So I figured that if my magic career didn’t work out, the worst-case scenario is that a year later, I’ll just go back into the same job I had. Worst case scenario is that I’ll see you guys in a year.” Then two years later I was on the ‘Tonight Show’ and defin itely on the path I wanted to be on.ĭid you have a plan B if your magic career didn’t work out?Ībsolutely, at the time when I wanted to try magic as a career, I had no student loans or debt to speak of. Then they gave me a raise at my day job with Dell and I freaked out! I realised, “Oh wait, this is how it happens, this is how you get stuck doing something you grow to hate, the money just gets too good.” So as a direct result of that raise I said, “Oh right guys, I am going to take one year off, to try and do this magic thing and try to get it out of my system. So it was the highlight of my entire week and at some point, I just started to think, “Maybe I’ll actually do magic for a living”. The bonus of that was that I got to drink for free. We got to play with a lot of cool things as people would send us lots of samples.īut every week, on Wednesday night, I would perform at the Electric Lounge just off of 6th street and I would pass the hat around and make about $50. I designed high-end systems and networks for Dell. I was actually on track to have a pretty good ‘regular job’. What inspired you to go down the path of magic and performing, rather than having a regular job? This is because I don’t want people to think of a kid’s birthday party if I say Magic. As a result, I try to not use the ‘M’ word when performing. I find it very cool to fool people and to know someone’s physiology better than they do themselves. Meanwhile, the fundamentals of magic were still very cool. So as a result, magic to me felt very uncool at the time. You want to throw away stuff, which you liked when you were 8 years old. Maybe this is just me, but from ages 15 to 25, you’re in a mushy middle for magic. Why did you pick to teach ‘scams’ and ‘bar tricks’ instead of general magic tricks?
#Brian brushwood book test word list free
It’s the card trick that everybody learns and the card trick that is responsible for the most free beers in all of history! So the first trick I learned was the Key Card magic trick, with a deck of cards. So along the way, I eventually found out that the method he used was called the ‘Key Card’. That made me so mad! So out of spite, I decided I was going to be a better magician than he ever was. Right before I left for college, my friend Gordon showed me a card trick and wouldn’t tell me how it was done. What was the first-ever magic trick you learnt? Not that I am anywhere close to that, but it did definitely all started from Penn & Teller. Then later I went to college and realised that it was already too late for me to be the world’s best violinist, too late for me to be the world’s best gymnast, but I had lots of time to become the world’s best magician. I had never felt that punk rock energy that Penn & Teller gave off until I saw their Magic Show Special in 1982. When I was a kid, I had seen magic be amazing and I saw magic be artistic but I had never seen magic be cool. I mean I assume Brian Brushwood would still exist, but I certainly wouldn’t be a touring magician. I can say flatly for a fact, if there were no Penn & Teller, there would be no Brian Brushwood.