Issue 23 - November 08
Identity (E-Book)
Daniel Madison
Available from: www.magicshop.co.uk
Price: £14.99
In 2005 Daniel Madison gave a special lecture at a secret
location during the Blackpool Convention and launched his reputation as an
'underground magician' worth noting. Identity is a collection of Daniel's ideas
that have at other times been sold separately but which are offered now together
in E-Book format.
First, let me get a gripe or two out of the way. This book
is not an easy read. The reason is that it is written in a somewhat strange
style. The language is often pretentious and at times the word usage is so
convoluted and bizarre (and on occasions simply wrong!) that you read a
paragraph or sentence and find that you haven't understood what on earth he is
trying to say and need to re-read it in order to try and fathom out what the
point is. The book is also littered consistently and liberally with typos and
incorrect spellings and would therefore have benefited hugely from someone proof
reading it. If someone other than the author DID proof read it, then they should
have got someone else, because it's pretty awful.
OK, so looking past the way it's been written, let's look at what's been written. There are 12 main effects described often with many variations on each. The material is nearly all cards and most will appeal to those tending towards mentalism. Some of the ideas are very good. Daniel's clever variation on the Invisible Deck set up, called 'Irreversible', is worth a look and he gives a whole range of ideas based on the principle. I also thought 'Memento', which is basically an effect in which a name or word is found permanently written on the back of a freely named card, bears some investigation, even though it is similar to Fred and other such tricks.
The description of 'The Devils's Touch' sounds like a
utopian dream. The performer writes a prediction of a word which is placed to
one side. A spectator is asked to suggest any word at all. This is noted down
and moments later the original prediction is shown to be of the same word. All
this achieved without a swami gimmick in sight. Daniel thinks very highly of
this concept and I would think that anyone who practises the necessary handling
could make a true miracle out of it. 'Breach', which is Daniel's version of card
through glass table, is also quite intriguing.
Some of the effects in this E-Book require the use of
psychological forcing. This is a hugely high risk strategy and quite frankly if
you don't have the confidence or performance skills to carry this off, there are
two or three items amongst the dozen here that you won't be able to do. If your
name is Derren Brown, however, you may consider that you have found some good
new material.
If you are into mentalism with cards I imagine you would
find the material in this E-Book thought provoking and useful. It is not really
a book of ideas for a novice performer, as some of the tricks require a sureness
of presentation to carry them off, but at the price you only need to get one
idea out of reading it and you will have had some reasonable value. I suspect
that the right type of reader will get more than one. ML
What's Hot: in the right hands, some very strong material
What's Not: the writing - it made me cringe!
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