The Cuckoo Town Podcast

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The Cuckoo Town podcast focusses on the borderlands where all the weird stuff meets creativity. We're attracted to the unseen places where a smorgasbord of high strangeness (UFOs/ghosts/bigfoot/black-eyed kids etc) blends on the fringes of our mainstream culture. This mysterious place is the source of all our creativity, but especially in the arts, music, and literature, as in weird fiction for example. Sven Berlin, a multi-talented artist/sculptor/writer etc., called this source/this unseen inspiration, the 'magic shuttle.' Our intention here at Cuckoo Town, with occasional assistance from deep-thinking guests, drawn from the paranormal/arts/music/literary world, and from various other walks of life too, is to peer deep inside these liminal spaces, these places where the magic comes from to enhance our lives.
Mark Anthony Wyatt, 2022

Mark is a published writer, having published three books so far, but he's currently working on a few more. The published books; 'The Spirit of Cornwall: A Haunted Legacy' (Vols 1 and 2, 2019); and 'Wyatt's Weird World' (2015). His books are available as either Kindles, or paperbacks, via Amazon.com online, or via Waterstones, Barnes and Noble and various independent and specialist bookstores. Please check out his book reviews on Amazon. Mark has appeared as a guest on over 30 paranormal/esoteric/popular culture podcasts worldwide, including several in the U.S.A., in the U.K, and in Canada. Welcome to Cuckoo Town!

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The Cuckoo Town Podcast

EP. 25. Owls aren't THAT big Dad!

30 SEP 2023 · In this episode I discuss my weird encounter with what appeared to be a HUGE owl, back in 2013, and its portent effect on my life. I'm not the first to have experienced something odd like this, and I'm sure these encounters are on-going around the world. As to what they represent, I'm no wiser, all I do know is that my life changed in so many ways in the months and years that followed my sighting. Are they aliens from outer space? Inter-dimensional? Spiritual? A figment of my imagination? A part of my wider consciousness? Have a listen to this episode, sleep on it, and then make up your own mind. As I mention in this episode, these strange encounters are not as rare as you might imagine. Something is happening to those of us who are receptive to whatever these owls represent. For me the meeting at the crossroads that night was life-changing.....

24m 5s
Ep. 24. The Legend of the Lost Land of Lyonesse

28 AUG 2023 · This episode is a thorough investigation of The legend of the lost land of Lyonesse, a mythical land that may have sat off the coast of Cornwall many, many years ago. No one is sure that the place ever existed, let alone sank, but there are tantalising little bits of evidence, both historical and geological. Do I solve the mystery? Listen and find out, you might enjoy my journey of discovery! If you do enjoy the episode, please tell your friends and family, anyone who may have an interest in Cornwall, legends, mysteries,folklore etc etc. Please also share the episode on your social media, thank you! Mark

36m 15s
Ep. 23. Faeries, Mushrooms, Bees, and Gremlins, with Jack Hunter, Ph. D.

15 JUL 2023 · I had a short but fascinating conversation with Dr Jack Hunter. Along the way we talked about his personal encounters with the fae, his PhD studies on trance mediumship, his mushroom trips, bees, hoverflies, gremlins, and the folklore of his home region, the Tanat Valley, nestled amongst the lofty mountains of mid-Wales, amongst many other topics. It was fun, I hope you enjoy listening as much as we enjoyed our conversation. Be lucky! Mark

35m 16s
Ep. 22. Bob Osborne on Crowley, Lawrence, and the Huxleys: Witchcraft, Sex, Spies, Nazis, & Fabians

9 JUL 2023 · In this episode, Bob Osborne shines a light on the far west of Cornwall, a place that has influenced YOUR life, whether you know it or not, through the gifted intellectuals and artists who were once lured there by its strange unearthly magnetism. A place where Aleister Crowley, D.H. Lawrence, Aldous Huxley, Frieda Von Richtofen, and many other world famous artists, writers, and musicians, once lived, loved, and, as Bob Osborne says in his book, 'Zennor, Spirt of Place', wreaked havoc! The world we live in today was hugely influenced by these talented people. Enjoy! Mark

49m 37s
Ep. 21. The Grim Reaper

20 JUN 2023 · This is an amusing, weird, but, I assure you, true story, a small part of an auto-biography I'm publishing in the next few months, to be called, 'Surf 'n' Turf', but be forewarned, it's an unconventional auto-biography! If you enjoy it, I would appreciate you sharing with all your friends/on social media etc, and please subscribe too. Thanks for listening, and.....'Be Lucky!

