CreepHyp -- Ao Ume（青梅）

 

In the last 24 hours, I've received an email from my anime buddy who's once again out and about in Japan. He's currently staying with his friend in the wilds of Ome（青梅）, Tokyo, a city out on the western mountainous outskirts of the megalopolis. Now, years ago, there was another friend who's long been back here in Toronto but a few decades ago, he'd been living in Ome in a company dormitory that was right across from the factory where he was working.

To be honest, I never made it out to Ome, but my impression back then had been that the city (which actually has a population of over 100,000 people) was some remote village considering that my friend told me that even in train-filled Japan, transportation between Ome and central Tokyo was relatively sparse. Basically, I'd thought that Ome Station was one of those tiny unmanned shacks nestled by the tracks and that my friend's company and dormitory were the only happening things in the entire district. However, as my anime buddy and I have found out, it's really not that desolate at all, and the above 9-year-old video by TabiEats makes that clear. In fact, I think that it could have become quite the magnet for nostalgia fans.

Because of my buddy's email and the memories of my old friend's former residence, I decided to see if there were a go-touchi song based on Ome...as far-fetched as that could be. As it turns out, there is a song with the same kanji as those for the city of note here but it's not a go-touchi song and I don't think it really has anything to do with any city. If I'm not mistaken, the title is "Ao Ume" meaning "Unripe Plums" by the rock band CreepHyp.

CreepHyp, led by vocalist and guitarist Sekaikan Ozaki（尾崎世界観）, is a band that I posted about back in the pre-pandemic days of 2019 when I noted their rat-a-tat surf rock march, "Obake de Ii kara Hayaku Kite"（おばけでいいからはやくきて）. Last year in May, they released the just-as-rat-a-tat "Ao Ume" as a single about a couple of figurative plums ripening up because of love. Written and composed by Ozaki, the music video certainly doesn't look like it had been filmed in Ome but it does show a person going to Avengers levels of heroics for their one-and-only including one stunt that must have been inspired by the 1987 movie "The Untouchables". Usually for such a video, I had expected that the lass would be an ungrateful tsundere despite her significant other's deeds but I was glad to see that she was quite flattered for the protection.

CreepHyp -- Obake de Ii kara Hayaku Kite（おばけでいいからはやくきて）

I have to admit that it was the music video which first got my attention more than the actual song, "Obake de Ii kara Hayaku Kite" (Come Quick Even If You're A Ghost), itself. However, this short and sweet number by the rock band CreepHyp（クリープハイプ）has come to grow on me because it was on pretty heavy rotation on NHK's "Minna no Uta"（みんなのうた）.

Apparently, it wasn't released as an official single but it was put onto the "Minna no Uta" lineup for February and March 2018. The song, created by vocalist and guitarist Sekaikan Ozaki（尾崎世界観）, is a quick and playful song about a hybrid hamster and rucksack which initially feels as if it had been abandoned by its beloved owner in a toy store. I do like the rapid guitar work in the song; rather reminds me of hamster feet going at full speed.

But as I said, the video got my attention for its style of old-fashioned posters and manga brought to life which seems to be one of the hallmarks for the animation craft team AC-bu（AC部...Department AC）. I used to see illustrations of that sort whenever I visited the mock-up of 1950s Tokyo at the Shin-Yokohama Ramen Museum. AC-bu has come up with the looks for a number of commercials and music videos including "Obake de Ii kara Hayaku Kite", and I think they even took care of the anarchic anime "Pop Team Epic" last year.

Going back to CreepHyp, though, the band first started out in 2001 as an indies rock group and underwent a number of personnel changes before getting their major label in late 2012. Currently, CreepHyp has four members: the aforementioned Ozaki, guitarist Yukichika Ogawa（小川幸慈）, bassist Kaonashi Hasegawa（長谷川カオナシ）and drummer Taku Koizumi（小泉拓）. Since 2012, they've released 11 singles and 5 original albums.