Matthew James is a self proclaimed medium currently living in Australia.
Recently I noticed that he was posting articles on his blog, and using the term "BadPsychics" in the title. Many psychic websites do this, as my site ranks very highly on Google, and a lot of people will search for a psychics name followed by BadPsychics, in the hope that we may have written about them. So Psychic websites will used the "BadPsychics" brand name, in the hope that the odd person on google might end up on their site.
Anyway I called out Matthew James for doing this, and was rather surprised at the vitriol he then spewed my way. Ok so I am used to it, so I did a little digging, and as you will see from a previous brief article I wrote about him, he has made a lot of claims, including claims that he had passed scientifically controlled tests in the 90s that were also peer reviewed. So of course I asked to see evidence of this, and suddenly he starts blocking me at every turn.
He also started to reply to that article on this site, and in the comments section made many a threat, including one to sue me for "defamation of character", he since deleted that threat, as well as some other rather nasty comments he made. For the record I have still yet to hear from his solicitor!
Anyway, he seemed to take umbrage at some comments I left on a video he had uploaded to Youtube, apparently showing him work. Titled Matthew James Renowned Medium & Clairvoyant - LIVE, and from November 2011. Clearly by uploading this video to his channel, he considered it to be a fine example of his craft. I pointed out that within 1 minute all he had done is ask questions, and then repeat back to the victim what he had just heard, a classic trick of cold reading.
So I thought I would take things a little further and allow people to make up their own mind.
I will share the video here, and include a full transcript below, and interject my own comments and opinions. I am sure Matthew will only end up deleting the video, when he fully realises it acts to expose his own methods of trickery, if that is the case, I have a back up people, so don't worry.
So here is the video, and remember to scroll down to read the transcript and my analysis of what he is doing. Please note that the audio isn't great in the video, and some parts are a bit muffled, so we have done our best with the transcript, but it might not be perfect, so please do watch the video as well, so you get the true full picture of what is going on. And make sure to leave your comments too.
"UPDATE: As expected Matthew James has made the video unviewable, as he desperately tries to hide how truly awful his mediumship is, and by removing the video he can tell people that my transcript is a lie, or I missed things out and so on. Luckily I downloaded a copy of the video, so here it is back for you all! - Jon Donnis"
Key:
Medium Matthew James in BOLD writing.
Victim/Client in normal text
Jon Donnis in Red
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I'm looking at the gentleman with the white shirt over there; I know there was a message over there before but whose father did Suzy get before?
So the very first thing he says is a question. Lets keep a count of how many questions he asks, remember a real medium would not need to ask any questions, and Matthew James has also claimed that he does not ask his clients any questions at all.
(Woman) Our father...... (Male) It was their father.
Where's your father, where's your father? (Talking to the male)
I think we can count that as just one question. Again he is asking directly where this persons father is, doesn't he know? Isn't he meant to be speaking with spirit. (2 Questions asked)
He's passed away, a few years ago.
Ok but you're a sceptic aren’t you sir?
(3 Questions asked)
Me?
Yeh – you're bit of a sceptic aren’t you?
Asks the question, then repeats it as if to suggest that the medium knew before hand. Lets be honest here the man in the audience is giving off a certain kind of attitude, which would suggest he is skeptical, not to mention the fact that women are often more likely to be believers than men, and 90% of the audience of any psychic show will be female, and this bloke looks like he has been dragged along to this event.
Yeh 50/50.
Funnily enough Matthew is wrong, as the man admits he is 50/50, or undecided.
It's just that he was an impatient man and he's been nagging me all night to come to you.
You serious?
Yes.
Yeh, ok.
Hang on a second, a moment ago Matthew didn't know who the father was, who the previous medium Suzy had got, in fact he knew nothing about this dead father, yet now suddenly he is claiming that this dead man had been nagging him all night to come to this man. This is pretty blatant cold reading here, and if you rewind the video, you can see Matthew had no idea at the start, and is just using the man's answers and throwing them back at him.
And he was a bit of ladies' man wasn't he and he liked the blondes?
Well he liked women, not just blondes, all sorts of women.
