{"id":5635,"date":"2012-10-26T10:42:37","date_gmt":"2012-10-26T16:42:37","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/stylusmagazine.ca\/?p=5635"},"modified":"2012-10-26T10:42:37","modified_gmt":"2012-10-26T16:42:37","slug":"the-pack-a-d-all-i-want-for-halloween-is-a-xena-costume","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/2012\/10\/26\/the-pack-a-d-all-i-want-for-halloween-is-a-xena-costume\/","title":{"rendered":"The Pack A.D. :: All I Want for Halloween is a Xena Costume"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>
\nby Victoria King<\/strong><\/p>\n

The Pack A.D. will be coming through Winnipeg on October 31. That\u2019s right folks. You read it right: Hallo-fucking-ween. So obviously we talked about costumes, weirdos in costumes, and Xena, Warrior Princess.<\/em><\/p>\n

Stylus: You guys have been very successful in getting airtime on campus\/community stations all over the place, but how do you guys look at success?
\nBecky Black:<\/strong> Hard to say. I mean, how can you say when you\u2019ve made it or when you haven\u2019t made it? Ideally, I wanna make money and so far we haven\u2019t broken even. I mean we\u2019ve broken even but we haven\u2019t made any profit. I guess . . . for me, it might sound silly, but I\u2019d actually like to make money in my career.<\/p>\n

Stylus: [Laughs]<\/em> That\u2019s not necessarily a bad thing I don\u2019t think.
\nBB: <\/strong>No, I guess not. I mean, it sounds like \u201call I want is money\u201d but obviously if I just wanted money I would not be a musician, because that\u2019s not very lucrative.<\/p>\n

Stylus: If you weren\u2019t a musician, what would you be doing?
\nBB:<\/strong> I don\u2019t know, I\u2019d probably just be working . . . just some other job. I think I would make a pretty good travel agent. I like getting deals . . . Although, I don\u2019t know if there\u2019s much work in that now because of the Internet. People can just look stuff up online, and I don\u2019t know how much more a travel agent would get.<\/p>\n

Stylus: Speaking creatively – in your playing and in your songwriting, what have you done to challenge yourself in the last little while?
\nBB:<\/strong> We\u2019re getting more complicated than we used to be, even though we\u2019re still pretty simple . . . We used to play more blues-based rock and we\u2019ve kind of gotten out of that just because, basically it\u2019s the same every time. We\u2019ve branched out into playing more choruses, whereas before it was more like \u201chere\u2019s a verse\u201d and then we just jam out. We\u2019ve come together in our songwriting.<\/p>\n

Stylus: You\u2019ve mentioned before the limitations of only having two people. Has that ever become frustrating to the point where you’ve considered adding other members to the band?
\nBB: <\/strong>We\u2019ve actually considered, not adding another member to the band but if we really needed it, we could hire someone to come along and play with us on tour. We don\u2019t want to turn into the Black Keys or anything [laughs]<\/em> I can see why a duo would want to expand though. It really is kind of limiting after a while. For the first few years you think, \u201cthis is awesome cuz there\u2019s just the two of us and we can write material really easily,\u201d but now I imagine songs and it\u2019s hard to really do them with just guitar and drums . . .<\/p>\n

On the upcoming \u2018Halloween in Winnipeg\u2019 show . . .<\/em><\/p>\n

Stylus: Are you guys going to be wearing costumes?
\nBB:<\/strong> I think I definitely will, that\u2019s most of the fun of Halloween.<\/p>\n

Stylus: What\u2019s the best costume that you\u2019ve had?
\nBB:<\/strong> I don\u2019t know . . . The best costume that I haven\u2019t had yet and I still have to make is a Xena costume. I really want that, but I need lots of leather and I\u2019m not really that good at sewing so I think it would be really hard to make that costume, but it\u2019s pretty sweet when I think about it. I\u2019ve never had that good of costumes, it’s always a last minute thing like \u201coh no, it\u2019s Halloween,\u201d and then it\u2019s too late.<\/p>\n

Stylus: How do you like to get your costumes? Thrifting, Value Village, or just buying it?
\nBB:<\/strong> I think a combination of the first two. It\u2019s like, I won\u2019t sew together a costume but I\u2019ll put something together. I don\u2019t like the ones that come in a package that are like \u201cSexy Pirate\u201d or something, that\u2019s kind of boring. I like to put together my own.<\/p>\n

Stylus: The only thing is, I\u2019m sure [a store] would have \u201cSexy Xena.\u201d
\nBB:<\/strong> No actually, I don\u2019t think they do! I mean, I found some online but I couldn\u2019t find any in any stores. They were really expensive, and they were really crappily made too. I want like a really legitimate looking costume too. It would have to be real leather.<\/p>\n

Stylus: And then at that point it\u2019s really an investment. If you\u2019re going to buy real leather for a costume, you gotta wear that thing for a long time.
\nBB:<\/strong> No kidding, I gotta wear that thing like everyday and not just Halloween. And then I\u2019ll just be one of those people – every city has a few weirdos who just dress up as something weird all the time. I think Seattle has somebody who dresses up like Link [from Zelda]. Like, he just wears a Link costume everyday . . . Yeah, I might be that person.<\/p>\n

Stylus: A reviewer in Vancouver describes you as a \u201cone woman wrecking crew\u201d and \u201csnarling ferociously\u201d during a show . . . Obviously there\u2019s something going through your head that\u2019s more than just the lyrics if there\u2019s that kind of intensity when your singing. What are you thinking of and feeling as you\u2019re doing that?
\nBB: <\/strong>Ugh, I dunno. Sometimes I have to think of the lyrics because I forget them frequently. And that\u2019s really funny when you\u2019re playing a show and people are watching, and they\u2019re singing along and then I screw up and then they look confused, because they probably had it right in the first place and I didn\u2019t. Anyways, that makes me laugh all the time . . . Actually, I don\u2019t even know what I\u2019m thinking about. Maybe I\u2019m just thinking about lyrics, or just like \u201cthe moment\u201d . . . One time I was playing and I was thinking about shopping, but that was unrelated, and I think I wasn\u2019t really into it at the time.<\/p>\n

Stylus: Has that [forgetting lyrics] lessened or increased since you guys started?
\nBB:<\/strong> It has probably always been the same. Maybe it increases because we\u2019re always writing more songs so there\u2019s always more stuff to remember. There\u2019s only so much capacity, at least in my brain, for remembering lyrics. And sometimes its like I know them but they just don\u2019t come, so I just make up gibberish.
\n
\nStylus: You make up gibberish?
\nBB: <\/strong>Yeah, I don\u2019t think I’m the only singer who does that either. Like . . I just make sounds that sound like they could be words. But maybe they\u2019re not, that kind of screwing up.<\/p>\n

You can check out the Pack AD w\/ Topanga on October 31 at the WECC. Tickets are $17 in advance and $23 at the door. Doors open at 7:15, show starts at 8. Wear a costume.<\/em><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

by Victoria King The Pack A.D. will be coming through Winnipeg on October 31. That\u2019s right folks. You read it right: Hallo-fucking-ween. So obviously we talked about costumes, weirdos in costumes, and Xena, Warrior Princess.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[417,977,1060,1104],"class_list":["post-5635","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-features","tag-halloween","tag-the-pack-ad","tag-vancouver","tag-winnipeg"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5635","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/12"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5635"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5635\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5635"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5635"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5635"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}