Last night at midnight in Central London, Jack White played a secret show in the basement of a disused office block, to fans clad entirely in powder blue medical gowns.
The event was a collaboration between Jack and the Punchdrunk Theatre Group who had temporarily transformed the space into the Vescovo & Co Clinic for contagious diseases, and had staffed this fake medical facility with dozens of their actors playing the roles of doctors, nurses and orderlies at the time of a disease outbreak.
Drawing on the themes of Jack White's current album, 'Lazaretto', a term used to describe a quarantine island, the experience began with an elaborate online treasure hunt. A spoof medical infomercial from 1949 appeared in the archives of online medical resource The Wellcome Trust, which contained various obtuse clues that led Jack's superfans to a website belonging to the fake medical company, Vescovo & Company. Thousands of fans submitted their details to this website as part of an online screening for a contagious disease. A lucky few progressed through the screening process that lead to them receiving a telephone call from Punchdrunk actors inviting them to an out-of-hours appointment at the Vescovo Clinic. The clinic had been created for this one occasion by Punchdrunk Theatre across multiple floors of a disused building owned by The Vinyl Factory.
On arrival, fans were asked to change in to blue medical gowns before being subjected to a variety of treatments testing in a maze of medical rooms staffed by Punchdrunk actors. Chaos descended as an outbreak alarm was raised and terrified fans were herded into a smoke filled quarantine chamber. Finally a screen was dropped to reveal Jack and band in full medical uniform who proceeded to belt out a thirty minute set before Jack himself succumbed to the mysterious disease. The rock star fell to the ground in a fit of convulsions before being strapped to a stretcher and wheeled off to a waiting ambulance.
Destijl – That sounded incredible. Thanks for giving such a detailed description.
Oh Destijl!! Thank you 3333333333333333333 times for sharing your crazy artistic experience, you make me jealous… ;-) ;-)
Dear destijl ~ the account of your experience gave me chills…I must be coming down with something! Thank you for sharing with us. What an astonishing event for you all to share with the good Doctor and his artistic team!
@destijl Thank you for sharing your amazing experience! It was really quite thrilling to see it all unfolding- I can’t imagine being there- wow!
I thought that I’d share my experience of a truly strange experience. I was alerted to Vescovo & Co. by a fellow Vaulter/Swirler. I’d seen the video of What Jack Is Watching and paid no real attention. The vescovoandco.com website, for those that have visited it was Light Blue/ Black & White with the three test tube logo so it had to be “something” to do with Third Man.
I filled in the questionaire and submitted. I then received an email back telling me that they would be in touch shortly. Then I received a second email with an URGENT message to telephone Dr. Lazlo Medina. I called and received an answer phone message to submit my name & mobile number. Later, I received a text message informing me that I had an appointment booked at 11:10pm on Wednesday in London and could I confirm my attendance.
On Wednesday I received a telephone call from a lady called Tabatha telling me that my appointment had been booked and that from the data that I had submitted it was in my best interest that I got myself checked out. I asked where the appointment was and was told that because of recent bad press about Vescovo & Co’s practices they had had to move their facilities and that I would receive details in due course. I was told that my appointment was for me only.
I met up with a few other Vaulters in London and at 9:30 received a text message confirming where the appointment was being held. When we arrived at the place there was a lot of confused looks. We had all thought “secret” show. I even had a very plausible theory of where it would be. But this was weird. It was an office building, revolving doors, marble floors and walls, a desk with security. The Vescovo & Co plaque on the door. A very professional looking place. There were other offices in the building and I did notice that on the second floor were the offices for a company called TMR (nice touch).
At 11:10pm I went in for my appointment. I had to fill in a form, things like being filmed (could be a video shoot). I was concerned about the part that said “Sudden Death”, which I questioned with the official. This has also been mentioned in The Guardian article, so maybe the reporter had the same appointment or maybe there were others concerned about there “Sudden Death”.
We were given patient wristbands with numbers (mine was B1002), facemasks and shown to the lift. Before entering the lift we were instructed to put our facemasks on and that were entering a contaminated zone and not to remove them under any circumstances. The lift descended…..
After we reached our floor we were split up and told to wait in separate rooms. It’s at this stage that everybody that was there have different experiences. My doctor told me that all the rooms were being used and that I could wait in his office. The lighting was very weird and really made you feel uncomfortable. Now being left for a period of time on your own with nothing to do gets the mind racing. You look at things, touch things. I was sat at a doctors desk. There were medical notes, posters on cross contamination and underneath the big diary an article on Vescovo from The London Sentinel dated Wednesday 2nd July. It had bits circled “A government review of Vescovo and Co found deficiencies in the standard of some of it’s laboratories”. As I was reading the article, the doctor returned. I quickly covered the article as he entered. He took my pulse and examined my nails. “Interesting” was all that he said and left. A lady entered, gave me my gown which he told me to put on along with a plastic bag for my belongings including all electrical equipment.
At this stage I was getting a bit worried, my mind started to wonder that maybe I’d been tricked. I grabbed the article, quickly folded it and placed it in my bag along with the rest of my belongings. If this was something more sinister I wanted to find out more. It was at that point I noticed a camera pointing straight at me…..FUCK!!!!
I put on my gown and opened the door. Another doctor rushed up to me. “Who told you to leave your room? Get back inside!” OK, this is weird. It’s amazing what goes through your head in this situation but I did not feel at ease. The whole atmosphere, lighting & sound around you was very scary.
I was then put into a room, containing several small cubicles along with the other patients. I was given headphones and a box with 3 coloured buttons which I had to press as and when the voice from the headphones. After the test I was told to raise my left arm.
I was then led across the room and asked to fill in a 20 page psyche test. After a while the doctor came, gave me a vial with my medicine which I was told contained alchohol. One girl in the room mentioned that she was only 17 and was then given an alternative medicine. At this stage we were quickly led out of the room for decontamination, herded like cattle 2 by 2. Smoke started to fill the room, lots of smoke, you could hardly see the person in front of you. We stopped, the smoke turned blue and a noise. Then suddenly the curtain dropped and Jack White is 3 feet away, straight into Lazaretto. A blistering set, High Ball Stepper, Icky Thump, St James Infirmary Blues, John The Revelator, Dead Leaves On A Dirty Ground, Sixteen Saltines.
Most other things are covered in other accounts. But this was a truly surreal experience. The level of detail that went into the whole set up. The whole experience was really messing with my head and I did not feel comfortable.
I would like to personally thank those involved from Punchdrunk, they never dropped their guard at any stage. The set up and detail was incredible. And to Jack, THANK YOU!!! A very memorable experience that I was able to share with friends that I have only met through a like minded love for your music and art.
Dr. J White III, I will “walk 3 miles a day”.
p.s. The cold beer at the end was a wonderful touch.
Thank you – what a fun ride, even for those just following along on the vault, it was an amazing experience. Thank you Jack and TMR crew for all the hard work, planning and forethought that you put into all you do!!! It is noticed and very much appreciated!
The show has been filmed?
Well done! love everything about this! And for the record, y’all can ‘throw me down in the lazaretto’ anytime. BShow. Denver. Let’s do this.
Very well executed and magical. I like how it can never really be done again or duplicated. Get well soon, I suppose.
You never cease to amaze. How engulfing an experience. Congratulations on keeping art alive and interactive!