Well he liked women I better come to you
I like blondes, I like blonds I like ????? (COULDN'T CATCH NAME)
I'd call this a fail, and Matthew quickly moves away from this.
From stating that his father was a ladies man, and he liked blondes, all we get is that his father liked women, which you would expect since he had a son.
You're a bit of a joker, I know as soon as I said that, but I've got a couple of difficult messages that I've got to do so I've got to set the tone. Do you understand me; and I've got told I've got to come to you because you will make everybody laugh and joke because you can do that but so could your father, and the reason he's here with me is like high spirits, literally high spirits because he had a kidney problem I don't have to tell you I know he had a kidney problem. I don't know if he passed with it but ..
Again Matthew James here is making out he knew this man was a bit of a joker before he came to him, yet he never said that before, I could tell after speaking to this man he is a bit of a joker, anyone could tell that. Matthew James makes out he was told by spirit to come to him cause he would make people laugh! Hang on a minute ago Matthew thought this man was a skeptic, and had to ask him where his father was, and now he is using what he has learnt in a minute of talking to him, and repeating it back to him as if it was told to him by his dead father!
He had pain around there but mainly the back, a bad back a really bad back around that area there (indicates where)
.
I'm sorry I'm sorry but I'm going to be very argumentative right and I'm going to say what he is telling me and he had a kidney problem.
Well he's like that so if he said kidney yeh.
Ok its just that he didn’t tell everybody what was wrong with him, he just got on with things, do you understand that?
Yeh.
Ok so this is very clear here. Matthew James specifically mentions kidneys, now i will tell you why he used this, when you are giving a reading you make snap decisions, and you make an educated guess as to why someone may have died. Looking at this man, you would say he is in his 40s, so his dead dad would likely have died in his 60s, which is obviously a very young age. The assumption here is his father had high blood pressure from a bad diet, and that caused kidney failure, sadly a very common death for men in their 60s.
The problem is Matthew James is 100% wrong here, the man states quite clearly he had a bad back, and that is the only connection to the area of the kidneys. Matthew realises he has failed in his educated guess does the old psychic trick of just insisting he is right, and that the client is wrong!
Just think about that for a moment, Matthew has told someone that their dead father had kidney failure, and insisted it to be true, even after the client said no! If this man goes away believing the medium, he will forever believe that not only did his dad have kidney failure, but that he lied to his family about it! Matthew James right there has implanted a negative and false memory regarding this man's dead father! And people wonder why I get so angry at fake psychics and the damage they cause!
Right, he's actually very proud of you and is there children in the audience because I'm about to swear because you know he swore, it's just that he said he's very proud of you but you were an absolute s*it when you were younger.
I was always trouble yeh.
Wow, just think about that for a second. Matthew James is now telling this man, whose father has died, is telling him that he was a sh*t when he was younger! What a dispicably and nasty thing to say just to get a laugh, obviously this man is a light hearted, friendly man who likes a bit of banter, and from this you can guess when he was a kid he had confidence, and probably got in trouble, so hardly a giant leap, but to then claim his father is insulting him from beyond the grave, that is pretty pathetic in my eyes.
Ok you don't actually have any problems its not causing any problems its actually to prove, make you realize there there really is something in this. Do you understand me?
Yeh ok right.
Because he was open minded enough to actually be into this.
Righto, ok.
He might not have admitted to it but he was into it, I think.... was your mum into it?
With dad she was.
(lots of laughing from audience)
Sorry, sorry?
with dad she was.
Seriously she was into this wasn't she
Yeh, yeh, she did.
So Matthew James claims that the clients dad was into spiritualism, but gets a negative response from the man, so quickly switches it to his mother, again more females then men are into such things.
Right, where's your mum, because I think...
(4 Questions asked)
Wheres my mum? She's gone too.
Again Matthew James has no idea at this point if this man's mother is alive or dead, so what does he do, he just straight out asks him, and the client reveals that his mother is dead.
Remember the medium is ASKING THE QUESTION, that is because at this point the medium has no idea, he needs the information before it is safe to move on.
