There are Sundays you forget by Tuesday. The kind that blurs into the week ahead without ceremony, quiet meals, early bedtimes and the slow surrender to Monday. And then there are Sundays like last night. The kind that settles into your memory like a good whisky: slowly, warmly and with the quiet insistence that you will not be forgetting them anytime soon.
That is exactly the kind of Sunday that unfolded at Thrones Bar Lounge and Restaurant last night for the Bottle Turnup dubbed “Boozy Brunch”, courtesy of Johnnie Walker. Nobody planned for the evening to feel this complete. And yet, by the time the last track faded, it felt like every element had always been destined for the same room.
The evening was lush and well curated. It was a beehive of activity as bartenders moved between tables asking customers whether they needed another round of Johnnie Walker. In other corners of the room, customers signalled to them to attend to them. When a guest ordered a bottle of Gold Label Reserve, Blue Label or Black Label, it arrived illuminated with lights, turning each order into a small, glittering ceremony of its own. Johnnie Walker brands were never hidden behind a bar. They sat at the centre of every table, exactly where they belonged. Revellers were not just drinking. They were savouring how beautifully whisky lives inside a great night.
At 10pm, DJ Jerry Mehn took control of the decks and the night shifted gear entirely. The lounge that had whispered elegance all evening now roared with energy. Just after 11pm, DJ Aludah stepped in and the crowd rose to meet him, weaving R&B into Afrobeats with the kind of precision that makes a dancefloor feel inevitable.
At 1am, Johnnie Walker influencer DJ Kasbaby took over and proved exactly why his name carries weight in Kampala’s entertainment circles. He is the kind of DJ that keeps an audience slightly suspended, always half-wondering what track comes next. His juggle of Dancehall and R&B held the room in a comfortable grip, right up until the moment he dropped Buwooma, Apass’s latest hit. The crowd swayed as one. It did not matter that Monday was only a few hours away. In that moment, it simply did not exist. Then he pulled them even further back into the oldies, into songs that carry memories older than the night itself, and the room filled with something harder to name than joy. Call it nostalgia. Call it belonging.
At precisely 1:24am, Tracy Melon stepped onto the stage and the lounge leaned forward as one. She opened with Sumagiza and the crowd answered. She moved through Kakana, then Totta, then Ogenda Kukilaba and somewhere between the first chorus, tender voices across the room could be heard singing quietly alongside her. Not performing. Just feeling. Her romantic songs had a way of finding the softer parts of a crowd that only hours ago was roaring following Arsenal FC’s crowning as English Premier League Champions.
By 4am, Thrones was still alive. The revellers who had arrived as early as 9:30pm on a Sunday were still there, still swaying, still reluctant to let the night become a memory. It was the kind of stubborn joy that only the best nights produce.
DJ Kasbaby, reflecting on the experience, put it simply: “When a Johnnie Walker bottle arrives with lights and the crowd is this alive, you feel it on the decks. Tonight was one of those nights you play for.”
Last night was never really about a bottle carried to a table. It was about what happens when a brand creates a space where people meet, connect and lose track of time in the best possible way. Johnnie Walker not only hosted a party but also gave Kampala a memory: the kind you carry into the week quietly, like a warmth you cannot quite explain but are grateful for. And if last night was any measure of what the Bottle Turnup promises, the only question worth asking is a simple one: when is the next one?
