Vancouver duo The Pack AD is bringing its latest album, Dollhouse, to Rossland.
Becky Black and Maya Miller will perform at the Flying Steamshovel on Friday.
The Rossland show is The Pack AD’s first of the new year, but in late 2017 they toured Dollhouse across Canada and the U.S. That tour kicked off in Nelson on Oct. 6.
“We went all over North American and then came home just as the weather started getting bad,” says Black.
Last time the duo played Rossland was during the 2017 Rossland Winter Carnival and Black’s finger was still recovering from when she’d broken it in a door at the end of a tour.
“It was kind of good timing though. It was at the end of a very long tour that, that happened,” says Black. “So I couldn’t play guitar for a month and a half.”
This time Black’s finger is healed up and ready to go.
She says she and Miller will be flying in for the Rossland show because they don’t want to drive at this time of year.
“We usually take a bit of winter off because of the weather. I mean, unless we go somewhere warm, it’s kind of not the best,” says Black.
But because of the weather, winter is also a great time for The Pack AD to play Rossland.
“Everyone is there for the hills and skiing and everything, so I guess at night time they don’t really have much to do except go and drink and watch a show,” says Black. “So … I think it’s a really good time to play in a place like that.”
She and Miller will be playing songs from their older albums as well as songs from Dollhouse, which was released in October 2017.
“The whole concept of the album is based around ‘We all live in a dollhouse.’ That we live in this closed ecosystem of a planet and we also live in our own minds. It’s kind of a double metaphor and the whole album kind of explores those themes,” says Black.
The first single off of the album is the eponymous “Dollhouse” and Black and Miller worked with director Matt Leaf to come up with a powerful, but cost-effective video for the song.
“We didn’t have a ton of money to make one video and we’re like ‘How are we going to do this?’ We talked to our director and it was kind of his idea,” says Black.
The “Dollhouse” is one long take of Black, framed from the shoulders up. As the video progresses, blood starts running down her face, the amount increasing as the take continues.
“It was kind of gruesome, but cheap,” says Black.
Dollhouse the album includes nine songs, which explore a number of different sounds.
“This is the first album we … wrote and recorded it in less than two months. Whereas every other album we’ve taken time off,” says Black.
The result was an album Black felt was more organic.
Asked how much effort she and Miller put into maintaining a sound from album to album, Black said, “The limitations of being in a two-piece kind of allow us to — I mean we started out a bit different. Our sound has evolved over time and I think what it’s become now is something that works for us and I guess that’s just what we’ve been going with for a little while. And I still like to push the boundaries, despite limitations, but it’s kind of part of us, I guess. That’s what we sound like.”
Tickets to The Pack AD at the Flying Steamshovel are $15 in advance from the Shovel or $20 at the door. Doors open at 9 p.m. and the show starts at 10 p.m.
“Everyone should come because we’re going to be there and we’re going to make some loud music and the more people, the sweatier, the funner,” says Black. “People should dance. It’ll be great.”
Immune 2 Cobras will open.
