Hmm... what can I say about Ken Webster?  Well, he does have his fans, and yes, the Horseshoe Bar is always full the three times I've seen him.  Unfortunately, it has been the same material on all three occasions - I just wish he would do something new.

Unfortunately, we were subjected to a Poundland Derren Brown show in the first half with some mentalism.  I'm not a great fan of Derren Brown either as he uses a lot of trickery and fakery.  I think why hypnosis fascinates me is that it is real (despite people believing it to be fake) - those of us who have witnessed it's effects at close hand know that it is a genuine altered state of mind and people are not "just imagining".

The so-called mentalism was quite tedious with some very obvious gives.  Ken tried his best to be like Mr Brown but that style of show isn't really his forte and I spent most of it looking at my watch.

The major drawback with tacking this rubbish on to the hypnotism proper is that after sitting through that drivel for an hour we had a 20 minute break followed by two hours of hypnotism (which to be honest was far too long - and all the trams and buses had long since departed by the time he finally wrapped things up).

One big plus with the hypnotism show this time is that he has drastically cut down on the videos he used to display during various routines and the show definitely flowed a lot better.  Hypnotist shows work best when those sorts of distractions are kept to a minimum and the use of props is in proportion.  Unfortunately, his hypnosis skills aren't as good as some other stage hypnotists I've seen (Mr Powers take note).  He has an over-reliance on shock induction to the extent that he had to shout "sleep" at the subjects 6 or 7 times to force them to go under which is a major no-no with effective hypnosis.  Had a competent induction been used they could have been put into trance with a whisper, or even a look.

The start of the show was also very poorly conducted.  He used a suggestibility test and got rid of a lot of people who didn't comply "exactly with his instructions".  I know in my own experience that people who are suggestible don't necessarily make good subjects, and sometimes people who are not normally suggestible are excellent subjects as one of the features of the trance state (when an induction is competently used) is that high suggestibility is a natural side-effect.

The results of his ineptitude were that once he got rid of people who "failed" his suggestibility test we were left with 7 women and 2 men on stage.  As women tend to be more submissive than men it was hardly surprising that the suggestibility test would work better with them.  However, he had a couple of great male subjects that he dismissed.  Ken had used the hand clasp test and told the subjects to keep their index fingers apart.  One guy managed to keep his fingers apart for the entire time (no mean feat in itself!), had great focus and I noticed that his eyes were fully dilated (I was seated at the front of the stage).  Ken had neither the intelligence nor imagination to pick up on that and dismissed him because the subject hadn't "passed" the test in the way he expected.  The fact that the good subject was quite hunky was also frustrating given the two dogs he finally kept on stage.

As for the show itself, all the same old routines - the quiz show, Debbie Dumplings gay aerobics, male subjects giving guys from the audience a lap dance, Ken forgetting the subjects names and having them believe their real name belonged to the opposite sex, women kissing the men of their dreams but then realising they were dirty old men, women having orgasms (yawn) etc. One new routine (the only one) was having the SAW character come on stage (a dummy on a remote controlled tricycle) and terrifying the subjects.  This was actually quite funny. 

At the end he had the full monty routine.  Usually he stops the guys at their boxers but after giving instructions that they were to do this he said "F*** it, it's saturday night in Blackpool, take it all off if you want to!"  This was a new innovation but I've no idea if he meant it because when one of the guys started to pull down his boxers he whispered something to him and the guy pulled his boxers back up again.  The other guy was too obese to do a quick strip and still had his shirt on when the music stopped.

I wasn't able to make his end of year show last year but I understand he'd dropped the mentalism rubbish for that and it was a straight hypnosis show with different material.  Yes, some different material would be nice for a change Mr Webster.

I overheard some guys chatting in the toilets after the show saying he had "good actors".  Yes, people still obstinately believe that hypnosis is fake and it's all a con.  The mentalism rubbish at the start of the show no doubt fed this belief.

The pic with this blog shows the obese guy doing the lap dance routine to an audience member.

