- What's going on guys and welcome back.
Happy weekend for those of you
who are watching this over the weekend
as this is uploaded.
Today we're gonna be looking at something
a lot of you have been asking me about.
My top five favorite decks.
Now, my top five will change and vary
throughout the years.
You ask me this question in six months
and my list might be completely different.
For now, right now, I will give you
basically my favorite cards
that I like to carry around,
the ones that I use the most.
Some are still available.
Some are not.
Don't get upset.
I'm sure you can find them on eBay or somewhere
but that just goes to show you
if you love a deck of playing cards
and you see it on the market, man, snag up a brick
if you can because the value will severely increase,
you'll find them sitting on eBay
a couple months later for literally 10 times the price.
I mean, playing cards are a great investment nowadays.
Every successful Kickstarter
that's ever been funded,
I mean, the value of the cards have increased exponentially.
By the way, I'm not going to include any of my decks.
I think that's a little biased.
We're gonna look at the decks that I like,
the ones that aren't mine, okay,
because or else it'd be, you know, it wouldn't be fair.
So we're gonna look at the top five favorite decks
that aren't mine but that I do carry around,
that I do use, so let's get into that right now.
Number five, we are looking at the Monarchs by Theory 11.
These are Blue Monarchs.
They're not the red ones or the green ones.
These cards were also featured in Now You See Me.
They were featured in the movies one and two.
We've got this beautiful embossing all around
with this gold, sort of, soft gold foil
and the material that this is made of,
the tuck case, is, like, I don't know how to quite say it
but it's not matte, but there's kinda
this little velvety feel to it almost.
Funny story, I actually have,
so under the seal there's like a skull with two swords.
I actually have that tattoo on my body.
I love everything about this deck, honestly.
I think it's one of the classiest decks
in recent history.
Whatever that means.
Yeah, no it looks good.
This looks like a deck that you would carry around
and, like, a very high end sort of classy gig which I do.
The back design is really neat.
It's very simple.
You got that line art going all the way through.
Beautiful snake and knife.
The jokers are identical which I really appreciate as well.
The ace is iconic.
This is, for me, a really perfect deck.
It's just like a whole package.
When you get this, you're very, very happy about
the tuck case, the cards themselves, the feel, the stock.
It's just a very cool deck to have in your collection
so those were the Blue Monarchs.
Number four, Gold Kings.
The Gold Kings or the Kings,
I think just the Kings basically.
This, when I first saw this I was blown away,
no pun intended, because the trailer for this
was, like, super over the top.
It was Daniel Madison and Pete McKinnon
literally, like, robbing a bank
and then, like, driving into the desert
and exploding a van.
It was one of the most over the top card trailers,
but I think that was the point.
They were like, you know what, hell with it.
Let's go, like hard over the top.
All these other people are using dub steps
and 3D lettering.
Let's just blow up a van and rob a bank
and not even show them the playing cards.
That was genius.
They literally did a whole trailer
where you never saw the cards
and these things, I think, sold out overnight.
Love that.
I love that.
I love it's so ballsy
and something you don't see often enough.
They have this duffle bag filled
with these gold decks in it.
Looked like just like a pile of gold.
I've never seen, like, a complete gold tuck case like this
with only the knife and the, or the sword and the ax
from the two kings and, like, the embossing of the address
on the bottom, but just this, just having this
feels like I'm holding, like, a gold bar.
Like I'm holding like a 24 carat, you know,
like I raided Fort Knox and I'm just like (grunts).
Here's a little funny story.
When these came out,
my buddy Pete McKinnon had a whole bunch.
I was not working as an illusionist yet
and I hit up Pete and I was like,
yo I want some of those cards.
I was going down to Toronto and he was like,
oh, I got some extra bricks or whatever.
Just come swing by.
So I went down to Toronto
and I was there on some business
and I took, like, a couple hours out of my day
to drive down to where Pete lives to meet him
and then he hooked me up with these two.
It seemed like some, like, illegal drug deal was going down,
you know, in a parking lot of a Tim Horton's.
So kinda funny that, like, the whole trailer
was like robbing a bank and then he's, like,
handing me two bricks of these gold bricks.
I thought that was pretty funny.
This is the back design.
I love the back design
and a lot of people dog this deck.
A lot of people are like, oh no, they're my least favorite.
