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MentalVoice 2 by Black Box Magic
MentalVoice 2 is a bone conduction device that is small and powerful. It is easily hidden in finger palm behind two fingers (think Sanada gimmick), and it is covered in a flesh colored silicone which helps hide any flashing that may occur between the fingers. The silicone also has a nice feel in the hand. While the device is being finger palmed you have the ability to turn the device on and off, adjust the volume, and trigger the sound.
I was worried about how difficult it would be to load audio onto the device itself, but thankfully, it is super easy to do. Simply plug the device into your computer and drag and drop whatever audio files you want. It has 512MB of onboard storage, so it can hold many audio clips.
I’m currently using it in about the most mundane way possible by just having a recording of my voice that says something to the effect of “I’m thinking of the word dog” and having them guess the word I write down. I know there have got to be way more creative uses for it than that, but I haven’t landed on one just yet. One thing I do like is that you can switch between audio files in the moment. Essentially, you click the button the same number of times as the track you want. So if you want track five, you click the button five times. I think this could come in handy if you force 5 items and then let the spectator decide on which one they want to think about. Or if you make audio files that reveal common everyday items like phone, wallet, keys, etc, you could essentially do a sightless vision demonstration with a spectator by having them blindfolded and having them call out the exact item people are holding.
The device also automatically goes through the list. So if you play track one, the next time you press the button it will play track 2, the next time it will play track 3, and so on. This could come in handy if you want to implant five different thoughts in five different people.
The device also comes with an app. This app allows the device to connect to your phone via bluetooth so that you, your spectator, or a secret helper can change the audio file being played in real time. The app offers three different real time input methods:
Notes Input: The spectator writes a word in your notes app–it automatically gets sent to your MentalVoice device ready to be implanted in someone else’s head.
Lock Screen Input: Allows you to put a number in as you “unlock your screen.” This can send a number to mental voice or it can be used to cue a certain sound from a list of sounds
API Input: Your spectator can search something on google on their own phone or on wikipedia or any of those other apps and it will automatically be sent to the MentalVoice device.
Each of these inputs have their advantages and disadvantages, but I think all of them are good usable options.
The app also comes preloaded with an ACAAN. Your spectator chooses a number between one and fifty-two and this will automatically send the card that corresponds to that number in a stack to MentalVoice so you can implant the correct card in someone else’s head. It’s a very high tech way of doing ACAAN that I think is a little bit of overkill, but you can use this template to allow MentalVoice to trigger any word from a list when you input a number.
The app also contains other things like templates which allows you to set how many times it repeats the audio clip, how much space is between it, how fast the audio is, the character voice, and a few other things. For every effect you do from the app, it has to be ran through a template. The app also has an audio editor that allows you to record audio clips and edit them, text to speech so you can make an audio on the go with a selected AI voice, a place to import audio, and an API Key for ElevenLabs which is the AI software that it uses to create the voices that speak the text that you or a spectator enters.
The app can be a little confusing at first just because of the way that you have to make a template and select a template to use for each input, but I can really see this being super valuable to stage performers who have an assistant backstage and want to upload audio or make selections of words in real time. I like the app, but I prefer to just use the audio that is loaded directly onto the device. With the app I have noticed a few glitches that make me leery of using it in performance. Once or twice the word just didn’t get picked up from the notes app and I was left with absolutely no out. Also, annoyingly, once the bluetooth audio starts playing on the device, I can’t get it to stop unless I turn the device off. You’re supposed to be able to press the trigger button to turn the audio on and off, but when I press the button it cycles through different voices. These bugs will probably be fixed at some point, but I generally find the onboard audio to be more reliable; plus I have full control over how it sounds instead of relying on AI to say the word correctly.
I think I would feel more confident using it with the app if there were some kind of indicator on the device that it was working. I wish there was haptic feedback or something to that effect. Instead, they suggest putting your finger on the device to feel if it is vibrating with the audio. While this works, it means the audio has to already be playing so as soon as I touch their head, they are going to hear the word being repeated. I just wish there was something more concrete that lets me know it’s got the word and it’s ready to be triggered.
Overall, this is a great product and you can’t beat it for the price. If you’ve wanted a bone conduction device for a routine but didn’t want to break the bank, this is really fantastic quality. I can’t imagine the device itself being any better.
It’s currently available for $199 at
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