This just in: To mark the release of The Dead Weather’s Horehound album, Jack White’s Third Man Records will open a special pop-up store in NYC, which you can visit next Thursday and Friday  (July 16 and 17) only. Fans of the Dead Weather can snap up a copy of the record, as well as other bits of Third Man merch (last time we checked it had some lovely buttons) at 31 Chrystie Street, between Broome and Delancey, between 10am and 6pm. And yes, we hope as much as you do that it’s Jack behind the register.

The big Jack White news these days is the Dead Weather, the new rock quartet in which the star plays drums behind Kills singer Alison Mosshart. The band’s full-length, Horehound, doesn’t come out until next month, yet the four musicians have already graced the cover of Spin and arranged for a busy summer of touring, including New York shows on July 16 and 17 at the capacious Terminal 5. Their Bowery Ballroom appearance was one of April’s hot-ticket shows.

White is the most intriguing rock star of his era, and his mind could add a thrill to any project. (Susan Boyle: Meet your new producer!) Yet as with the Raconteurs, the Dead Weather draws out the musician’s more pedestrian tendencies—his adoration of classic rock formulas and his status as a humble band member rather than otherworldly star. Even as the White Stripes sit dormant, it is in that duo that Jack White remains Jack White: a proud eccentric, stubborn freak, bent genius. (For Time Out’s 2003 White Stripes interview, click here.) The pair’s performance on Conan O’Brien’s Late Night finale was roundly criticized, but it provided an absolutely singular TV moment—the type of dodge in which Dylan has long specialized. For what it’s worth, the White Stripes’ performance was roughly 10 billion times more interesting than Pearl Jam’s insipid showing on O’Brien’s Tonight Show debut.

The more exciting news from White HQ concerns not the Dead Weather but the musician’s label, Third Man, now also a Nashville record store…

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