So after being kinda lazy and not putting in very many hands the past few months, I have gotten back to my old self in December and have been putting in a ton of hands. Pretty much all 2/4-5/10 on pstars, going ok so far up about 7500. Main thing I've noticed is that the 5/10 games have gotten a lot tougher. Because of this I have probably spent more time working on my game the past few weeks than I have during the last 6 months combined. I really feel excited about some changes I've made to my play and I've actually been enjoying putting in time at the tables for the first time in a while. Gonna take a week off to go to Vegas for New Years, but after that I'm gonna be right back at it with the goal of being a reg in the 25/50 games by next summer.

I was planning on my next video being part 2 of my series at shallow 6max plo, but due to high demand it looks like instead my next video will be part one of a HU leakfinder series where I sweat CR instructor m(x+t) and do dual commentary with him. If you have any suggestions or preferences as far as plo videos go, please post in the "plo video ideas" thread in the plo forum.


Now onto the reason why I wanted to write this blog. I am a huge music fanatic and many of you told me in the past how much you liked the songs I posted in my blog, and have asked me to post more so I have been wanting to talk about dubstep and share some tracks for a while. A year ago practically no one had ever even heard of dubstep, six months ago only a handful of people had gotten into it. As of now the top dubstep DJ's/producers are selling out massive venues 3 months in advance. People in the music industry are saying the only thing in history that can compare to the massive instant following it's recieved is back in the late 90's when trance started blowing up in Europe. It's basically a derivative of another form of electronic music called drum and bass(which I'm actually not a big fan of). The change in the way it's produced is subtle, but it has a massive effect on the sound. I won't go into technical details on this because I don't think I'm musically inclined enough to give an accurate break down, but just know this: every major DJ on earth is already playing it, and it's already making it's way into the production of major music producers in every form of electronic and hip-hop music.

The man pretty much considered the god-father/inventor of dubstep is Rusko. This track here is actually the Sub Focus remix of one of his tracks, but it is by far my favorite track of the year. Sounds normal at first, but you'll hear the dubstep sound starting at 1:06. If you ever this track played when you are on a dance floor, you seriously won't know what to do with yourself...

Rusko ft Amber Coffman - Hold On (Sub Focus Remix)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NI2b7qXUlnE

These next tracks are by a DJ/producer called Bassnectar. Imo the best of them all right now. If
youv'e ever seen a DJ murdering a crowd harder than he does in these videos please let me know. These aren't the kinda events you want to go to every night or bring your parents or small children to, but in small doses they're a lot of fun. This first vid is from his now infamous set at the Shambhala festival back in August. Again the first minute of the vid will sound like other stuff you've heard before, but at 1:01 you will hear the unique dubstep sound.

track playing is Bassnectar - Here We Go:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4eA7Qu7Lz2g

More Bassnectar:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sq_Sko8wW6U

Another Bassnectar track, more of a hip-hop sound to this one:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oGCc0WqvVT4


This track shows a little bit more of the lighther side of dubstep. I had to burn probably 20 cd's of this for friends of mine once they heard me play it at my house or in my car:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vbnqP4BFS6c


Two more for good measure...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ISokhL1_8VA


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_tlhvFusnPI


Ok so that took a lot of effort, I hope you guys enjoy these tracks. If you don't, you are definitely in the minority or over the age of 35 : )

glgl

Matthew

For the next week, now through November 2, I will be giving plo lessons at $100/hr. I have never coached for less than $200/hr, and my current rate is $300/hr so this is an incredible bargain and something that I will most likely only be offering this one time. I've decided to do this for a couple of reasons. First, I've had a ton of lesson requests the past few months from players at lower stakes that I've had to turn down due to my rate being to high for them or because of me not having enough time. Secondly, I've ran 40 something buy-ins below ev the past few weeks and honestly have no desire to play poker at the moment. I had already decided that I was going to take a week off from playing for my health and sanity, but I don't want to spend the entire time being unproductive so I figured it would be a good opportunity give everyone a chance to have some coaching.

If you are interested you can contact me at mindcirkus.coaching@gmail.com. Just let me know when you are available and I will do my best to accommodate everyone. Lessons can be conducted by having a sweat session, hand history review, theory discussion, or anything else you would like.

For those of you who don't know anything about me, here are my plo results for the year:

6max:



HU:



glgl

Matthew

OK so I finally made it to vegas a few days ago and I honestly feel like I am the last person to get here. I was ready to go home after about 4 weeks last year so I didn't want to be here from late May until late July like a lot of people are going to be this year. I was planning to play the $2500 PLO event at the Rio on Tuesday, but I stayed up playing a mixed game until 8am that morning and hate having to wake up after only getting a few hours sleep so I skipped it. I'll most likely play the 5k and 10k PLO events as well as the main event though. I'm also going to be at the two remaining Cardrunners parties so come say hi if you see me there.

