Hashtag Japanese geography crash course with HypMic (+Also quick language crash course
Apparently Ikebukuro(marked red), Shibuya(marked yellow), and Shinjuku(marked grey) are 3 major secondary central business district of Tokyo(marked magenta).
Meanwhile Yokohama(marked blue) is the second largest(right after Tokyo) city in Japan, and serves as an outport for Tokyo.
For the meaning of each city, I decided to go backward from Tokyo to Bukuro:
東京 Tokyo: 東 = east 京= capital
新宿 Shinjuku: 新=new 宿=inn, lodge
渋谷 Shibuya: 渋=astringent 谷=valley
横浜 Yokohama: 横=side, horizontal 浜=bay
Yokohama division’s album ‘BAYSIDE M.T.C’ and Jyuto’s solo ‘Bayside Smoking Blues’ are obviously referring to this.
池袋 Ikebukuro: 池 = pond, reservoir 袋 = sack
Owl in Japanese is pronounced as ‘fukurouふくろう,’ which sounds similar to bukuro. In fact, the owl has been a community symbol in Ikebukuro, thought to bring good luck. Located in the basement of JR Ikebukuro Station since 1987, this certain owl statue has been famous meet-up spot in Ikebukuro.
(From left: Saburo, Ichiro, Jiro)
You can also find three owls in Hoodstar MV:
From this another screenshot from Hoodstar, you can see four emblems for each division on the subway-like diagram.
Ikebukuro: Owl, as explained above.
Yokohama: Skull, following Samatoki’s skull-themed design, as can be seen in his shirt and microphone.
Shibuya: Candy, a reference to Ramuda’s last name Amemura飴村, which means ‘candy village’
Shinjuku: Wolf, a reference to Matenrou麻天狼, which roughly translates into ‘hemp’s heavenly wolf’
But what about the line layout? Is it simply the creative design? No. I came across this particular tweet-
It says the world of HypMic is actually inspired by Nagoya, of all cities!
Above is the diagram of the subway lines in Nagoya.
Yellow line: 東山線 Higashiyama Line. Line number 1. Translates into roughly ‘East Mountain Line’
Purple line: 名城線 Meijou Line. Line number 2 and 4(it’s a bit complicated). Translates into roughly ‘Name Castle Line’
Lavender double line: 名港線 Meikou Line. Line number 2. Translates into roughly ‘Name Harbor Line’
Blue line: 鶴舞線 Tsurumai Line. Line number 3. Translates into roughly ‘Crane Dance Line’
Red line: 桜通線 Sakuradouri Line. Line number 6. Translates into roughly ‘Through Cherry Blossom Line’
Pink line: 上飯田線 Kamiiida Line. Line number 7. Translates into roughly ‘Above Rice Field Line’
Find the four lines that have colors of four divisions. Don’t they look strikingly similar?
For last but not least, here’s the screenshot from good ol’ Google Maps. Subway lines are represented as grey lines.