"Underground Jam" DVD by Jay Sankey
Suggested Retail USD$25.00
Available from your favorite dealer
In a Blink: 5 Out of 10

"Underground Jam", a DVD put together by Jay Sankey to showcase the talents of four performers who entered what amounts to a talent search, is chock full of slick material; it's unfortunate the disc doesn't live up to the quality of the material.

And it is quality material with, at times, some brilliant thinking. On the disc, you'll see Sankey and his material, as well as offerings from Joe Diamond, Eric Leclerc, and Jeff Stone.

I'll get right to it: this disc is worth buying just for Jeff Stone. I'll go farther: this disc is worth buying just for Jeff Stone's "Dream Vacation". To me, that one routine (which we'll talk about later) was worth the price of the DVD and the rest was just icing on the cake. But, man, what icing!

Okay, you know the drill. If you buy a performer's DVD and he has a dozen effects on there, there'll be some you like, some you hate, and one or two you love. That's the nature of anthologies, especially in magic. Now think in terms of five performers, each with their own material presented over the course of a little more than two hours, and consider the variety we're talking about. To be honest, I expected to like one, maybe two pieces here. I was underestimating things greatly:

Sankey's "Uniquely" leads off the disc. In this piece, a signed coin is placed in an envelope. A card is chosen and a corner torn off. The coin is rubbed and turns into the signed coin. The envelope is opened and the torn corner of the card removed. This is a nice little bit of business.

Leclerc's "Razor Burn" left me cold. You show a razor and it turns into a book of matches. Notably, I reckon, this is done without switching and visually. This falls squarely into the Not My Thing category.

Stone's "Jacked Up" is one of my favorites. In this one, the spectator selects two cards which are placed face down on the table, sight unseen. The deck is shuffled and the two cards placed into the deck by the spectator. It's shown they inserted the cards next to the two Jacks. Then the two selected cards are shown to be Jacks. Then the Jacks are shown to be the only red-backed cards in a blue-backed deck. This one is slick.

Diamond's "Super Sharped" is mediocre at best. In it, a signed coined (signed on both sides even) vanishes only to be shaken out of the cap of a Sharpee marker. This one is way too familiar in presentation and method to be of much concern to performers.

"This and That", by Leclerc, is a cute presentation for a very simple handling. In it, a single card is picked (free choice) from a packet of cards and later shown to be the only different card from the packet. It's hard to go into detail without blowing it, but I liked the presentation here. A nice little piece of fun and one that deserves to be played with.

Sankey's "Solo", like "Super Sharped", is way too common. A card is chosen by a spectator, lost in the deck, etc. When another spectator tries to find it, it's the wrong card. Miracle of miracles, it changes into the selected card in the hands of the performer. There's a so-so presentation attached to it, but it's still the same old effect.

Now we get to Stone's "Dream Vacation". A 35mm film canister is examined and then the lid secured on it. A Mexican peso is signed by a spectator and held in the performer's hand. The film canister is shaken and, at first, nothing is heard. Then slowly there's a slight rattle and then a stronger one. The performer opens his hand, showing the coin gone. The canister is opened revealing the coin. This is very, very slick; that it's also so simple and straightforward in method makes this gold. This is my favorite routine on the disc.

Leclerc's "Straight from the Heart" didn't do much for me. You wave your hands over your shirt or coat pocket and something -- a pack of gum, a card, etc -- rises out of your pocket. It's neat, in its way, but not exactly overly impressive. Still, it's worth looking at and could be made into something more than Leclerc demonstrates.

Stone's "King-Side Castling" bored me to tears.. until the climax hit me. Here's how it goes: the four kings are shown and one is signed by the spectator and given to them to hold. A mystic pass later and the King magically appears under the performer's hand, leaving the spectator holding a blank card. Bored yet? Well, here comes the punch: the other kings are turned over and they are all blank as well, leaving just the lone, signed king. This one got me... badly.

"Visa Card", by Diamond, got me, too. Maybe I was lured into a false sense of security, what with thinking like a magician and all, but then I got burned. Here's how it goes: a card with "Visa" written on it is shown. Six cards with different items and prices on them are shown. The spectator chooses one, the "Visa" card is turned over and the limit on your "credit card" -- written on the back of the "Visa" -- matches the price of the chosen item. This is a good one. A really good one.

Leclerc's "Shy Guys" is Hollingworth on steroids. In this case, the steroid in question is an update on a DeLand gimmick (think Jose de la Torre's "The Jumping Back") that makes "Waving the Aces" much simpler and more workable. This comes in a close second behind "Dream Vacation" as the best on the disc.

Stone's "Key-Oh-Nee Buh-Lo-Nee" is another good one. In this one, a key is removed from the performer's key ring and the key ring given to a spectator. The key vanishes, only to reappear on the key ring. This is worth it just to learn a ditch of a "special something" that is rarely seen (it's credited to Cellini in "The Close-Up Magic of Frank Garcia" in case you want to look it up; it's still neat to see Stone pull it off so well in a combination with a neat idea by Richard Ross).

