Reverse Pathogen
The Client
2.1 million
Total impressions
2
Locations
4 weeks
Campaign length
Reverse Pathogen is a band that sits at the intersection of experimental rock, industrial and noise music, with strong influences from electronic and alternative hip-hop. It creates an intentionally raw and abrasive sound layered with distorted guitars, heavy synths, aggressive rhythms and glitchy samples. The band targets a younger (18-34), countercultural, all-genders demographic that’s highly engaged in underground music, particularly in Los Angeles, where most of its fan base is.
We worked with Reverse Pathogen’s artist management, Realize Vision, to execute and plan this campaign.
Promoting debut album ‘Attention Is the New Heroine’
Reverse Pathogen’s debut album, “Attention Is the New Heroine,” came out on September 27, 2024. Realize Vision aimed to generate mass interest and awareness of the album leading up to the release, with a campaign that reflected the disruptive nature of the band’s music and challenged perceptions.
We decided to create intrigue by staging what appeared to be graffiti tagging of a billboard advertising the album’s release, playing into the way the band challenges the status quo.
Finding the right venue and partners
Balancing authenticity with legality isn’t easy. It presented logistical complexities different from any other project we’d worked on. We also had to maintain secrecy to make the tagging appear real.
Location scouting proved a challenge. Not all sites suited our needs, and most vendors took issue with the stunt and wanted nothing to do with the project. Options were limited, so we worked diligently to identify ideal locations to fit client expectations. Without the partners we eventually found, this campaign would have been impossible to execute.
Finding creative ways to do the tagging
Here’s how it played out: We put up a billboard with minimal verbiage (Pathogen: The True Story, coming fall 2024) that suggested something was coming while staying vague on details. Then, in the dead of night, we “tagged” the billboard, making it look like someone had graffitied the message using bright red paint so that it now read:
Reverse Pathogen: The True Story
Attention Is the New Heroine 9/27/24 coming fall 2024
We had to search for billboard locations that allowed for a billboard stunt like this. No vendors willingly accepted, citing liability concerns, so we devised solutions to make everyone happy: finding an easily accessible board, identifying an artist company that could help us pull this off, and, of course, making sure they were fully insured.
We needed a partner who could deliver spraypaint graffiti with the perfect balance — precise enough to look how we wanted it yet raw enough to feel like authentic spraypaint tagging. Our artist partners scouted the billboard location in advance to confirm accessibility and coordinated the scheduling of a scissor lift to ensure the safe and efficient completion of the artwork.
This stunt perfectly embodied Reverse Pathogen’s rebellious, disruptive identity. Instead of a standard billboard ad, the “tagging” created a sense of real-time action and mystery that naturally grabbed attention.
Using organic reach
While this campaign did not include a specific social element, Reverse Pathogen received organic attention from people who saw the billboard before and after and posted on social about the apparent “desecration.”
Two locations and dynamic updates in the dead of night
We used two locations, Pico and Fairfax and Sunset and La Brea, for four weeks apiece. Only Pico and Fairfax had the live on-site tagging. Sunset and La Brea used a vinyl that was spray painted off-site and then subsequently delivered and installed in the early-morning hours to appear it was spraypainted in the dead of night on-site.
We only needed one live stunt; two would have been redundant, so we kept it simple for the Sunset and La Brea unit. It had two vinyls, the original untagged version and an identical version we took to a studio large enough to open all 14 feet x 48 feet, tagged with spray cans, and folded back up for a courier drive to the installer’s warehouse in time for the next day’s launch.
Funnily enough, the courier was our media buyer’s younger brother, who drives trucks for a living — it certainly was all hands on deck to make this happen.
What stood out most was how convincing the “graffiti” looked in real life. People genuinely questioned whether the billboards had been illegally tagged, which was exactly the reaction we wanted.
2.1 million impressions generated
The campaign was a colossal success, with 2.1 million impressions combining street visibility, organic social shares and influencers.
Our experience helps bold visions come to life
“Staged vandalism” worked because it was executed believably, adding an edge of danger and mystery.
We were the perfect fit for the campaign because of our experience with unconventional, high-impact outdoor campaigns and our ability to execute with both creativity and precision. Reverse Pathogen’s bold vision required more than just buying media — it needed a partner that could translate an abstract, rebellious idea into a tangible, legal and strategically placed activation. We did that.
“So many unknowns remained up in the air as we planned this campaign. We had to stay tight-lipped and plan for all scenarios. For instance, we had to ensure a specific parking space was available at the Pico/Fairfax McDonald’s at the precise time we needed it for our scissor lift delivery, so we sent a scout ahead to reserve the space for us. Little preparations like that make the difference between good ideas and great campaigns.”
Amanda Enriquez -Outdoor Strategy Manager at DASH TWO
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