I'm, like, in love with these cards.
I don't care what anyone says.
I love that pattern.
Looks kinda like a Louis Vuitton sort of
Burberry high end simplistic design, no borders.
They are marked.
I don't even know how they're marked,
but they're marked.
If you guys can figure it out, good for you.
- [Man] Oh good for you!
- But they also come in stack which is dope.
Okay, the jokers are not identical
which I'm not a big fan of,
but open two decks, swap out the jokers,
all the sudden you have identical jokers, right.
Here's also a cool thing.
All right, you've got a double backer.
Whatever.
Here's, like, the world's coolest gaffe.
This is, I think, Daniel's idea.
So sick.
Such a good idea.
Seven of hearts here, look at the back of this.
Look at that.
Says seven of hearts corner.
So the routine basically is you say to the spectator,
okay I'm gonna rip this, right,
and you actually rip it and you pretend
to put it on the back.
You're actually, like, throwing it into your palm
and then you have them hold it, right,
and people hold that 'cause it looks real.
It looks like, and they're like okay.
And then what Daniel does, he just walks away.
And they're left there with, they're like what?
And then, huh, oh my god!
It's in the card!
So a really cool thing you can leave with your spectators.
This is one of the most incredible gaffe cards
that have been created,
one of the most original gaffe cards.
I think lately there's, you know,
we see a lot of the old gaffe cards coming around.
This is just great idea.
So love this deck.
Love it to bits.
It actually lasts you a long time.
Like, the feel and stock are very, very good.
Not enough to say about this, you know.
Link below.
Number three, Red Wheels playing cards by Dan and Dave.
This was a DKMG Studios which is a graphic design.
I want to say graphic design studio.
I love this, first of all I love this tuck case.
The matte red against the white embossed
gold seal right here just really, really pretty.
It's got that little skull on it.
The reason I love this deck so much
is because it's a modern take, sort of eclectic
abstract take on traditional design,
so on the back you have this sort of bike design
where it's like a bike inverted
and then these skulls here which are so pretty
and then you have, like, all the pips in the corners
so it is a one way design which is pretty cool.
You know, not something you would normally use
but if you want to use a one way design,
quick simply way to use that is
keep the deck in the orientation that it's in
and have them take a card.
Flip your deck around, have them put the card back in.
Now all you're looking for is the irregular card,
right, because you got hearts,
clubs, diamonds, spades, right,
so if you flip it you'll know which side it's on
so it's a little trick for you guys
if you want to use that.
There's a one way back design.
So many things I love about this deck.
First of all, the feel.
It's a very thin stock.
It's a crushed stock which I really like
because it feels like you're holding air.
You know what I mean?
And really makes it easy to, like, break it in.
It already feels broken in.
You can kinda hear, like, it's not giving me any resistance.
You got two identical jokers.
Well, almost identical.
It's a metallic ink.
One of them is a little bit darker than the other,
but honestly if I use them as a duplicate,
no one's gonna know the difference.
What I really love about this are the pips
and some people hate these.
Oh my god, I love these so much.
Contrasting color where you have that golden metallic ink.
The design, to me, looks like a very Danish inspired design.
Something you would find in, like,
mid-century modern magazines.
Funny because two Danish kids actually did the,
are they Danish or Belgian?
Tobias and Oliver, two of the best cardists in the world,
two guys that I look up to in cardistry,
and I think everybody should.
They're, like, literally extreme practitioners
and perfectionists in their aesthetics,
in their flourishes, and their cuts
are just beautiful at base.
They're very, very good at what they do.
They did the trailer for this
which I really like 'cause it kinda had
that Danish feel already with the deck design
and I don't know if that was intentional
to be, like, oh this feels Danish.
Let's give it to some Danish kids
and have them, you know, I just thought
all of that was just (tongue clicks).
On point, great feel, bread wheels.
High heels.
Number two.
We are going to look at the Cherry Casino playing cards.
Now a lot of you have seen these in my videos recently.
I love the Cherry Casino playing cards.
These are designed, in part, by Frankie Morales.
So many things I love about this deck.
First of all, it feels and looks like a standard
deck of cards you would find in a casino,
right, Cherry Casino, not a real casino
but it, look at this, Cherry Casino, very simplistic.
This sort of Coca Cola line going through the top.
