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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Unlike some of our competitors we are not going to try and blackmail you into donating by saying that we won't continue if you don't. That would just be vulgar, but our lives, and those of the animals which we look after, would be a damn sight easier if we receive more donations to our fighting fund. Donate via Paypal today...




Monday, January 11, 2016

THE GONZO BLOG DOO-DAH MAN COUGHS

The Gonzo Daily - Monday
Yesterday afternoon I wrote the editorial for next weekend's Gonzo Weekly. It was a review of the excellent ★ album by David Bowie. In it I wrote how fantastic it was that Bowie was finally back on track as an artist, that the album is his best for forty years, and I analysed some of its nuances. I even made some tentative guesses about its meaning.
As anyone with an iPad knows, incoming messages are heralded with a 'ding' sound. Corinna got up early to go to work, and an hour or so later I was still mostly asleep when in came a barrage of 'ding' sounds.
Tony Visconti is quoted as saying: "He always did what he wanted to do. And he wanted to do it his way and he wanted to do it the best way. His death was no different from his life – a work of Art. He made Blackstar for us, his parting gift. I knew for a year this was the way it would be. I wasn't, however, prepared for it. He was an extraordinary man, full of love and life. He will always be with us. For now, it is appropriate to cry."
And what about my interpretations of the album? They are not that far wrong, but they missed something very important:
"Look up here, I’m in heaven
I’ve got scars that can’t be seen
I’ve got drama, can’t be stolen
Everybody knows me now
Look up here, man, I’m in danger
I’ve got nothing left to lose
I’m so high it makes my brain whirl
Dropped my cell phone down below"
★ is about all sorts of things, including - quite possibly - what I wrote yesterday afternoon. But above all it is his final statement, his valedictory soliloquy, his last farewell. Be sad my dears, David Bowie/Ziggy Stardust/The Thin White Duke/The Gouster/The Prettiest Star and a dozen otherws have left the building, and the world is an immeasurably poorer place.
David Bowie Dead at 69
YES: RABIN ANDERSON WAKEMAN PROJECT BACK ON?
THOM THE WORLD POET: The Daily Poem
THE GONZO TRACK OF THE DAY: David Bowie – My Death...
ZAPPA'S LOST BROADCAST COMING TO DVD
Gonzo Weekly #164
www.gonzoweekly.com
Free Festival, Fleetwood Mac, New Order, Joy Division, Canterbury Sans Frontieres, Hawkwind, Bridget Wishart, Twink, Digitiser, Mr Biffo, Jaki Windmill, Roy Weard,  Dogwatch, That Legendary Wooden Lion, Hawkwind, and Yes fans had better look out!
The first issue of 2016 is now available, featuring an exclusive interview with Ian Abrahams about 'Festivalized'; his remarkable new book cowritten with one-time Hawkwind chanteuse Bridget Wishart. There is also a feature about Fleetwood Mac's best loved record, Jon moaning about the UK Government's Austerity measures, a review of the autobiography of New Order's Bernard Sumner, radio shows from Strange Harvest, Canterbury Sans Frontieres and Mack Moloney, the latest installment of the saga of Xtul, and columns from all sorts of folk including Mr Biffo and the irrepressable Corinna. There is also a collection of more news, reviews, views, interviews and antechinuses wanting poos (OK, nothing to do with small marsupials who are slightly constipated, 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:
Steely Dan, Donald Fagen, Syd Barrett, Jack White, The Edge, Bono, Keith Richards, Lemmy, Damon Albarn, Barbara Dickson, The Beatles, Galahad, Strange Harvest, Canterbury Sans Frontieres, Mack Maloney's Mystery Hour, Pierre Boulez, John Thurman Hunter Jr., Robert Colin Stigwood, Hyman Paul Bley, CM, Mark Barnes, Natalie Maria Cole, Marion James, William Wayne McMillan Rogers III, The Pirates, Freddie King, Denny Laine, The Selecter, Wild Man Fischer, Rick Wakeman, Ian Abrahams, Fleetwood Mac, Bridget Wishart, Twink, Roy Weard, A J Smitrovich, Mr Dad's LPs, Mr Biffo, Hawkwind, Motorhead, Xtul, Bernard Sumner, Eric Clapton, Bjork, Grateful Dead, David Bowie, Elvis, John Lennon, Yes, Jon Anderson, Micky Dolenz, Chris Squire, Steve Howe, Jean-Luc Ponty, Neil Nixon, Blowfly, Stary Olsa
Read the previous few issues of Gonzo Weekly:
Issue 163 (Lemmy)
Issue 161-2 (The Christmas Double Feature)
Issue 160 (Frank Zappa)
Issue 159 (Jon Anderson and Matt Malley)
Issue 158 (Billy Sherwood)
Issue 157 (Drones for Daevid)
Issue 156 (Rick and Emmie)
Issue 155 (Pink Fairies)
Issue 154 (Steve Ignorant)
Issue 153 (Martin Barre)
Issue 152 (4th Eden)
Issue 151 (Corky Laing)
Issue 150 (Roger Dean)
Issue 149 (Tony Palmer in Space)
Issue 148 (Wally Hope)
Issue 147 (Thom the World Poet cover)
Issue 146 (Bee and Flower cover)
Issue 145 (Dave Brock cover)
Issue 144 (Percy Jones cover)
Issue 143 (Billy Sherwood cover)
Issue 142 (Daevid Allen and Spirits Burning cover)
Issue 141 (Rick Wakeman cover)
Issue 140 (Jaki Windmill cover)
Issue 139 (Raz cover)
Issue 138 (Galahad cover)
Issue 137 (Chris Squire cover)
Issue 136 (Neil Nixon cover)
Issue 135 (FNP cover)
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:
SPECIAL NOTICE: If you, too, want to unleash the power of your inner rock journalist, and want to join a rapidly growing band of likewise minded weirdos please email me at jon@eclipse.co.uk The more the merrier really.
* 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.co.uk
* 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 56 who - together with an infantile orange cat named after a song by Frank Zappa, and a small kitten totally coincidentally named after one of the Manson Family, purely because she squeaks, 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 young lady called Jessica. 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, and the adventurous kitten?

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