As far as online play goes I started playing a lot of 6max hands again recently and a lot on pokerstars for the first time since early March. I was going to post some graphs or results like I usually do but I forgot to update the database on my laptop before I left for vegas so I don't have any of the hh's on this computer. I was up about 36k in EV and 26k in actual dollars over 28k hands since my last blog before I left for vegas. I then proceeded to run 8k below EV and -8k overall in 3500 hands since I've been here so I am going to force myself not to play 5/10 or 10/20 again until I get some momentum back. Like I said in my last blog it's always a good idea to play lower stakes than your normal game when you have been running bad even if you are rolled for bigger games. It took me years to finally learn that lesson but I'm really glad I finally did.

I've also been playing a lot of 8-game mix on pokerstars lately, mostly at 10/20 and 20/40. I've always been interested in playing all the games so I feel that I'm at least competent in all of them. I think my weakest games are stud hi and 0maha8 but I've improved a lot recently. I'm definitely up a good bit in the 8-game on pstars so I'm feeling pretty confident in them at the moment. I also played in a great live mixed game the other night which consisted of PLO, PLO/8, NL 2-7 single draw, 2-7 triple draw, and badugi. It was 20/40 for a while and then 9/18 towards the end and there was a lot of action to say the least...

I've spent a ton of time in vegas the past 4 years, well over 100 days, and this place never ceases to amaze me. I'm going to just list a few random thoughts and things that have happened since I've been here.

1. Aria is only about 6 months old and the other day I noticed that the paint is already completely stripped off around the credit card slots on the ATM machines. I guess they've been getting a lot of use...
2. There is something so awesome about being able to order gourmet beef carpaccio at 4am.
3. There are enough dimes in this town to end the recession.
4. Game 7 of the NBA finals was absolute craziness here, there were at least 100 people crowded around every tv in the casinos and bars.
5. For the second time in the past couple months Flava Flav randomly walked up next to me at a craps table and started playing. The odds of that happening have to be astronomical but it honestly doesn't even seem that strange here in vegas.
6. People wearing sunglasses in a 4/8 fixed limit game never cease to amuse me.
7. There have been big mixed games running every night in the Ivey Room at Aria. It was 400/800 for a while and then went up to 600/1200 last night. Notable players I've seen in the game include David Williams, Michael Mizrachi, Daniel Alaei, and Jean-Robert Bellande(lol).

I'm most likely going to go see Sean Tyas play at the Perfecto event at Rain on Saturday night. The Perfecto events @ Rain and XS are my two favorite nightlife places in vegas. XS is just unbelievably nice and usually has the best crowd of females in vegas from what I've seen, and Rain brings in the top-ranked DJ's in the world for Perfecto on Saturday nights and has a ton of things going on that are just visually stunning. You definitely need to get a table if you are going to either one though, if you don't you will be standing in very crowded areas all night and have to wait forever at the bar to get a drink. Here is a clip of Perfecto @ Rain for those of you who haven't been:

http://www.n9negroup.com/las-vegas.n9negroup.com/downloads/5.html

On to the World Cup. I have become a big football(soccer) fan in my adult life which is unusual considering most people don't follow it here in the U.S. and I didn't even play the sport when I was growing up. Despite the fact that we aren't considered one of the best teams in the world I am still first and foremost a team U.S.A. fan. We clearly got lucky on the goal against England, but I don't think there was any doubt we looked like the better team in the second half and had a very good chance to win the game. I just finished watching our game vs. Slovenia and I honestly don't think I've felt more emotion watching a sporting event since the Texas/USC game when Vince Young became a legend. I'm pretty sure I woke up everyone on my floor with all the screaming I did at the tv. The official who was in charge of the game is an absolute disgrace and has no business officiating a youth league game much less one in a World Cup. Thierry Henry's handball goal to get France into the World Cup has to be the blown call of the century, but the disallowed goal in the closing minutes of the U.S. game has to be a close second. It wasn't just that one call though, the guy just completely blew countless calls throughout the entire game. What a disgrace to the sport.

As far as other teams go, Argentina is looking like an extremely scary team at this point. There is absolutely no doubt that Lionel Messi is the best player in the world. When you watch him play it honestly feels like he is going to score or at least create a very good chance every time he touches the ball. Also the vuvezalas and the ball they are using are huge mistakes on FIFA's part imo.

Finally I just want to mention a few huge complaints I have with Apple. First of all, it is such a joke how you always have to wait for 2+ hours when you go into an Apple store before anyone will speak to you or even ring you up for a simple purchase. Secondly, they make it so damn difficult to get windows working properly on a macbook. You would think a company with tons of brilliant people working for it could figure out how to fix these things. Tilts me to no end...

gl gl

Matthew

I have new PLO video is coming out tomorrow and I think most of you will really like it. It is part one of a series at .25/.50 deep 6max PLO, and it focuses on becoming aggressive and creative at the table once you have learned the basics. I'm actually quite happy with it and I think quite different than any video that has been made previously at lower stakes. For those of you who didn't like me laughing in my first video with Taylor, let me just tell you that I am aware of it now and hardly laugh at all in this one : )

As far as poker goes, I have still been running pretty bad lately which has caused me to spend less time at the tables and more time hanging out with friends, playing golf, and coaching. I've about broken about even in actual $ the past couple weeks, but continued to run well below as far as adjusted EV$. I have been around long enough to know that this is just part of the business sometimes, so I'm doing a pretty good job of taking it in stride. I've also spent a lot of time analyzing my play, and I think I've learned some new things and also refreshed some concepts in my mind that I think I was neglecting somewhat for a while. I've kept forcing myself to play lower stakes(1/2 and 2/4) than usual until I get some momentum, and it's something I recommend for all of you to do when you are running bad. I'm going to keep at it though and I'm sure things will turn around soon.

