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It is as clear as day that Rap music is one of the biggest and notable trends in commercial production last year. Regardless of product categories, a wide range of Vietnamese brands and agencies did not miss out on this opportunity to surf on the trend, resulting in more than 20 music rap TVCs for the 2021 Tet campaign alone.

In this article, Advertising Vietnam is going to take a closer look at the profound impacts this music genre has left on the TVC production industry from the perspective of MAY Production - a leading player in Vietnamese production field.

2020 has been a booming year for Vietnamese music industry in general and Rap genre in particular due to the national phenomenon TV show Rap Viet. Particularly, before Rap Viet, there were just some underground rap artists with various national hits under their belts, like Den Vau, JustaTee, Karik, Binz, etc. stepping out into the mainstream territory.

TVC “021” - a collaboration between Binz and MoMo

Since the first airing days, Rap Viet has admittedly closed that gap between underground rappers and the mass media. From an unfamiliar music genre, Rap and their artists recently have swept all the ranking boards in Vietnamese internet platforms.

Undoubtedly, regarding the dominance of Rap Viet, especially among the young generations, the brands and agencies wanted to ride the wave of this trend in various advertising campaigns. Some of the well-crafted worth mentioning ones include: 

The Rap MV “Trao hanh phuc nhu Koreno - Karik” embraces the instant noodle brand ’s efforts to tap into youngster consumers through the hype of Rap

After the collaboration with Binz, e-wallet MoMo engaged in another Rap commercial - “Ting Ting La Tet Ve - GDucky”

Continuing “Chuyen cu bo qua” 1 & 2 collaborating with Mirinda, this Tet, for the first time, Truc Nhan has worked together with Ricky Star on “Chuyen cu bo qua” 3

Besides being great inspiration for advertising, Rap Viet also brings about various new rap-based KOLs. From focusing mainly on mainstream influencers like the last couple of years, the brands now tend to be more open towards choosing new artists relying on the success of Rap Viet. 

Rapper Lang LD starred as the main character - the young guy finding way home in the Pepsi Tet TVC 

Since Rap is a music genre fit only to some specific brand images, the implementation of Rap TVC is not also as simple as that of popular music commercials.

Moreover, with the support of the brands, the local creatives and artists are able to upscale the quality of their MVs. Therefore, the attention to details that the production teams put into TVC are now the same skills used for MV. As a result, a production house has to execute a branded TVC with the same skills used for MVs. This poses both challenges and opportunities to the production team.

To meet those expectations, the industry-leading MAY Production has been working closely with domestic creative artists. They are local creative directors, choreographers, music producers, film directors, etc. who have a grasp of local Rap concepts and ideas that perfectly blend the branding and music elements in every work. 

Furthermore, instead of working with directors who are usually working mainly on branded content, MAY has pitched with MV directors who have the opportunity to showcase their visions and talents to different audiences.

BTS of MAY Production team working on MoMo x Binz project

The COVID - 19 pandemic has left the whole production field with significant challenges. In this travel-restriction situation, however, some of the works still need the involvement of overseas directors. 

Owning a solid base of technology and the resources leveraged from the ME production hub, MAY Production has sustained their competitive advantages, producing various remarkable Rap works amidst the pandemic.

In particular, one of the highlights for MAY Production’s rap works last year - “Khong Gi Can Buoc Ban Ve Nha” - Pepsi for Tet campaign was created with the help of QTake technology.  

According to MAY, in this meticulous work, they got an opportunity to remotely work with a Spanish Barcelona-based director expert in action shootings (Daniel Benmayor, film Director of Hollywood movie “Tracers” in 2015). “Despite the Director not being on set, we can still feel the fun and the energy that Suboi, Karik, Lang LD, and Wowy contributed to this shoot”, says MAY Production. 

Viral TVC Pepsi - “Khong Gi Can Buoc Ban Ve Nha”

Regardless of both excitement and disputes from the public over the prominence of Rap commercials, the heat of this music temporarily gives no sign of cooling down. When a new season of Rap Viet is around the corner, together with the subsequent trends and music movements still yet to discover, there are seemingly many rooms left for the production house to play with.

With the well-prepared resources and their accumulated experience in previous projects, MAY Production is looking forward to exciting new inspirations for their production. Stay tuned for more disruptive works from MAY Production in upcoming time! 

Truc Quyen | Advertising Vietnam