WELCOME TO THE CFZ BLOG NETWORK: COME AND JOIN THE FUN

Half a century ago, Belgian Zoologist Bernard Heuvelmans first codified cryptozoology in his book On the Track of Unknown Animals.

The Centre for Fortean Zoology (CFZ) are still on the track, and have been since 1992. But as if chasing unknown animals wasn't enough, we are involved in education, conservation, and good old-fashioned natural history! We already have three journals, the largest cryptozoological publishing house in the world, CFZtv, and the largest cryptozoological conference in the English-speaking world, but in January 2009 someone suggested that we started a daily online magazine! The CFZ bloggo is a collaborative effort by a coalition of members, friends, and supporters of the CFZ, and covers all the subjects with which we deal, with a smattering of music, high strangeness and surreal humour to make up the mix.

It is edited by CFZ Director Jon Downes, and subbed by the lovely Lizzy Bitakara'mire (formerly Clancy), scourge of improper syntax. The daily newsblog is edited by Corinna Downes, head administratrix of the CFZ, and the indexing is done by Lee Canty and Kathy Imbriani. There is regular news from the CFZ Mystery Cat study group, and regular fortean bird news from 'The Watcher of the Skies'. Regular bloggers include Dr Karl Shuker, Dale Drinnon, Richard Muirhead and Richard Freeman.The CFZ bloggo is updated daily, and there's nothing quite like it anywhere else. Come and join us...

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Monday, April 20, 2015

THE GONZO BLOG DOO-DAH MAN IS BUOYANT

The Gonzo Daily - Monday
 
Well, what an interesting few days its been. I returned to the stage for my first live performance in thirteen years on Friday night.
 
The event was called Reflektions and it was promoted by my dear compadre Martin Eve, as part of his college course at the increasingly stupidly named Petroc. I am very fond of Martin, and am disappointed that he did not have more support from his fellow students and college staff. But as these places largely exist so that successive incompetent government administrations can look as if they are actually doing something about youth unemployment, I suppose I shouldn't have too high expectation that they will behave in a civilised manner. However, the event was lovely, with a truly warm and loving vibe about it, it is just pity that it was not better attended. However, I would like to stress that anything written in this review is my opinion not anyone else's, and certainly not Martin's. Over the past year I have had several run ins with the college, and am not at all impressed with them as a whole.
 
It kicked off with the lovely Tracy Nicholson, who sounds and looks bizarrely like Sandy Denny. She was followed by Stargrace whom regular readers will have heard me talk about on a number of occasions, me, Jim Watts playing a selection of Country Blues, and finally Dogleg, who mix jazz, folk and rock into one glorious noise, surprisingly raucous for an acoustic duo. The other advertised band didn't turn up, which is why I suggested to Martin that with events like this it is better to advertise the event rather than the performers. However my sage advice based on nearly forty years of producing events like this was over-ruled by his course tutor, who - because of illness - didn't turn up to see her advice go tits up.
 
Much to my annoyance, my trusty Ovation guitar packed up two days before the show. I brought along a rather crappy electric guitar that has been kicking around the place for years...and it sounded awful! Steve Mayne from Dogleg, who I used to know back in the day (that particular day being a third of a century ago) when he played guitar for a post punk band called Optimax, and I was swanning around the place taking a lot of drugs and pretending to be Brian Epstein, leant me his spare acoustic and so roared my way through four of my songs (three old, one new) and two cover versions. Thanks Steve, I owe you one.
 
This morning we had a very welcome interruption to our routine when Animals & Men columnist Carl Portman, his wife Sue, and two very well behaved dogs (at least one who has won prizes at Crufts) turned up for a cuppa. It is always nice to see them, and I think that I have managed to get him to write regularly for Gonzo Weekly.
 
And finally, Volume Three of the Journal of Cryptozoology is out today..Good 'ere innit?
 
 
The Gonzo Weekly #126
www.gonzoweekly.com
 
Atkins-May Project, Judas Priest, Judge Smith, Peter Hammill, Van der Graff Generator, Edgar Allan Poe, 4th Eden, Phil Collins, Genesis, Monika, Hawkwind, Jon Anderson, and Yes fans had better look out!
 