Let me also quickly mention some changes in my coaching. I got a ton of lesson requests from low stakes players(people playing .5/1 and lower), so I have decided to offer a lower rate at the moment for those who want to be coached at 1/2 or lower. I agree that my normal rates are too high for players at the smaller stakes, so I have decided to coach players at 1/2 or lower for $200/hr for the time being(same rates as usual for 2/4+). I'm only doing this because I have been enjoying coaching lately and I feel bad turning down people who are eager to learn but can't afford my normal rates. I'm also willing to give some discounts for multiple lessons and discuss profit sharing(but only for those who are already successful players and have an established reputation and references in the poker community). If you are interested you can contact me at mindcirkus.coaching@gmail.com

I promised in my first blog that I would always include some interesting stuff in my blogs in addition to poker stuff so that people not interested in PLO would still want to read it. So as promised here are some vids and tracks I think most of you will enjoy:

First of all these are some videos that I think are absolutely insane. I do not ride motorcycles but I have some good friends who do, and let me just tell you the stuff in these videos is unbelievably difficult/dangerous. My friends have told me that the rush of opening the throttle and raising up on the highway is the most intense adrenaline rush/high that anyone can experience on earth, but I have resisted the temptation to ride because everyone who does this gets seriously injured at some point. Everyone I know who rides has been in multiple serious crashes and a few people I know have even been killed in motorcycle accidents. Makes you appreciate this stuff that much more:

http://vimeo.com/11788658

http://vimeo.com/9069888

(Shout out to my boy Benji Benjamin for these vids)

Now for some music. I enjoy almost every genre of music and especially hip-hop, rap, rock, metal, alternative, and especially electronic music such as house, trance, electro, and dubstep. I'm going to leave the electronic stuff for a future blog, so here are a couple hip-hop tracks I discovered recently that you guys should like if you have any interest in that type of music. The first track some of you may have already heard, but every friend of mine who I've played it for in the past month has become obsessed with it and insisted that I burn them a copy. The second track features the same guys and is also pretty sick and still mostly unknown at this point. Just for the record this is not the type of music I have a lot of respect for, but I still enjoy listening to it at times and I think that most people do.

Far East Movement - Like a G6 (ft. The Cataracs) / The video is actually kinda lame, just block it out and listen to the track:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7lGRIw1WNRY

The Cataracs - Bass Down Low (ft. Dev)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gbMut1PnJJM

Hope you guys enjoy this stuff, if not hopefully you will find the stuff I post in the future more interesting.

gl gl

Matthew

Ok so this is my first blog and I'm going to skip the part about my poker background because I talked about it in my Cardrunners interview as well as my first video with Taylor. Instead I'm going to post some detailed results and mention a few other things that I think are more important and interesting.

February of 2009 I started focusing all my efforts on 6max PLO, and these are all the hands I have played in 6max games since then(I always play 8-12 tables):

In March of this year I started feeling somewhat burned out playing 6max, so I started playing some HU from time to time. It went very well for the most part, but it is very hard to find action once you become known and extremely frustrating when people play 10 hands and then insta quit you once they are up a couple bucks. My HU results from this year:

I started coaching a few students a couple months ago, and actually found that I enjoy it much more than I anticipated I would. I have been enjoying it much more than grinding 6max lately, so I've decided to take new students and do a lot of coaching during the next 4-5 weeks before I head to Vegas for the summer. I am going to give Cardrunners members top priority so send me a message if you would like some info.

I think by spending more time coaching, and less time playing over the course of the next month it will help restore my desire to play hands online. I know I have ran well this year(esp HU), so I'm certainly not going to complain but I have started running really bad the past couple weeks and it's always good to take a little break and regroup when this happens:

I have always been pretty good about moving down to smaller games when running bad(even if I'm adequately rolled for the bigger games) so I have been playing mostly 2/4-3/6 this past week and even a bit of 1/2. I hadn't played any 1/2 since early Feb as far as I can remember, but I thought it would be a good idea since I was going to be recording some stuff for Cardrunners at lower stakes.

The main reason I am posting all of these results is for those of you who are interested in watching my videos or receiving coaching from me. I also just wanted to mention that when I write future blogs I am going to try to make them as interesting as possible and include stuff like graphs, photos, videos, links or anything else I think people will find interesting. I know that I'm not a big star like some of the other guys that have a blog on Cardrunners, so I'm under no false illusion that people will want to read my blog if it's not interesting.

The last thing I want to say is please let me know in the forums or by pm what you would like to see in future PLO videos. I have already completed some stuff that I think is really interesting and different than anything done before, but I am always open to suggestions and will make any type of video that there is demand for. gl gl

Matthew