I love the color as well.
The same color as my ring here.
Cards themselves, once again, duplicate joker.
Win.
Ace is, looks like a casino ace
and the rest are completely standard
which is also really cool.
So this is something I do perform with
and this is something I love
just carrying for, like, cardistry and stuff.
It looks so cool.
But the best thing about these cards,
the very best thing.
Okay, master eight when I was back
at Murphy's working with them
they had these in stock.
I think there was four bricks left
and I picked up all four.
I was like I know these cards are gonna sell out.
They're not reprinting.
I'm gonna grab these now.
I'm down to eight decks out of four bricks
just to tell you how many of these decks I used.
I know.
I probably should take better care of my cards.
A lot of you guys are asking what I do
with the cards when I'm done with them.
For the most part I keep them
and then I'll do, like, a giveaway and I'll give them away
and I've done that a few times, actually.
I literally sent hundreds of decks of cards
to people all over the world,
so stop asking for giveaways.
The shit will happen when it happens,
but thanks for asking.
The best thing about these cards
is as soon as you take 'em out of the box,
I haven't even done this yet, watch this.
(laughs) Are you kidding me?
They feel so good.
It's like that perfect mix between
soft and hard and (grunts).
These, like literally (grunts).
Man, I'll carry these in my pocket
without even a deck, without even a tuck case,
break 'em out and boom they feel good again.
You know what I mean?
I love that kind of feel
and it's so rare because I think
when creating decks of cards,
you don't actually control any of those factors.
You can try, but it's all in the hands of USPC.
Sometimes you just get screwed
and sometimes you get lucky
and on one run you just get, like,
the best feeling, looking deck ever
and this is right up there.
This is literally (grunts).
I wish that they made more of these.
They made a V2, a little bit darker back.
It's not this, right.
I mean it was clever.
They crushed it and you can't top this.
For me this is the Jerry's Nuggets of playing cards.
If you want a deck, you know,
that doesn't exist any more, to be honest
these right here (grunts).
So good.
And number one, the number one deck,
my number one favorite deck at the moment.
You guys probably already guessed it.
White Lion's Series B Black.
These babies are everything to me.
I perform with them.
I sleep with them.
Cuddle them, cradle them, hold them to my face gently,
softly caress my cheek with the exotic embossing,
foliage, the beautiful tuck case.
I just recently looked at the Red, White Lion Series B
on the Blaine vs Criss Angel video.
I'm not gonna go to,
it's the same thing except they're black.
I just love these cards so much.
Again, they come in stack.
They last forever.
So that is my number one favorite deck.
If you guys want to check out a review
of this deck a little more in depth,
check out the previous video
with the Criss Angel vs David Blaine.
I'll leave the link at the end of the video
where you can watch that,
but this, my number one favorite deck.
All right guys, that is my top five favorite decks.
I hope you guys like that
and I hope you enjoyed that.
I'll leave a couple links below
where you can search these decks
if they exist or maybe the V2s and the Cherry Casino case.
Grab them if you like.
I highly recommend all of these decks
and I think they're all great.
Let me know below which one of these five
you actually like or if you've used any of these,
which ones do you like or do you agree or disagree
with what I have to say
and if you disagree then give me your top five.
Let me know what your top five is below
and if I have those cards laying around
maybe I'll do some type of deck review in the future.
This has been fun.
I like this.
Little top five video, little click bait for ya.
Huh?
(tongue clicks)
Got 'em with the click bait.
(laughs)
So you guys, thanks so much for tuning in.
I hope you enjoyed this.
Leave a like if you liked this video.
It helps me out so much.
Let me know, like I said, what your favorite deck is below
and what your top five might be
or if you agree or disagree with my top five.
Guys, as always it's always fun putting up videos
and seeing the feedback that I get
so I really, really appreciate it.
I read the comments and I respond to a lot of them.
I want to respond to more
and when I have time I usually do
so I especially within, like, the first hour.
If I've just uploaded a video,
chances are in the first hour
I'm gonna read, like, every comment
and just respond to a lot of 'em
so you wanna hit me up, like, with questions and stuff,
that's the time to do it.
Just letting you know.
There you have it, guys.
Thanks so much.
Stay tuned for the next video dropping very soon
and I'll see you on the next one, all right?
Peace.
(mid-tempo music)