Johnnie Walker launches ‘Walk Beyond’ brand platform, spotlights SEA street culture

Singapore – Popular scotch whisky brand Johnnie Walker has recently launched the ‘Walk Beyond’ brand platform, which aims at spotlighting the progressive blend of creative cultures born from the streets of Southeast Asia.

Conceptualised alongside Virtue APAC, ‘Walk Beyond’ places Johnnie Walker’s legendary brand philosophy of ‘Keep Walking’ inside culture, giving it fresh meaning, cultural credibility and relevance to a new generation of changemakers in Asia.

The platform will include a content series featuring unexpected collaborations between established cultural icons and up-and-coming trailblazers across Singapore, the Philippines and Vietnam. This brings together different communities to create new genres and champion new narratives to enrich street culture across Southeast Asia.

To launch this brand platform, Johnnie Walker and Virtue partnered with three local ‘Walkers’, each of them a cultural icon in their own right – Yung Raja, a Singaporean breakthrough dubbed Southeast Asia’s next avant-garde bilingual hip-hop artist; James Reid, an actor turned musician, artist, manager and entrepreneur innovating and changing the game of Original Pilipino Music (OPM); and 16Typh, a Vietnamese rapper and songwriter who has put Vietnamese rap on the global map. 

Lyndon Govender, marketing director for Diageo Southeast Asia said, “The Johnnie Walker philosophy, ‘Keep Walking’ stands for positivity, progress and resilience. The ‘Walk Beyond’ collabs are a tangible demonstration of that sentiment; a simple, yet powerful idea that brings together different changemakers to champion collective progress, uniting these authentic voices to empower a new generation.”

Meanwhile, Chris Gurney, group creative director at Virtue APAC, commented “‘Walk Beyond’ empowers and celebrates the voices of an emerging generation of multi-hyphenate artists who are transforming the region’s streets into a dynamic and diverse cultural melting pot. The collaboration between established icons and up-and-coming trailblazers creates a new narrative for self-expression, authenticity and progress that we believe will inspire and shape the future of street culture in Southeast Asia.”

‘Walk Beyond’ will be featured on VICE Media, which managed talent, the collaborative output and production for the campaign. In addition to the digital amplification, on the ground activations in Singapore, Philippines and Vietnam will bring the ‘Walk Beyond’ content series to life for consumers to experience the Johnnie Walker’s ‘Keep Walking’ spirit, with updates to come.