"Magi", by Sankey, is just a little too pedestrian for my tastes. In this one, two kings are removed from the deck and then three spectators pick cards. One card materializes between the kings and it's seen to be one of the chosen cards. The kings then change to the other two chosen cards. This one didn't do much for me; an old plot with little new.

Next is Leclerc's "The I.L.U.S. System". Okay, this one is just plain fun and tweaks a spectator gently in the process. Anyone who performs any length of time gets hit with one of the usual "stock lines" a spectator will throw at you: "Can you make my wife disappear?", "I wouldn't want to play cards with you!", etc. In "I.L.U.S.", those statements are used to build a fun, quite individualized, prediction. It's hard to go into detail with this one, but suffice to say people are going to using this one: it's a really good piece of work.

"Loose Ink", by Diamond, is a two-card transposition with a blank card and a regular playing card. That's about all that can be said for this one, I'm afraid.

"Coolest Ace Trick in the World", by Stone, is another one of those things that didn't do a whole lot for me; it's just too familiar. In it, you've got the four aces all turning into an ace of one suit then turning into Kings. As I said, just too familiar.

Sankey's "50:50" I like a lot, too, but then, I'm a fan of simple coin work (being a simple kind of coin worker). In this one, a half dollar and a two quarters change places in a short, multi-phase routine. This is a neat piece and could be the nice basis for a more varied routine.

"Great Scott", by Diamond, ranks up there with "Magi"; just way too familiar. A card is chosen, signed, vanishes and reappears under the performer's watch. And it's what you think it is.

Leclerc's "Final Cap in Bottle" is one of those "right place/right time" pieces. In this take on the plot, the performer makes a bottle cap penetrate into his bottle of water (or whatever). The neat part here is that it's done totally impromptu and everything can be examined afterward. It looks neat and, done appropriately, could play really well.

Sankey's "T-Bone" is way too simplistic and with a very discernible method. A card is folded lengthwise and placed inside a second card that is folded widthwise (think "Card Warp"). Both cards are torn in half but, when put back together, the card folded lengthwise is restored. A little work here and there might make this one a little more deceptive, or you could opt for a few other methods floating around in.

Okay, so that's the material and some of it is quality stuff. But if I'm raving about it, why the low rating? Well, there are a few of reasons.

First, the production values are bad, as in close to being non-existent. The mike work is way off -- there are many times you can't hear any of the discussion underway without cranking the volume. The camera work leaves a lot to be desired; at times, it feels like you're in another time zone trying to watch something the guys are talking about. Maybe it's just me, but I like watching a disc where I don't have to burn the batteries in my remote and try to juggle the equalizer to get what's going on.

Then there's the whole "porn shoot in a hotel room" thing. Yeah, I know this is supposed to be some kind of "virtual jam session", and evidently these things now center around beds and floors for explanations and done by people throwing out insulting and obnoxious comments, but that's not what I'm paying $25 for. For the money, I expect a little professionalism in things. Other DVDs have gone with this theme and pulled it off; "Underground Jam" doesn't. I'm also not paying to watch Sankey climb up a wall or "shrink" or any other of the muggings going on -- that time could have been better spent on the instructions.

And that's the next problem.

The instructions are okay in places, marvelous in others, and downright rushed in the rest. I kept hoping, praying, for some one to show up with a bottle of Valium (or at least play the role of director here) to slow things down, make sure things are explained correctly, concisely, and thoroughly, deliver the meat of things as some of them really deserve.

It didn't happen.

So I said all of that to say this: keep spare batteries handy; you're going to need them for all the stopping, pausing, and rewinding you're in for.

Those are grievous errors, to be sure, and detract from the quality of the disc. But it doesn't take away from the quality of the material which, for the cost, is a darn great value. There's sure to be at least one item here you'll do, and probably more. You can't ask for much more.

Yes, you can. Rather, I can. I want more Jeff Stone. But that's just me.

At the end of the day "Underground Jam" is a good collection of material, if professionally challenged and lax production-wise, and definitely worth a look.

"Underground Jam" by Jay Sankey
In a Blink: 5 Out of 10

Material: 9
This is a collection of performers showing their original pieces. Translation: there is going to be stuff here that attracts you and stuff that repels you because that's the nature of these kinds of anthologies. The good part? Overall, the material here is really very good.

Practicality: 7
It's all over the place here, but set-ups are usually minor as are the resets. Taken as a whole, the material here could work in the real world with minimal headaches.

Quality of Production: 2
There are sound problems galore, a video glitch here and there, and some of the camera work seems to be shot at least a county away from the performer. Keep the remote handy.

Quality of Instruction: 5
In a few places the instruction is marvelously well done, at other times it's so rushed that you barely get the basics, let alone the finer points.

Presentation: 8
Some of the material is decidedly lackluster, but other pieces are wonderfully presented within their own rights. This is very much a hodgepodge of presentations and, strangely, that's interesting to see.

Shane

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