Once again I made the trip to Bonnie Scotland for the last shows being given by Peter during his February run at the Glasgow Pavilion.  It always feels strange coming to Glasgow - you think the women can't possibly get any bigger (but they do), and the men can't be more uncouth (but they are).  Whilst trying to get into the theatre before the midnight show an oik said he was going to stab me if I didn't get out of his way - I of course didn't, as I'm from an even tougher town than Glasgow (and I don't mean London!)

Anyway, despite the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune it is worth the trek up North as he does give good value.  I know a lot of stage hypnotists confine themselves to an hour long show (of which the induction can take nearly 30 minutes) but Mr Powers has a reasonably speedy induction of around 15 minutes before beginning the show proper where he'll entertain the punters for nearly an hour before a 20 minute interval and a further hour of hypnosis.  So in a way, your kind of getting two shows for the price of one.

The 7.30 pm show was a bit of a shambles as, is his wont, he let perfectly good subjects return to their seats and kept the rubbishy ones.  Why he does this is a little puzzling.  As happened a few weeks before, he then lost all his male subjects except for one guy who he used for the "bananas, bananas" routine.  So once again, he had to use the females for the Full Monty finale (with them keeping all clothes on of course).

After such a disappointing show I didn't hold out much hope for the midnight show and after the aforementioned threatened stabbing by the Glasgow oik my mood was not particularly good.  The show itself got off to a very rocky start as he kept the drunks on stage and let the sober people go.  Cue the inevitable drunks falling off seats etc etc.  However, after a while things did start to settle down and the show started to hit a good stride.

Peter himself seemed to be in better form for the midnight show and his increased energy helped the skits along.  I'd seen most of the routines before and this particular series of shows used less props than the last ones.  One routine which he tends to use a lot is the "gay lovers in the bath" where he gets two guys to strip down to their boxers and every time they hear a music cue they jump in the bath on stage and sponge each other.  However, on this occasion one of the guys stripped everything off.  I'd only ever seen this happen once before and on that occasion Peter got him to put his boxers back on.  On this occasion, he was in a particularly mischievious mood and then gave the suggestion that both guys (including the naked one) would believe they had all their normal clothes on.  Perhaps because it was the last show of the winter season Peter must have decided to push the envelope.  So for the rest of the show the guy was naked except right at the end when he got the guys to dress, only to have them strip shortly afterwards with the other guys for the Full Monty finale.  I'd heard rumours about his shows in New Zealand being more adventurous, so perhaps they weren't rumours after all...

It was interesting to see that although the subject accepted the suggestion that he was fully clothed he still made sure that he was sitting behind a chair to preserve his modesty when he wasn't doing the bath routine.  So some part of his mind was aware of the nudity but another part of his mind acted like he wasn't.  Those of us who hypnotise regularly will recognise that behaviour from subjects - there are so many parts to the mind...

All in all, a great show which more than made up for the earlier shambles.  Stage Shows can be particularly unpredictable - there are so many variables at play - you need decent subjects, decent routines and of course a good hypnotist.

Peter is back in the Pavilion again for his summer residence during August.  Hopefully he will be just as mischievious then, as it does make for a more entertaining show.

It seems that Peter Powers is the only stage hypnotist I see these days such is the scarcity of such performances (certainly in a theatre venue) in the UK.  I was discussing this with some other tists at the event and didn't realise that the UK police state had added more rules to the holding of hypnotist stage shows and that many now require licenses.  Of course councils charge more for the licenses than the fee the hypnotist actually receives for the event - hence the scarcity of shows - and so much for a free society!  I do intend to get into stage hypnosis (some day!) but won't be arsed doing it in the UK.

I met up with a group of tists to see both the 7.30 pm and of course the infamous midnight madness show on saturday 4 February 2012.  I wasn't able to make the family show on friday but had heard it was a great show with really good volunteers (so important!)  Apparently he'd introduced a new routine in that show where a guy thought he was a dog and his 'mistress' was giving him a bath.  Sounds like a lot of fun but alas he didn't use that routine at either of the saturday shows so have no idea how it would have played out.

