Andy, Tim, Michael

As official as it gets.

Welcome to the web site for Silkworm (1987-2005).

R. I. P.

MICHAEL JERMAN DAHLQUIST

22 DEC 1965 - 14 JULY 2005

 

12-31-1997

I've updated the upcoming shows section with a little more stuff about the Crust Brothers shows. If you're thinking of coming in from out of town to see the show(s), you should have a look.

We've actually started practicing! We're sounding about as good as we did last time, which is either a good thing or a bad thing, depending on your perspective. I've realized how much my vocal technique benefits from the use of high-quality tequila. Steven was stuck briefly in the snow between Idaho and Seattle, but we should be able to get in a couple full-band practices before the Break Room show on Wednesday. Honestly, I think of that show as practice, though it should be all sorts of fun. The Seattle show is practice for the Vancouver show, and the Vancouver show is mainly an excuse to shop. That's why you know both shows will be a hoot.

There's a rant by Greil Marcus in the latest Interview Magazine about Marquee Mark (that's the Crust Brothers' bootleg). He says our version of "Heard it throught he Grapevine" may be the best ever! Beat that, Interference!

Now back to the old, old, old stuff....

I'm finally back home and settled down enough to do something new here. The tour was fairly succesful and thoroughly enjoyable. Andy's in Chicago but we're keeping in touch. And the big thing, the thing you're all justifiably thrilled about, is that we actually have Crust Brothers CDs available. No shit! And of course they sound great, I've told you about them, you've heard about them, you can read something about the show if you haven't already, and if you like, you can hear a song in Real Audio. Don't let this fool you, the actual CD sounds blistering hot.

The tour journal is up, of course, and I keep rewriting stuff to make it more funny and more explicit. I'm still waiting for Marc Attenberg to write about our day off in NYC. I think I'll be waiting for quite some time.

Tim Cook of Money Shot records is in the process of releasing a trio of singles: one EinHeit single, one Joel Phelps single, and one Silkworm single. The Silkworm single has just been released, and it's a real charmer. The cover is a stunning blueprint-style rendition of my tiny basement where we recorded the single, Blueblood, and lots of other stuff to come. The songs are a few outtakes from Blueblood which I think stand out pretty well for various charming reasons. Check it out man.

Tim, James and I (Andy's in Mexico this time) got together on the 23rd to do some recording. We did this sorta techno-funk song of Tim's, about his conversion from a to-the-bone-and-beyond carnivore to an if-it-walked-I'd-sooner-starve vegetarian. It's cute, and it's coming out at some point on this compilation being put out by some feller down Georgia way.

One thing I have added is a laff-riot story Tim wrote in an email interview the other day. Everyone loves miserable tour stories, and this one's a pearl.

Oh, by the way: if you want to find In The West and have been having a hard time, go to www.cdnow.com. They claim to have it in stock, and are selling it for $13.49. That's not so bad, is it? We don't have any to sell, sadly.

Tim, James and I (Andy's in Missoula) spent Saturday August 1st recording a song for the My Pal God Records' Christmas compilation. Goofy, huh? It's a Big Star/Barry Manilow sort of thing. Charming. So after that, I worked my tail off trying to get the site updated and ready for our trip down the West Coast.

Tim brought by a copy of the Japanese release of Developer, right? Well, shit! It's got FIVE extra tracks! And they're funky and wierd, and not so bad! I could hardly remember some of them. I'm not going to write about it anywhere else, so I'll tell you what they are: "Ogilvie," "Dead Hair," "Stray Bullets," "Bones," and "Numbered." I know we've played a few of these live, though not for a while. Wierd, huh? Old songs, back to life. Anyhow, you can ordered this thing for about a bazillion dollars through CD Europe.

This was mentioned on the mailing list, and I'll mention it again here: Tim's started writing a record review column for an online magazine called Pandemonium. It's called $2.99 Wax Necessities. A thouroughly enjoyable read, and updated much more frequently than anything at this site, I'll tell you that much.

Blueblood has been released. As of July 21st, it is officially available, and should be in stores everywhere and is probably for sale all over the place.

I know there were a few folks at the record release party and rock show on July 25th. It was sort of a trauma for those of us onstage. It's strange, some nights you feel okay, but there are just too many little things which add up to a not-so-pleasant experience performing. Folks in attendance enjoyed it, thank God. Those that didn't leave immediately, I mean. You can read one attendee's description on the Message Board.

