As it turns out, we couldn’t have imagined we’d be witnessing history as we caught Detroit’s very own Jack White at Gröna Lund in Stockholm, Sweden, earlier this week. Gröna Lund is the Swedish capital’s flagship theme park, and let’s be honest, in all likelihood doubles as the world’s cheapest live marquee concert series. For just over $40, one gets access to dozens and dozens of gigs throughout the summer, set amidst a kaleidoscopic rollercoaster of merry-go-rounds and a total capacity of just over 10,000 people a night. This year includes folks such as Rick Astley, Natalie Imbruglia, Garbage, Brad Paisley, Shaggy, Anthrax, Charlie Puth, and of course, The Cardigans. Pretty sweet deal if you’re from the land of ice and snow (in fairness, a vast majority of the acts are either domestic or Nordics-centric). At any rate, the White Stripes and Third Man Records founder graced the wide-ranging-demographics crowd members this past Tuesday 9th June with a totally fuzzy, messy, and zany near two-hour set that included 22 songs (of which 13 White Stripes and Raconteurs “covers” lol, according to setlist.fm), as well as a bout of cold rain toward the end.
Something else the 50-year old Michiganian did on the same day was announcing a new album without actually… announcing it. Himself, at least. Once again. Aside from quietly squeezing the raucous and testy new lead single “Dollar Bill” at number three on the night’s setlist—unbeknownst to the crowd in attendance—the singer/songwriter-turned-upholsterer did not utter a single word in reference to his new LP, entitled Frozen Charlotte. Sporting the previously released “G.O.D. and the Broken Ribs” b/w “Derecho Demonico” singles to open up the dances, the new thirteen-track project—Jack’s seventh solo outing—sees “Dollar Bill” sequenced halfway through the record at number 7. Naturally, the full length is being marketed and released via his own imprint Third Man Records—slated to drop worldwide on 10th July next month.
Speaking of Third Man Records, given that the boss himself couldn’t be asked to make a mere mention of his new album while literally being on a tour promoting it, the “official” announcement cue had to come by way of the haphazard Detroit-based label’s Third Man Release Lab webinar. A free online series in two parts, the thought leadership series was billed to offer “a behind-the-scenes look at our creative approach to record releases, discussions on the music industry’s evolution, and the strategies we feel still hold up in 2026. Whether you’re an artist, independent label, or simply interested in the mechanics of the music industry, this series offers something for everyone interested in how modern release campaigns take shape”. Well, it was during the second and final installment of the video series—ostensibly an educational deep dive into the label’s marketing strategies, published on the same day as Jack White’s Stockholm gig—that the Easter Egged information about his brand new solo album were disclosed.
For all intents and purposes, the webinar focused on the campaign behind 2024’s terrific No Name, an album that was first ushered into the ether when physical vinyl copies were secretly slipped into customers’ bags at Third Man shops all over the world. Yet at around 24:25 into the video, a dry roundtable of Third Man execs Ben Swank, Ben Blackwell, Morgan Perry, and Jordan Williams gets briefly signal-jacked by a low-fidelity black-and-white footage of a chrome skull-helmeted character in front of a picture framed with the sole word “CONTENT” in it. The mysterious action figure’s nameplate reads “FROZEN CHARLATAN”, as they eventually hold up a sign that says “NEW ALBUM”. A front cover then briefly flashes onscreen before the Release Lab continues without anyone at the roundtable batting an eye.
Truth be told, a similar low-key tease happened during Part One a day prior. As co-founder and Third Man minority owner Blackwell blabbered about releasing the Dead Weather’s “Hang You From The Heavens” 7″ in 2009, the video got warped and interrupted by about thirty seconds of new music, which in twenty-twenty hindsight we now know stems from the aforementioned “Dollar Bill”. That clip was then surreptitiously uploaded to a new standalone YouTube account, @FrozenCharlatan, whose description box currently includes a Linktree to blue and chrome vinyl pre-orders for, you guessed it, Frozen Charlotte. Par for the course, Thee Frozen Charlatan’s YouTube account’s bio simply reads “CONTENT CONTENT CONTENT”, and redirects to a hilariously domain-named site: https://wwwwwwwww.000000000.net.
Intriguingly, this time one should look beyond sonic wavelengths to arrive at source of the total marketing strategy around the LP, as its title appears to stem from White’s recent visual fine art work, as reported on his official IG profile. Incidentally, “Frozen Charlotte” is the name of a series of his sculptures currently on display at Damien Hirst’s Newport Street Gallery in London (as well as being rocked as part of the stage choreography on his current tour, see above), for what is the garage rock pioneer’s first museum exhibition. For those interested, here’s how both the installation and its curious name came about:
An old carnival prize chalkware statue from the 1940’s of a sailor boy falls over in my recording studio and its head breaks off. I grab a nearby blue skull shaker percussion object and glue it in the head’s place. I paint the body white and suddenly an all new character avatar that I called “Frozen Charlotte” came to life.
A “frozen Charlotte” is a penny doll toy from victorian times, they were ceramic but could float or have a dress put over, recalling an old folk song about a girl who froze to death from not dressing properly in the winter. I wanted to make the modern version of chalk ware of the 40’s and 50’s which to me is 3D printed plastic. We took the piece to be scanned and CAD filed in order to make more of her with the help of Daniel Birkhead at @pr3nter_inc and my good man Daniel Mancini facilitating. Then sanding, priming, spraying back at my own shop to create numerous avatars of her including a male trixter hero version named the “Frozen Charlatan” who is the chrome metallic alter ego.
Some of them felt like they needed to include the original broken off sailor’s head. Many versions of the sculpture started to come out of me, different personalities and characters, some to mimic the fast airbrush style of cheap carnival prizes made assembly line style, and some more elaborately painted, all of which are in the art show.
For now, this seems to be all we know about Jack White’s latest project. The record’s up as a pre-release on Apple Music et al. There is never a world in which we don’t need a new Jack White album, but this current juncture’s erratic and off-the-wall nature—one in which the New York Knickerbockers return to eternal hoopin’ glory after more than half a century while World Cup referees are sent back home—really does seem to warrant it. Yet, don’t get it twisted, you better set a calendar placeholder for Friday 10th July, for you wouldn’t know Jack White had a new album out if you only got your news from the (third) man himself.
We’d like to thank you sincerely for taking the time to read this and we hope to feel your interest again next time.
AV
Everything Must Swing 