Produced by Little Radio, the old Regent Theater is transformed into Third Man Records for The Dead Weather

While The Dead Weather, created by Jack White (Raconteurs, White Stripes), Alison Mosshart (The Kills), Jack Lawrence (Raconteurs) and Dean Ferita (Ranconteurs), has been on tour taking over many cities by storm recently, we wanted to reflect back on the outstanding pop-up marketing campaign that they did in August in downtown Los Angeles.

Basically, their label Third Man Records, created a pop-up theater revamping the old, deconstructed Regent Theater in downtown Los Angeles in less than 3 days. It was one of the fastest and most interesting music pop-up “entities” we’d seen in a while, and it’s obviously working as they just announced a similar concept in London on Halloween.

Not only did they transform this tiny theater, painting it yellow and black/brown like a bumble bee, but they created a pop-up novelties shop next door with various vinyl records, lomo cameras, posters, pins, and T-shirts for The Dead Weather -available for only 1 hour before a free live performance that lasted for 25 minutes.


Merch from the Third Man Records pop-up novelty shop, available for an hour.

Given that we’re from LA, it’s not that unusual to see celebs and musicians here and there, however when we realized that we were standing next to Anthony Kiedis (Red Hot Chili Peppers) in a dilapidated theater who was obviously as curious as the rest of the world to hear this new band collaboration in a pop-up atmosphere, you know they were onto something. In a blisteringly fast set, in super hot weather, The Dead Weather performed a handful of songs from “Horehound” to all 150 of us freebie fans. Overall, it was a remarkable one-hour experience (we shopped, walked in, watched, then left).

Obviously, The Dead Weather was in town for their “real” show held later that night at the Mayan Theater, but by offering this quick experience where quite frankly, only core fans new about it, and for free, was a very astute marketing maneuver because it left everyone simply wanting more. Which is the point.


Dark, smoky, bluesy, hot–Jack White on drums and Alison Mosshart on lead vocals performing Cuts Like a Buffalo.

Starting another uber band while you’re already in a really uber band is d’rigueur these days, what with Jack White taking the lead, and now David Grohl with Them Crooked Vultures. You can bet such uber-uber bands are going to be a popular part of the music landscape in the near future, taking what may have once been studio mash-ups to the next level by actually creating a new-real band for a real amount of time selling real merch on a real tour.

Here are some photos to show you the transformation of this pop-up merch and performance experience. FYI, 2 days later, the Regent was back to its normal, trashed-white dilapidated self, complete with homeless sleeping in the front. The only remnant that The Dead Weather was even there is a tiny poster high up in a barred-up window that got left behind.


Meg White lomo merch from the novelty pop-up shop.


Barbershop Quartet performs for fans waiting for the show.


The Dead Weather fans line-up for the freebie concert in downtown LA.


More rock-bluesy Dead Weather.


Many fans dressed in The Dead Weather colors of black-brown and yellow.


One of many different posters available–the posters and pins changed for each location making them very limited-edition.


Only thing left now after The Dead Weather storm blew through is a poster left in the upper lefthand side of the theater window. It%uFFFDs all back to dilapidated white.