HipHopDX Asia launches and announces exciting new content

30 March 2021 - Press release

Eddy Lim to head rap and Hip Hop news, music and lifestyle site

Platform features original and exclusive content with Asia’s biggest and up and coming Hip Hop stars

 

HipHopDX is excited to announce the launch of HipHopDX Asia, to support and grow Hip Hop music and Hip Hop culture and promote it to a worldwide audience. With a focus on Greater China, South East Asia, South Korea and Japan, HipHopDX Asia was created to drive the globalization of Hip Hop music from the region, showcasing talent and connecting fans.

For over 20 years, HipHopDX has been a leading US-based digital media outlet establishing its footprint on the internet, then growing with the addition of social media, YouTube and podcasting channels. Today, hiphopdx.com is visited by more than three million people a month, while being followed by 1.6 million people on Facebook, 700,000 on Twitter, 530,000 on Instagram and 850,000 on TikTok. On YouTube, HipHopDX shows are watched by more than eight million people per month and can boast more than 850,000 subscribers.

“It is about being local and staying true to what Hip Hop means to us in the US, but from the lens of what it’s like to be in, and grow up in, Asia.” Says Founder and CEO Sharath Cherian. “While there is the adoption of US Hip Hop culture to Asia, it still has its own style, slang, venues and of course its own music. Eddy is taking us on a journey to see it all. It’s going to be awesome.”

HipHopDX Asia will be led by Eddy Lim, a creative executive who is deeply involved in Asia’s Hip Hop scene.  He previously headed up Rocketfuel Entertainment, a group of channels that created talent-driven digital content.

While at Rocketfuel, he co-created and produced the hit barbershop cypher series 16 Baris which culminated in the largest ever Hip Hop concert in Malaysia.

HipHopDX Asia already has three flagship content series in production with the first episodes of The Glow Up and Weekly Rap Up available to watch now. 

The Glow Up is an artist profile series featuring the who’s who of Asian Hip Hop. The show will introduce up and coming Hip Hop artists to a wider regional audience, with the first show focusing on Indonesia’s Ramengvrl. Future episodes will feature Hong Kong rapper JB and Japanese Hip Hop artist Shurkn Pap.

Weekly Rap Up airs every Sunday and highlights all the big news stories to come out of Asian Hip Hop.

A third series, Behind Bars, will be taking a deep dive into Asian Hip Hop’s biggest songs and is set to launch on 1^stApril with Joe Flizzow’s ‘Ciao’, which features K-Clique’s MK and South Korea’s Jay Park. The show translates the best bars of the song into English and explains the punchlines, metaphors and references in the lyrics with exclusive insight.

The platform will also be producing specials called DX Originals, which will tell some of the most impactful stories from the region’s Hip Hop scene.  The first DX Original documentary will tell the story of how an international Hip Hop festival was held inside Indonesia’s top maximum security prison, organised by an inmate more than a decade ago.

Eddy Lim says: “Taking the legendary HipHopDX brand into Asia is a huge honour for me.  There are so many brilliant, original Hip Hop artists in Asia right now. It feels like the right time to try and break down the barriers between local scenes and help these performers find their place on a global stage.”

The Hip Hop scene in the region continues to explode, with particular hot spots in Indonesia, Philippines and Thailand.  Rappers such as Indonesia’s Ramengvrl and Rich Brian, Hong Kong’s Dough-Boy, Malaysian duo Tujuloca, Philippines’ Shanti Dope and Waiian and Thailand’s Youngohm and 1MILL are building up significant followings.  Yet most scenes remain localised, with language and cultural barriers still acting as a brake on the spread of new music.

Lim adds: “The range of content series we are creating will help by offering greater insights into the various underground cultures around the region and will shine a light on the incredible talent within Asian Hip Hop.”  

This is the latest expansion of the HipHopDX brand globally, following launches of the platform in France and the UK.