was, wallet, keys, knife, lighter and a pen. So these were the first items I learned tricks with. I didn't limit myself to ungaffed items either. My first key trick was Greg Wilson's Florida keys and that evolved into, three ring circus, Spookey, and no I have settled on Key master.I started with color changing knives and that has evolved into Chad Long's Flash. I started with a few simple Zippo tricks and now I have a Serendipity(Ring to Lighter). I used to do pen through dollar and just kind of stopped doing it. I currently don't do many Pen effects. Then I have tried out several different Card to Wallets over the years. Naturally you can also use your wallet to carry a lot of other magic so there are other effects that I can do right out of my wallet.

So If I were you I would start with the same process. Look at what you carry around right now and start learning gaffed and ungaffed magic with those items. Your goal is certainly in reach. If someone walked up to me at any time of the day and asked for an hours worth of magic I could most likely do that just with what I carry with me day to day.

 

[nIvan]

I would like to toss out a suggestion for "More Memory Man" by Joel Givens. Borrowed, shuffled deck, supposedly memorized in seconds and then proven in awesome ways.

 

[RikAllen]

FASDIU or FASIDU II?

Paul Cummins has some great material inside those volumes.

 

[JD]

I second Geraint Clarke on Advocate by Daniel Madison. Madison is a genius for inventing that. It's so good. Definitely pick that up.

 

[GarethNg]

Metal by Eric Jones is a good DVD for coin magic.

 

[RobAnderson]

FASDIU or FASIDU II?

Paul Cummins has some great material inside those volumes.

You beat me to it! I was going to say, did you know there's actually a set of books named "From A Shuffled Deck In Use? You can get these books from Denny & Lee's shop at www.dennymagic.com