Beyond Urban Branding

I received an email from a reader of Beyond Urban Branding named Max from San Francisco. He sent me a link to the old school 2007 Sprite Voltron series. I had forgotten about these manga styled commercials that used The Goodie Mob, Mack 10, Common, Fat Joe and the Godfather of Hip-Hop Afrika Bambaataa. But once I looked at them again, it is almost the perfect Hip-Hop campaign. Why? There are many reasons. You could almost do a complete case study just on this ad as a platform for authenticity. I might have to do one just to show illustrate how thorough Sprite was with this one. But I will try to give you the "cliff notes" so to speak. The rappers chosen all represented different regions and lyrical style within the Hip-Hop community. Some of them have exclusive fan bases. Goodie Mob represents fun, but politically minded rap from the South. Mack 10 represents the west coast underground scene. Fat Joe represents hardcore rap from Bronx, NY. Afrika Bambaataa represents the foun...