It's 10:45pm in the Forge, a row of chairs await their hypnotic subjects and everybody is waiting for the man himself as the dreamy supernatural intro music builds....
Suddenly he's here and insulting everyone (to put them at ease!) in his warm-up
The packed Forge looks on as the hypnotic rhythm starts and dreamy music builds again
"If you don't want to be hypnotised you won't be...."
"If you believe you can be hypnotised then you will be...."
"Nothing you're going to see tonight is staged or prepared...."
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The first subjects are brought to the front and sent to sleep. The girl in the yellow top drifted in and out of hypnosis and eventually went back to the audience. The boy in the left hand picture went into such a deep trance you can see in the right hand picture he has already collapsed onto the girl beside him by the time the fourth subject was about to be sent to sleep. |
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Every face looks on in awe; they can't quite believe the state of the people sitting in front of them
This is the next stage if you didn't fall asleep the first time; after this if your hands stick together you are now hypnotised
"Imagine the superglue pouring over them"
"The harder you try to pull your hands apart the more they stick together...."
Totally sceptical people from the first round of hypnotism are now starting to fall asleep. The next subject will be Rosie (centre with her hands clenched together) who is now falling asleep and the first four subjects are already asleep in the row of chairs here
The next two subjects are brought to the front
Seconds later they're asleep, the girl in the pink top is in the chair at the extreme left and Peter has spectacularly collapsed on the floor. His knees and feet are just visible in the picture. Between the two blonde girls in the centre is Colum who also found his hands were stuck together.
Unfortunately it's hard to convey the atmosphere that followed in pictures only. You really need to be there and see the whole show happening in front of your eyes to appreciate how supernormal the whole experience is. But there follows in words and pictures a description of just a few of the many ways in which the seven hypnotised subjects entertained the crowd gathered here in the Forge on Easter Tuesday night.
The fact that this picture is a little blurred should give you some idea of what was going on between the hypnotic subjects and their sexy chairs. When asked afterwards what he thought of his chair, Colum (in the centre) gave a huge grin and said "It's class!"; you really had to be there to appreciate it.
This time the seven hypnotics were out walking their dogs, when all at once the dogs pulled them off their chairs and onto the floor
And now two of them are dogs, mating with each other there and then on the dancefloor in the middle of the Forge! Just look at the expressions on the faces of the people looking on at them....
Here's Elvis with his adoring fans....
....and waving to the crowds
When the 7 hypnotics had to jump out of their chairs because they were too hot, the two girls here were up complaining to the Forge management straight away. During the Eurovision Song Contest it was good fun watching them bitching at each other when the hypnotist wasn't looking, after he'd convinced each of them that they were better than the other....
....standing up straight is a problem when you've just had a few sips of the strongest drink you've ever tasted, even if it looked like water to the rest of us
When the whole Forge became a Liverpool supporters club and Colum led the singing for "You'll never walk alone"....
....everyone seemed to be friends again to join in the fun
And come the end of the show everyone wasn't un-hypnotised and left to go home. No, they were all told that their little pink monkeys that they'd had since the day they were born were missing, and they would have to search everywhere for them.
And if anybody needed convincing that the 7 hypnotics weren't just putting on a show, that they really were in an altered state of mind, this was it. For 10 or 15 minutes after the show they were running around everywhere looking worried trying to find their monkeys. And of course everyone humoured them. To have people you know and see every week come up to you and ask have you seen their pink monkey is really a surreal experience and certainly convinced me of the power of hypnotism.
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Whenever "YMCA" came on, everyone gradually 'found' their monkeys again. Here's Colum and Peter holding them for the camera (Peter's monkey was called George) |
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Just a few other highlights would be old favourites like the magic glasses that allow you to see all the opposite sex without their clothes on; one of the girls refused to wear these screaming "I've got a boyfriend!". When all the subjects believed they were naked their varied reactions were really something to see. Or who would have thought that something as simple as not being able to say the number 7 means that every time you count your fingers it comes out at 11 - would you not end up getting a bit worried if you'd had 10 fingers when you came in?
All in all it was a spectacular show and a great night out. Richard Morrow said he'd come back around Christmas, and I for one won't be taking pictures then - I want to be hypnotised.