The latest issue of Gonzo Weekly (#126) is available to read at www.gonzoweekly.com, and to download at http://www.gonzoweekly.com/pdf/. It has The Atkins-May Project  on the cover, and inside yours truly interviews Paul May about the new Anthology project. Doug writes about Phil Collins, Jon eulogises over Monika, and Michael Des Barres' new album, and interviews 4th Eden, and the director of a new staging of Peter Hammill and Judge Smith's classic opera 'The Fall of the House of Usher'. Jon critiques a book about 4Chan. Neil Nixon reports on an even stranger album than usual, Wyrd goes avant garde, Xtul gets even more peculiar, and there are radio shows from Strange Fruit and from M Destiny at Friday Night Progressive, and the titular submarine dwellers are still lost at sea, although I have been assured that they will hit land again soon. There is also a collection of more news, reviews, views, interviews and pademelons trying to choose (OK, nothing to do with small marsupials having difficulty in making choices, but I got carried away with things that rhymed with OOOOS) than you can shake a stick at. And the best part is IT's ABSOLUTELY FREE!!!
 
This issue features:
Black Sabbath, The Polyphonic Spree, Bill Wyman, Abbey Road Studios, Paul McCartney, The Who, Percy Sledge, Ronnie Carroll, Gunter Grass, John Shuttleworth, Hugh Hopper, Rocket Scientists, Tommy James, Birmingham Sunday, Inner City Unit, Mick Abrahams, OneRepublic, Ellie Goulding, Florence and the Machine, Brantley Gilbert,Paul May, Al Atkins, Phil Collins, Colin Watkeys, Peter Hammill, Judge Smith, Hawkwind, Richard Freeman, Steve Hackett, Toto, Yes, Chris Squire, Rick Wakeman, Jon Anderson, 4th Eden, Xtul, The Beatles, Ozzy, Michael Jackson, Elvis, Kate Bush, Muddy Waters, NSync, Michael des Barres, Monika, America, Furor Gallico
 
Read the previous few issues of Gonzo Weekly:
 
 
All issues from #70 can be downloaded at www.gonzoweekly.com if you prefer. If you have problems downloading, just email me and I will add you to the Gonzo Weekly dropbox. The first 69 issues are archived there as well. Information is power chaps, we have to share it!
 
You can download the magazine in pdf form HERE:
http://www.gonzoweekly.com/pdf/
 

* The Gonzo Daily is a two way process. If you have any news or want to write for us, please contact me at jon@eclipse.co.uk. If you are an artist and want to showcase your work, or even just say hello please write to me at gonzo@cfz.org.uk. Please copy, paste and spread the word about this magazine as widely as possible. We need people to read us in order to grow, and as soon as it is viable we shall be invading more traditional magaziney areas. Join in the fun, spread the word, and maybe if we all chant loud enough we CAN stop it raining. See you tomorrow...
 
* The Gonzo Daily is - as the name implies - a daily online magazine (mostly) about artists connected to the Gonzo Multimedia group of companies. But it also has other stuff as and when the editor feels like it. The same team also do a weekly newsletter called - imaginatively - The Gonzo Weekly. Find out about it at this link: www.gonzo-multimedia.blogspot.com/…/all-gonzo-news-wots-fit…
 
* We should probably mention here, that some of our posts are links to things we have found on the internet that we think are of interest. We are not responsible for spelling or factual errors in other people's websites. Honest guv!
 
* Jon Downes, the Editor of all these ventures (and several others) is an old hippy of 55 who - together with an infantile orange cat named after a song by Frank Zappa puts it all together from a converted potato shed in a tumbledown cottage deep in rural Devon which he shares with various fish, and sometimes a small Indian frog. He is ably assisted by his lovely wife Corinna, his bulldog/boxer Prudence, his elderly mother-in-law, and a motley collection of social malcontents. Plus.. did we mention the infantile orange cat?
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