23m 49s
Ep. 20. Fairy Films: Wee Folk on the Big Screen

11 JUN 2023 · Just a short episode to promote the book 'Fairy Films: Wee Folk on the Big Screen'. I contributed an essay (on Twin Peaks) to this book. Mark Anthony Wyatt

14m 47s
Ep. 19. Nuts, Fruits, and Gypsy Boots: The Nature Boys of Southern California

4 MAY 2023 · Following on from the Ascona Monte Verita commune episode, (Ep 18) we travel across the Atlantic to California, to see how German emigrant lebensreformers/naturmenschen (life reformers/nature men) some of them direct from Monte Verita in Ascona, Switzerland, heavily influenced the Nature Boys of California, and how that thread can be traced to the late 1960s flower power generation of hippies. We take a look at the charismatic hippies that were around LONG, LONG, before the late 1960s hippies. We go right back to their roots the late 19th century in Germany, and the early 1900s (at Monte Verita etc) then show how they directly connect to the LA Nature Boys who have never really gone away! There were nature boys (hippy men living wild in caves, trees, on the beaches etc) in California from around 1915ish onwards, possibly even before that. Among several facinating people we will take an interest is Eden Ahbez, a hippy musician, a spiritual man who rubbed shoulders with people like Nat King Cole (he wrote his massive hit...Nature Boy) and Brian Wilson, and he was revered by Paul McCartney, too. Give it a listen! Mark

38m 2s
Ep. 18. Free Love, Art, Revolution, and the Third Reich

19 APR 2023 · An overview/beginner's guide to the Monte Verita commune at Ascona. At its peak(1900 to 1920) Ascona was at the epicenter of the counterculture, emitting seismic waves of intellectual thought and creativity. It played host, and influenced some of the brightest and best of a generation (Otto Gross, Sigmund Freud, D.H. Lawrence, Aldous Huxley, H.G. Wells, Rudolph Steiner, Frieda van Richtofen, Herman Hesse etc etc... As the current Monte Verita website, says, ‘it was a place where our minds could reach up to the heavens.’ The ground-breaking ideas that emerged from that commune in the early years of the 20th Century, spanning many disciplines, went on to influence our world, mostly for the better, although some of those ideas morphed in the outside world and were used for more nefarious purposes.

49m 45s
Ep. 17. Throwing Stones at H.G. Wells' House

16 MAR 2023 · In this episode we're looking into the Victorian plant-hunters, adventurers who risked their lives in their pursuit of florae to bring back to Britain, and changed our gardens for ever.....but fear not, it's NOT going to be boring! This isn't 'Gardeners' World' you know, it's not Alan Titchmarsh, this isn't the BBC! There's lots of fun along the way, especially in the final part of this episode, where I talk about a little old lady who liked to sneak into peoples' gardens to errrrmmm...well, borrow plants, on a kind of long-term arrangement! She also put other plants back in their places....exchange being no robbery and all that. She caused quite a stir sneaking into posh peoples' gardens in 1970s Surrey, some people even put up fences and watch towers with searchlights to try to stop her. She was a kind of green Robin Hood, re-distributing botanical wealth....yes, I know it's a bit crazy, OK., it's a lot crazy....but is it true? Well, yes, in part it is. Enjoy! P.S,. I also discuss the old English tradition of the Sunday Roast

44m 22s
Ep. 16. Lost on the Granite Studded Hills of West Cornwall, with my guest, Matt James

24 FEB 2023 · I recently caught up with an old Cornish friend, Matthew James. I've known Matt for many years now. Matt is very knowledgeable about the paranormal, both as a student of the genre, and as an experiencer, too; he's had many odd owl encounters for example. We have attended many conferences together, and sky watches too, we've had a few adventures....including getting lost on the high, bleak, creepy, mist-enclosed Cornish hills. I hope you enjoy our conversation, we certainly did, enjoy!

50m 46s