The first-time partners release a cheeky ’90s-inspired video to announce the limited-time product.

On a typical afternoon in a sunny suburb, all-American teenagers Piper and Addison fawn over their favorite goth rocker in Corpse Beat magazine, snack on vegan goat’s blood and paint their faces like hard-core metalheads.

Of course they do.

This is, after all, Li Death’s twisted version of a slice of life, with e.l.f. Cosmetics joining for the giddy, over-the-top ride.

In a first-time collaboration, the brands debuted a cheeky video today to hype the fruit of their combined labor—a frightful makeup kit called Corpse Paint, filled with products like Kiss of Death lipstick, Dead Set mist and Eye Die shadow.

The five-piece co-branded set, packaged in a “keepsake coffin,” will be available starting at noon for $34 on the e.l.f. website. The partners said they may consider another limited drop, depending on consumer reaction.

As for the alliance, it comes after one year of discussion between the brands and e.l.f. chief marketing officer Kory Marchisotto’s willing embrace of Liquid Death’s in-your-face, horror-comedy sensibility.

Calling the canned water brand “the ultimate disruptor—everything we want to be when we grow up,” Marchisotto said the deal is a strategic fit for e.l.f. on the heels of its first national Super Bowl ad.

“It’s really important for us to find the path that others are afraid to take, or don’t imagine, or don’t stretch their minds far enough to cook up this kind of badass crazy stuff,” Marchisotto, a self-professed Liquid Death superfan, told ADWEEK. “Any collaboration has to work organically, seamlessly and fluidly—and there was never a second of forcing this.”

Although they may seem like odd bedfellows, the two marketers have “a lot of shared interests” as mission-led companies, according to Andy Pearson, Liquid Death’s vice president of creative, and they’re both social media powerhouses with die-hard followers and track records in brand mashups.

Crossover audience

Marchisotto said she didn’t analyze data about the brands’ shared demographics—or metal subcultures—but relied instead on deep knowledge of the e.l.f. loyalists.

“The insight is that our community wants to have fun and be entertained,” she added. “We have an enormous amount of respect for people’s time, and if they’re hanging out with us, we want to make sure we’re providing something creative and clever.”

To that end, e.l.f. took a handful of its existing products, such as its putty applicator and H2O Proof Eyeliner Pen, and gave them Liquid Death-style makeovers for the promotion.

“These products have never been inside a closed casket before,” Marchisotto said, “so we’ve stretched them into an entirely new dimension.”

The collaborators started seeding the product launch Monday with cryptic social posts that showed only a black lipstick mark on a can of Liquid Death.

The response was immediate, with nearly 33,000 comments in the first few hours alone on e.l.f.’s Instagram. Fans called it “the collab of the year,” liberally sprinkling fire and heart emojis and “omgomgomg” into their posts.

Influencers and celebrities are set to take part in the rollout, via “get ready with me” posts, but neither Liquid Death nor e.l.f. would name names or give more specifics.

Visit from Glothar

The video to announce the partnership, created by Liquid Death’s in-house team, takes the brand’s trademark satirical approach, tapping into 1990s nostalgia and borrowing the cheery tone of old-school toy commercials.

“We started with this really bizarre premise—this is a world where everybody listens to black metal like it’s another boy band,” Pearson said. “And then we treated that premise very normally.”

The 60-second spot’s young stars manifest their goth hero, Glothar, who shows up in their Anytown U.S.A. bedroom, introduces them to Corpse Paint and tutors them on applying it to achieve just the right amount of hair-raising glamour.

“Murder your eyes, lips and face like your favorite celebrity,” says the upbeat narrator. “Now you can look as dark on the outside as you are on the inside.”

Glothar, along with being a credible teacher and a whiz at beauty products, has history with one of the girl’s moms, but no spoilers here on the ad’s surprise ending.

Both partners pointed to the ongoing strength of the horror genre in movies and other entertainment as encouragement for putting death metal at the center of the campaign’s creative.

“We think people are going to be excited to see goth codes and cues brought into a mainstream beauty brand,” Marchisotto said. “People have a breadth of interests, and they can’t be put into a box by age or psychographic—Liquid Death has always done a tremendous job of spinning that notion on its head.”

As for the timing of the stunt—close to Easter and nowhere near Halloween or any other spine-tingling event in the pop culture consciousness—Marchisotto said the teams intentionally chose “a random day in March” rather than a spooky season date because “that would’ve been expected.”

Click HERE to read the original article.