Peter did struggle getting volunteers for the 7.30 pm show - to the extent that he ended up with an all-female set of volunteers by the end.  A lot of the skits failed but as one of the tists commented it showed his skill as an entertainer (he's been doing this for 25+ years) that he was able to work round that.  He even ended up with the ladies doing the full monty (but unlike with the guys, they did not remove any clothes).

Some of the tists had rented a loft in anticipation of doing some sessions with subjects.  Ha!  Fat chance that happening with the dross who are members of this site.  Of course loads of subs said they were coming, enthusiastically texting various tists but as is their wont they melted away faster than the snow in April ("I'm busy", "Something else is on", "Maybe some other time", "I think I'll just chill out" were the sorts of rubbishy, predictable texts being sent - and of course my personal favourite (correct spelling of the word - Yanks take note) - not bothering to reply to texts any more.)  We did have a good bitching session about the subs on the site back at the loft during the gap between shows.  We also were able to talk and exchange tips/advice about the decent subs we were currently working with (all NOT members of this site) and it was interesting that the wide diversity of opinions were as varied as the varieties of human experience.  However, we did agree that those with intelligence, athletes, those whose jobs involve concentration or repetition (programmers, lorry drivers etc) tend to make the best subs).

After our little soiree we returned to the theatre for the midnight madness show.  Peter had no problem getting volunteers this time, particularly the males.  One outstanding volunteer was a scouser who was great fun (and turned out to be surprisingly well-endowed).  Sometimes it's hard to predict the sorts of shows Peter will do - some have loads of props, some have loads of new routines and sometimes he sticks to the old faithfuls.  The major difference this time was that after the main induction when he was using various 'tests' to weed out the rubbishy subjects he didn't use the "bad smell" routine but instead the "embarrassing itch" - the guys quite enthusiastically began scratching a certain part of their anatomy - which of course indicated we were in for a fun show with some great subjects.  Despite not have the "gay lovers in the bath" routine during his last set of shows he had this routine again and the scouser had certainly some interesting positions.  It was clear (ahem) he knew what he was doing.

Some subjects left during the interval - unfortunately one guy actually left the theatre because for whatever reason he didn't like what was happening (and the first half is always the "mild" part of the show!)  However, the scouser stayed on stage and was joined by some other great volunteers in the second half.  As is traditional, the show ended with the full monty.  Interesting that they held hats over their modesty when the routine ended (meaning they were aware they were naked) but when given the suggestion that they believed they were "perfectly normally dressed" they tossed the hats away once they were woken up despite not being told to do that.  As we were in the third row we got a good view of various (surprisingly long) bits and pieces swaying about as they left the stage to return to their seats.

All in all a great night and Mr Powers is truly a talented hypnotist (providing of course he has decent subjects - a bugbear us tists have to continually contend with...)

Peter Powers normally does a few weekends twice a year (usually February and July) at the Glasgow Pavilion Theatre. Time's being what they are the theatre invited him back for a one-off weekend in October (presumably because they know his shows will fill the theatre). Given that you cannot see a hypno show for love nor money in London I decided at the last minute to make the trek up North - and didn't regret it!

The actual shows themselves were a little disappointing in terms of routines as they were for the most part well-established routines that he has used extensively in the past and some of the interesting routines he'd introduced in the July/August shows this year did not unfortunately make a reappearance. However, and this is crucial for any good stage show, he really had fantastic volunteers for both the 7.30 pm show and the much wilder 'midnight madness' show.

Regarding the routines... He had a routine where a guy was in a tent and when the lights were dimmed he'd think it was night time and he'd go to the front of the stage, drop his trousers, squat to do a sh*t and then be horrified when the lights came on. This was done 3 times and one time he was squatting so long I thought he really was going to poo but thankfully nothing came out.

