Album Notes

milkweed started life in roxbury, massachusetts on mission hill way back in 1993 when zev, g. honey porter (who was still living life as gregg porter) and blindbanjodjim (that's me) were living together in our roach infested apartment.

after learning some of the basics of banjo playing and wanting to hear gregg sing (he and i were in a band prior to milkweed, called goop), i decided that i wanted to go in a new musical direction, which was actually a return to my roots (folk,blues, old-timey & bluegrass & a smattering of tasteful country). zev discovered that he had a violin in his room, though he had no idea how he came about ownership of it and so after a few beers on sundays, we began writing songs about drinking beers and other meaningful (to us) detritus.

we began playing shows at the urging of our friends, and our very first show was at the now famous, "jacques" in boston, in a supporting role for the band bugjuice and the "queen" zola (who despite sharing a drink with us backstage, decided that they had better things to do that night- like entertain someone who was going to pay them lots of money). we did, however, share the stage with a seemingly intoxicated, dancing inflatable female...

our first cassette, self-titled, was released in 1994 and 3 songs from it were chosen to appear in the indie award-winning (pat on the back) film "the darien gap". this cassette is now out of print.

a few years later we managed to finish recording the follow up, again self-titled, cd. this time we managed to actually have a clearer direction of where we were going.

by 2001, we had completed another cd, titled: "cry, lonesome and high" and prepared to tour the u.s., but certain political events put a bit of a damper on our plans and so we huddled back up in a shack in maine for the remainder of the year and worked on our most recent cd, which is finally complete, and at long last being released, called "further to fall". this coincides with the fact that in 2004, we decided to call it quits and play a farewell tour, due to each of us living in different parts of the country and/or being preoccupied with other things.

"further to fall" takes themes from "cry, lonesome and high" and "milkweed" and expands upon them, both musically (with the incorporation of a chamber orchestra, including bassoon and french horn, which appeared first in "cry, lonesome and high") and lyrically. pushing what's acceptable in the very tightly knit old-timey, bluegrass, country worlds, we added our own blend of spices and deliver its goodness to you.