Ok, now she's munching on a bag of what I call crisps, you call chips, she's like munching and she's over there somewhere
She could be doing that yes.
Suddenly this mans dead mother, who Matthew didn't know was dead 10 seconds earlier which is why he had to ask him, is now eating crisps in the afterlife!
What a bizarre thing to do, eating crisps is such a physical thing to do, so why on earth would you do it in the afterlife, and even more so why would you do it when you living son is right there and you have the chance to pass on a message to him!
Its all about carbohydrates and again just eating, just eating what she liked to eat.
She's Italian so spaghetti all that sort of stuff shes a great cook.
So his mother liked to eat things she liked to eat! Wow that is me convinced, time to close down the site, I have never seen evidence quite like that before! Some who eats something, eats the very thing they like to eat! WOW!
Well she didn't really bother what she looked like or what her weight was or anything
Well she was a big lady.
So the client has told the medium that his mother was Italian, was a great cook, and now the medium is presuming that the mother may have been over weight.
Again repeating back in a way what the client has told him. Have you ever seen a great cook from the Mediterranean who was slim? I live in the, and I have never see a middle aged cook/chef to be slim!
and your father used to complain all the time about her.
Umm, not really, dad was good with women so he never complained.
Right.
Matthew James gets this one 100% wrong, he took a chance that the dead father would moan about his fat wife, but he didn't! Again just think about what the medium is saying to this man about his dead parents!
He didn't complain about her weight no, I can tell you that he's Italian, Italians are lovers they don’t complain about their women, the lady next to us maybe he would take her.
(laughing)
Again to re-iterate, Matthew Smith insults the mans parents and gets it 100% wrong!
Right, I knew I had to come to you first! Right, have you had your son yet?
(5 Questions asked)
Yes I've got two boys.
Psychics will often do this, ask a question in a vague kind of style, it leaves them open to manipulating any further statements
Do you want a third one?
(6 Questions asked)
I've only just talked about that recently with Karen.
What's the betting that next the medium will claim to have known this, and just repeat back the info he has just learned, after he asked a direct question to the man.
I know one of you wants a girl but he's insisting it will be another boy.
I want a girl badly, she wants a boy, she only said that today.
Lol, I must be psychic, I saw that coming, again look at how he structures what he says. Matthew says that he "knew" that one of them wants a girl! He doesn't even say which one, the man or his wife, so its a 50/50 guess, in the first place, placed so vaguely, with an insistence it will be a boy, another 50% guess. By talking in this style, Matthew leaves himself very open for pretty much any reply by the man regarding any future kids. Remember just seconds ago Matthew had no idea if the man had kids, if one was on the way, he just asked a question, and all the info comes from the client.
It will be a boy.
She said that today, she only said that today! What did you say today? (Woman responds) If I had to pick one it would be a boy because I don't want to….. inaudible.
Again insisting something that is a 50% guess, and letting the client do the talking. If they do have a boy they will claim that the medium told them. Forgetting completely that he asked them a question, which the client replied to.
I think you know whats coming next, he's volunteering come down and be the little s*it in your life. This is the sense of humor that this guy has sort of got.
Yeh. he was that way yeh he was I'm just as bad.
Not really anything specific here, just going back over what he has already learned from the client previously, to keep things light, while forgetting completely that Matthew had no idea this mans mother was dead, had no idea if he had kids, and also got the cause of death of the father completely wrong, as well as the claim his father complained about his wifes weight, which again was wrong.
It's just that I had to get his personality and I had to be absolutely insistent that I brought your dad here so all I can do is validate the last thing I actually got. Now I was asking a name and but I know its not his name but whose Mike or Michael? I know its not HIS name.
Michael, Michael is probably like a father to me he's my best mate and I've got a nephew named Michael and a brother in law name Michael so there you go that's 3, no you did hit 3 Michaels, meant a lot to me.
(7 Questions asked) Matthew asks the client who is Michael, the reason he asks is because he has no idea! He has just picked out a very very common name, and threw it at the client in the hope it sticks. Ask yourself how many Michaels you know. Today I have spoke to 2 people called Michael, one is a very very good friend of mine, and another is someone who works at a nearby hotel who I always chat with.