He also had the subjects thinking they were at a party and drinking. He told three of the guys that when a certain piece of music would come on they would moon the audience. One of the guys got really turned on and started slapping the other guy's bare bum. What amazed me was the mooning occurred in the first half (which is usually the clean part of the show) and guys were still coming up to volunteer in the second half, fully aware that Powers had got some of the subjects to bare their bums in the first half. I don't know whether they don't care about ending up naked or whether they actually think that they won't allow Powers to get them naked. Anyway, there were a couple of quite good looking guys who volunteered for the second half and I thought, I can't believe these guys don't realise they're gonna get their kit off at the end of the show.

At the end when the Full Monty skit happened I think Powers must have whispered something to the subjects because normally when guys strip, they take everything off but cover their dicks with their hands. He usually tells them to strip as quickly as they can. However, this time he told them to take their time and tease the audience. So the strip lasted a good 7 or 8 minutes (instead of the usual 30 seconds) and most of the guys when they stripped off turned to face the audience and waved their dicks about. It was ironic because earlier one of the good looking guys had got annoyed when he found himself without his shirt on earlier in the show after doing a dance to some music and yet at the end of the show he's prancing about naked, waving his dick about, happy as anything. Goes to show the power of hypnosis.

I think I realise why Powers is able to get his subjects to be so outrageous. I didn't realise it at the time but some of the other tists from the hypno site told me (when we saw his show together in August) that various skits that Powers uses are actually deepeners so that as the show progresses he is making sure that the subjects end up very deeply hypnotised. I think he is unique amongst stage hypnotists because he genuinely tries to ensure that everyone on stage is hypnotised. I read a book recently by another stage hypnotist and he said that he was happy just to have one volunteer hypnotised and rely on the others just to play along.

As you can see from the photo on this page I think it is safe to say both the guys on display were fully hypnotised...

Alas (for me) I saw the last show given by the Canadian hypnotist Titan Knight at the Edinburgh festival.  He had been doing a two week run at a nightclub near Waveney station (no friday/saturday shows for some reason).    It was very different from the sort of shows that Peter Powers/Ken Webster do (which come from the theatre tradition).  Titan likes to encourage a lot of audience participation.  Presumably because the room was fairly intimate (about a hundred capacity) he could walk about the room and interact with the audience.  This gave the show much more of a party atmosphere and he encouraged the audience to shout things out (eg shouting "sociable" every time he took a sip from his drink - a little silly, but it created a fun atmosphere).

Prior to the show we had a brief cabaret performance involving a man spinning a chainsaw etc (not my cup of tea) and a diva with her toyboys singing a few disco ditties (yes, for those who need to know, I can confirm that Josh is indeed a 9.9).  I didn't notice anything untoward about the leading lady but it turns out she was a he so she was very convincing, and in particular her voice was very feminine.  First time a trannie ever fooled me, but there you go.

Titan then started his show and I did mention to the other tists that his stage photo doesn't really do him justice.  He quickly had no problems filling the chairs on the stage (about 15 or so) and presumably some of them were repeaters from his earlier shows.  Titan also pointed out that unlike other stage shows he would not be asking the volunteers to remove any clothing (... however, more on that later!)  This did disappoint some members of the audience who are no doubt used to the full monty routines at the end of most other hypno shows (or to be factually correct, partial monty routines in most, but not all, cases).

The show itself was quite funny although I felt the induction was overly long (I think it lasted in total something like 25 minutes) and as the show progressed about half the volunteers ended up leaving the stage anyway.  There were of course a couple of volunteers who sat there like class dunces, very obviously not following the instructions of the tist and then not understanding why they weren't hypnotised.  However, those who did remain on the stage were genuinely hypnotised and did participate (more or less) quite fully in the various routines.  One funny routine was having the volunteers going into the audience to get the left trainer on people's feet believing that it was a lottery ticket.  When they returned to the stage some volunteers had quite a number of trainers and some had none.  The volunteers refused to share their trainers/lottery tickets with the volunteers who had none - interesting to see such a naked display of human selfishness.

