Biography
Indie rock outfit PACKS fuses the alternately murmured and snarled self-reflection and loose melodies of frontwoman Madeline Link with jagged riffs and an overarching ’90s slacker-rock atmosphere. Those elements stood out clearly across the group’s first album, Take the Cake, issued in 2021, and its successor, Crispy Crunchy Nothing, which followed in 2023. Melt the Honey, released the next year, channeled the same sonic identity into a brighter perspective.
PACKS originated in Toronto when Link began treating the project as a solo endeavor during gaps in her work as a commercial set dresser. Several early demos earned her opening dates alongside Squirrel Flower and Odetta Hartman, after which lead guitarist Dexter Nash, bassist Noah O’Neil, and drummer Shane Hooper completed the lineup. Link composed Take the Cake partly in Toronto during 2019 and partly at her parents’ home in suburban Ottawa the year after; Fire Talk and Royal Mountain Records issued the album jointly in May 2021. The same labels put out the more stripped-down solo EP WOAH under the PACKS name in the middle of 2022.
The band’s second album drew on material written at her parents’ Ottawa residence, back in Toronto, and during an art residency in Mexico City. Link applied humor and directness to confront both the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic and the unexpected loss of a relative. The resulting “bashed-out” 14-song, 30-minute set Crispy Crunchy Nothing appeared on Fire Talk in March 2023. Less than twelve months later the quartet returned with Melt the Honey, recorded at Casa Pulpo in Xalapa, Mexico. The sessions reflected a gentler mood after Link had begun a relationship and moved in with her partner.
PACKS originated in Toronto when Link began treating the project as a solo endeavor during gaps in her work as a commercial set dresser. Several early demos earned her opening dates alongside Squirrel Flower and Odetta Hartman, after which lead guitarist Dexter Nash, bassist Noah O’Neil, and drummer Shane Hooper completed the lineup. Link composed Take the Cake partly in Toronto during 2019 and partly at her parents’ home in suburban Ottawa the year after; Fire Talk and Royal Mountain Records issued the album jointly in May 2021. The same labels put out the more stripped-down solo EP WOAH under the PACKS name in the middle of 2022.
The band’s second album drew on material written at her parents’ Ottawa residence, back in Toronto, and during an art residency in Mexico City. Link applied humor and directness to confront both the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic and the unexpected loss of a relative. The resulting “bashed-out” 14-song, 30-minute set Crispy Crunchy Nothing appeared on Fire Talk in March 2023. Less than twelve months later the quartet returned with Melt the Honey, recorded at Casa Pulpo in Xalapa, Mexico. The sessions reflected a gentler mood after Link had begun a relationship and moved in with her partner.
Singles