I thought I would check to see how popular Michael was as a name in the 1970s in Australia, which would roughly be the age of this guys friend if similar in age to him. And guess what, it was the second most popular name according too http://www.essentialbaby.com.au/pregnancy/baby-names/1970
Psychics often have a good knowledge of the popularity of names from certain years, it helps them make educated guesses.
Which is the one that he's concerned about?
No no if anything it would be my best mate, he watched us grow up together and so it would be Michael, he's been in trouble lately.
(8 Questions asked) So first Matthew James asks the client if he knows a Michael, (very common name) and now he is asking which one out of the 3 possible Michaels would this dead father be concerned about. Always asking questions. So now the client has revealed that his best mate Michael has been in trouble recently. Remember Matthew asked a question, he did not make a statement, all he asked was which Michael would this guys dead father be concerned about. A QUESTION!!
I'm putting this into my own terminology; he's not said this but that Michael has got cloth ears, hes not listening to anyone.
Correct, that's him, that's him completely.
Well the client just told Matthew that he had been in trouble, and generally when someone has been in trouble, they have not been listening to good advice, hence why they are in trouble.
So to recap, Matthew James, asks the client a question, the client gives him information, then Matthew just repeats back to him what he has just learned.
Got your mother again... shes got bad hips... her hips are playing up.
Yeh yeh she had bad legs/hips playing up
inaudible.
Why would she has bad hips in the afterlife? Matthew is stating this as a current problem for this guys dead mother. Just think about that, this guy has lost his mother, and would like to think of her back in full health and enjoying the afterlife, now Matthew is telling him that she is in pain! That's a bit of a dick move by anyone standards. Either way assuming that this guys mother died roughly the age of 60, it is quite a common ailment to have, made hips/legs, especially considering we already learned that she was overweight. Again it is all about using what you learned from the client and then repeating it back as if it has come from the afterlife.
She was angry when she passed, I'm not saying that you did anything wrong but she had anger when she passed because when she passed she didn’t want to pass when she passed and that’s whats she's angry about.
Well I think she was only 49, 59 sorry when she passed and she wanted to see my youngest boy grow up.
Firstly damn, I was only 1 year out on her age! And I dont even claim to be psychic!.
Next up most people who visit mediums do so because a dead relative died before their time. Rarely if ever will someone visit a medium in the hope of communicating with a dead relative who died from natural causes aged 95! So it is a safe guess that someone who dies at 60 will not want to die! So a really dumb thing for Matthew James to say to someone in my opinion.
I'm actually going to say that she is actually very, the energy I've got with this lady is very aggressive but I'm not saying like nasty aggressive I just want to be aggressive at the minute. I want to drive, I want to push, I want to force. Its like you've got to rip those hands off that Micheal’s ears and he's going to start listening to you and he'll respect you.
Righto.
You got to rip, you got to do it.
If I can do it yeh that will be fantastic
You've got to do it you've go to do it you got to do it about to apparently make the biggest mistake of his life ….........
And that is it, the end of the reading.
Remember this video Matthew James put on his website and youtube channel as an example of his best work. Afterall you wouldn't put on a poor reading would you?
He is convinced that this is him at his best, yet I would say I have clearly shown step by step exactly how he did it, the methods he used, the fact he asked 8 very direct questions, and then used the answers he received as part of the reading.
Matthew James got a lot of important details wrong, and wrong in such a way they were in fact quite insulting not only to the client but also to the memory of the dead parents.
Matthew James you should be ashamed, and embarrassed.
Matthew James, I am officially calling you a BADPSYCHIC, and I dare you to say anything different.
By Jon Donnis
Transcript by forum member girlseeksghosts
$80 for an half hour recording of Matthew James cold reading! Blimey, that's a good living to make, much easier than actually trying to change science, take the human race forward and proving what you do is real, but wait you don't claim what you do is real, you quite clearly state what you do is entertainment, that it is an act! Lets never forget that people, remember there is NO UK LAW whatsoever that forces him to state that, he states that by his own personal choice and admission he is not really psychic!