  When the show ended one of the stage crew happened to have a birthday so to give him a "treat" Titan gave instructions to one of the muscle jock volunteers that he would do a strip routine for the stage crew member.  However, given that Titan doesn't normally do a strip routine in his shows he got the instructions slightly wrong.  He prefaced his instructions with the phrase "only take off as many clothes as you are comfortable with" and then gave instructions that he must keep his underwear on (or if not wearing any underwear, he would keep his "pants" on)  So the music starts and the muscle jock volunteer didn't take anything off (presumably he wasn't comfortable with that...)  So Titan had to whisper something off-mic to the volunteer and then with a big smile on his face he was quite happy to take his shirt off and do a little dance.  

There was an after show party and the performers, stage crew (but not Titan) were happy to mingle with the audience which continued the party atmosphere.  I had an early start back to London so would have liked to stay longer and admire Josh but it was not to be.

One thing that did annoy me at the after party was the actions of another self-proclaimed "well known" stage hypnotist, who nobody in our group had heard of, and he went to the volunteers, rehypnotised them and just sauntered off again which left them very confused.  I don't know whether  he just put them into trance and gave no further instructions, or whether he gave an instruction they didn't like.  Luckilly, one of the other tists with us spotted what had happened and was able to undo some of the nastiness.  A pity that some smartass tists treat subjects like that with not the slightest thought regarding the impact of their moronic behaviour on people who are still vulnerable and highly suggestible after a show.

Peter Powers was back in Glasgow for his summer season at the Pavilion Theatre.  He normally does a three week run (fridays and twice on saturdays) but this year they invited him for a four week run which is a testament to how popular stage hypnotism is north of the border for those of us in London who can never see a stage hypnotist show in a theatre.

I was at a show along with a few guys from the site, one of whom volunteered for the 7.30 pm show, and by all accounts had a good time.  As usual, Peter had mixed the routines up, introducing a number of new skits which helps to keep his shows fresh (unlike certain other tists where you know exactly what's going to happen each time).  The highlight for me was the subjects being very nervous as a plane was trying to fly over a mountain and a crying baby was driving them nuts.  Yes, I suppose you could say my sense of humour is a little infantile.

Of course, in keeping with Peter's claim to be "the world's most evil hypnotist" he had a routine where one of the guys had their legs waxed by a sadistic beautician.  There was unusually some partial nudity in the 7.30 pm show (normally reserved for the midnight show) where he got the guys to believe they were at a party and would periodically moon the audience.  Who would have thought a diet of deep-fried mars bars could produce such pert bubble butts.  There were some other new skits including a lifeguard saving a blow-up doll from drowning and guys removing items of clothing each time they heard the sound of a bell.  I enjoyed the 7.30 pm show better purely because the subjects were much better controlled and genuinely hypnotised.  There were some drunks amongst the midnight show volunteers and a few of the tists and I were discussing why Peter sent perfectly good subjects back into the audience (who were in trance) but kept a couple of annoying drunks who did nothing but stagger around the stage.  It appears Peter is returning to tradition and the full monty ending at the midnight show did live up to its name.

Caught the latest shows by Peter Powers in Glasgow.  He generally does the Pavilion Theatre for a few weekends every six months and as with any long-running hypnotist the shows (and volunteers) can be variable.  Thankfully this was one of the better shows.

I attended the event with another member from the site and one of his friends who ended up volunteering for the 7.30 pm slot and of course became the star of the show.  We'd done some private hypno before the show so I don't know whether that led to him ending up on stage because beforehand he wasn't sure if he wanted to take part.

Peter tends to mix up his routines and introduce the occasional new sketch as well.  The show had had a major revamp last summer and the so the format was fairly similar to his July shows.  It was interesting to hear what happens during the interval as I always wondered what happened behind the curtain - he focuses on deepeners with the volunteers so that they can maintain the trance in the second half.  I think this is a new element to his shows because in the past he would have lost a lot of volunteers during the interval but on both occasions all volunteers from the first half remained on stage for the second.  The midnight show hadn't been as wild as I expected but two of the (male) volunteers did end up doing the complete full monty.  Interesting to see that some of the volunteers were rejecting suggestions even though there were quite deeply hypnotised - something I've encountered myself.