As many of you know by now, that wasn't our only rock show. The tour dates for our East Coast tour are pretty much set, enough so that I don't feel uncomfortable posting them here. They're also included in the last two of Tim's email list updates, but I'll be damned if I'm going to put all that crap together without having some wierd computer program do it for me but I just haven't been able to make the damned thing work yet. Shit.

The other month I got around to getting a track from the Ein Heit show to put up here. It's called Summer, it was the opening number. It's in Real Audio, so I apologize for the sound quality, but hope you enjoy it.

One Joey Shears sent in a nearly complete lyrics sheet for Even a Blind Chicken etc. etc., which is a pretty remarkable achievement. It's great to get help when you need it.

Oh, but here's something: a young collegiate requested removal from Tim's mailing list. I've posted his request for your enjoyment.

And something more, also from Tim: A BIG LONG TOUR DIARY from 1993! Now that's a treat. This was when we tried wearing suits for a while. Shit!

The "acoustic" show at the University of Washington went surprisingly well. You can read about it in the News section -- yes, I have finally added something to the News section. That is because there is now some news. Before there was none.

Now that Andy's figured out what he's doing with his life, we're almost able to pin down some tour dates. We figure on doing the West Coast in August, the Midwest and East Coast in September. I can't leave so long that I'll get fired, but I can get a good few weeks in with no troubles. There will, of course, be constant updates, and a knee-slapping account of all the ongoing excitement of a Silkworm tour, at this site. So watch for it.

The latest: Andy's finally decided on a law school, and Tim's sent a new mailing list update.

I'm left speechless in the wake of the Ein Heit show. It was tremendous. I'm hurting from it. I have to go to my Mom's house, it's Mother's day you know. I'll write about it later on tonight. If you were there and would like to blab about it, send a message my way and I'll post it. Please say anything you like, harsh criticism is gratefully accepted.

We decided to take full advantage of John K's visit & record a single. Tim Cook's been threatening to release a 3-single series: one by Silkworm, one by Ein Heit, and one by Joel Phelps. So we spent the last couple days getting the Ein Heit third out of the way, recording two songs those of you who were at the show might recall: "Replay," and "Limelight," which you've heard a little bit about if you've been watching the news here. We recorded at Ballarat, and it came out sounding good. John drove himself mad with his unflagging perfectionism, but in the end, everything, aside from a smoking mixing board and a lawn full of cigarette butts, worked out fine. It was nice to have a two-day party in the basement, the music is good, Tim's single onslaught is on its way, and now it's all over and I can get some sleep.

Thanks to the gracious persistence of Shawn Anderson, I've finally figured out how to make Real Audio sound okay. I remember listening to a track off of "In The West" from C/Z's website about 3 years ago and being horrified. It's not quite so horrifying these days. So if you find something that claims to be sound and you can't hear it, go to Real Audio and download the player.

In fact, pretty soon I'll have to make some sort of a sound section or something. I've actually posted a Crust Brothers song now, which you can listen to by clicking here. It sounds like shit, I mean, it's a Real Audio file made from a tape that sounds, you know, okay, but anyhow, it's hard to find this music, so you may as well listen to it.

I put a brief history of Silkworm on the News page. Tim wrote it last year sometime; I'll pester him to update it. If you read the history here, and then read the few-years-old-but-extensive interview by Eric Bradford from Thicker, you will know all there is to know about Silkworm circa 1996 or so.

Oh, and now I've added Tim's Travis Bean story, as well. It's inspirational. You should read it.

I don't know if anyone's discovered this yet, but the picture above has links in it to pages with crap regarding Andy, Tim, and Michael. There's actually very little there right now; but I've got big plans, of course. Andy's page has a couple of comical sound clips from a trip we took to New York a few years back, courtesy of Cory Rayborn.

We got a test pressing for Blueblood the other day. I talk about it briefly in the news section. And look, now you can hear it! Sure, it's just the first chord, but what the hell.

If you have any problems with the site, broken links or bad juju or if you have a hard time finding your way around, or if you think I should add -- forgive me for suggesting it -- a chat room, you can send email here.

Most, if not all, of the photographs at this site were taken by Mike Hoffman, who can be reached at milo2@nwlink.com.

Brian Eck used to maintain a swell site for us, but he's gotten bogged down in God knows what & has asked if we might take it over, and so we have.

Thanks for visiting. I'm planning to post frequent updates, so check back.



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