G. MURRAY THOMAS

G. Murray Thomas writes poetry, fiction, political commentary, literary and music criticism, and anything else that comes into his fool head.

He was born in Brockport, NY, and spent his childhood in Spencerport, a suburb of Rochester. He showed an inclination towards writing at an early age; even before he knew how to write, he would dictate stories to his mother, Merrillan Thomas, who wrote them down for him. He was still in high school when he decided he would pursue a career in writing.

He attended Hampshire College, in Amherst MA, where he received a BA in Creative Writing in 1980.

He spent the next several years in Ketchum, ID (outside of the Sun Valley ski resort), where he, admittedly, spent much of his time dissipating youthful energies. He did, however, find time to write, producing a number of short stories, several of which were published in small literary magazines. While in Idaho he started a novel, which he struggled with for many years to come.

In 1987 he moved to Southern California, where he quickly became involved in a thriving poetry scene. He put the novel away, and focused on poetry. He attended poetry readings throughout Southern California, and was published in a number of literary magazines. His first chapbook, Death to the Real World (and other poems about life), was published by "poetry sucks" press in 1991.

In 1992, Thomas founded Orange Ocean Press, dedicated to publishing poetry anthologies on "unpoetic" topics. Orange Ocean Press published three anthologies, Paper Shredders, about surfing (republished by iUniverse in 2005), Polluted Poems, a collection of environmental poetry, and Kill the Opossum, about dead opossums. Orange Ocean Press also published collections by Tom Foster, Lawrence Schulz and poetry cartoonist Walt Hopkins.

Thomas is, perhaps, best known as the editor of Next... Magazine, a poetry calendar/newsmagazine for Southern California, which he edited and published monthly between 1994 and 1998. Next... covered the growing SoCal poetry scene, and included a monthly calendar of poetry events in the area. At its peak, 10,000 copies of Next... were distributed for free from Santa Barbara to San Diego.

        News Clips and Ego Trips, an anthology of articles from Next..., will be published by Write Bloody Press in 2012.

Thomas' poetry has been published in numerous literary magazines, including Chiron Review, Pearl, Caffeine and Spillway. Recent publications include Sage Trail, Beggars and Cheeseburgers and The Poetry Super Highway. In addition to poetry, he has had articles and reviews published in OC Weekly, Panik, and Skratch, as well as the websites Poetix, Ground Control, Poetic Diversity and The Independent Reviews Site.

His first full length collection of poems, Cows on the Freeway, was published by iUniverse in 2000. He has also published five chapbooks, Death to the Real World, Opposite Oceans, Poetry Spilled All Over the Carpet,  A Rare Thing, and Songs of Inappropriate Desire.

In 2001, inspired by a performance on Christine Palma's show on KXLU, Thomas formed a spoken word band with Lob (Instagon) on bass, Mike Weintraub on drums, and Dennis Lansing on guitar. The band was named Murray (which was not Thomas' idea. Sean Campeau was later added on guitar. Murray performed regularly for the next two years at many poetry and music venues around SoCal, including the Knitting Factory, Blue Cafe, Cobalt Coffeehouse, and Alta Coffeehouse. Several recordings are available, including the original KXLU broadcast, and the Laguna Brewery. (For information on recordings, e-mail to GMTPoet@aol.com.) Murray disbanded when Lob moved to Sacramento.

Between April 2004 and Oct, 2008, Thomas hosted a monthly poetry show on The Prime Spot (TPS) Radio, broadcast over KBeach radio at CSULB. KaRi, host of TPS Radio allowed Thomas an hour to interview local poets and/or play spoken word CDs. Among the many guests on The Poetry Show were Brendan Constantine, Elena Karina Byrne, Mindy Nettifee, John Gardiner and Matthew Mars.

His new book, My Kidney Just Arrived, was published by Tebot Bach in May 2011. It deals primarily with his experiences as a dialysis and kidney transplant patient. Thomas received a new kidney in April, 2010.

Thomas currently edits a monthly listing of poetry events for Poetix.net, the source for information about SoCal poetry. He is also the Reviews Editor for Poetix. He writes two regular columns on rock music: "The Aging Punk" for Ground Control, and "A Personal History of Rock'n'Roll" for Poetic Diversity.

Thomas also finally completed his novel, Without Saints, which is currently looking for a publisher.