Shibuya : Place of Opportunities, my personal experience

Shibuya is a crazy town a glittering world which attracts teens from across Japan who some times run away from their homes and land up in Shibuya, trying to figure out life. Some get successful, my personal experience was with a brand F-Mode in 2005, I used to work for in this lane. Run by a group of girls in their 20s designing clothes for youngsters and were wildly popular on the i-Mode iMenu service run by NTT Docomo. I remember that the moment they announced a new clothing line, the server cluster our team had hosted went down on day 1 with over 6000-7000 concurrent user access. F-Mode used to run limited stock promotion and the youngsters in Shibuya used to mob the site like crazy. Used to work around this area and this is a nostalgic location. 

SHIBUYA = GRAFITTI 落書き?

This is an awesome choice of a filming location. Shibuya bylanes as you move ahead of the famous traffic intersection and Dogenzaka has some awesome grafitti walls. The surprise is that the wall art IS STILL THE SAME!!!!!! Unbelievable, little bit faded, but still lives on! 

Shibuya Station

Tokyo probably triggers “neon” signs in the tourists mind, and this stop is just next to the JR Shibuya Station. That electrical pole feat, they must have been required to take so many permissions to do such a video! 

Shibuya = Video Box(個室ビデオ)?

Just next to the tere-kura lcoation is this video box where you can sit and watch videos VHS then, DVDs now in a room selected from a library in the same establishment. The video box is still there, so is the overall building layout including the air conditioning you can see on the right. If only I was a physically fit chap I would love to do this jump too.

Shibuya = Extinct Record Businesses?

Shibuya had many record stores until early 2000s when people used to travel all the way to visit these stores and BUY physical media. The online services have KILLED all these businesses and all the record stores have vanished replaced by Coffee Shops. Below 2 snaps are all outside a popular record store MAX RECORDS which no longer exists.

Shibuya = Ramen ラーメン屋?

When you shoot in a location so central in the city, commercial establishments will always feature in terms of sign boards and permission is required whether they want to be in the video. Supposedly this noodle establishment did not want to get featured, I don’t know, but the Madonna’s video was edited where the shop name has been masked with the KATAKANA letters マドンナ meaning MADONNA. WOW!, hope ths shop does not mind me posting this image…  

Shibuya Neighborhoods

A few shots of neighborhoods which have stayed more or less the same in the past ten years. Ten years is not a long time, so understandable. 

As a first-generation Indian IT migrant, I came to Japan in the same wave as many who arrived in the early and late ’90s, armed with tech skills and just enough bilingual hustle to fit into the market. And like most of us, I’ve ended up emotionally split: India tugs at me when I’m in Japan, and Japan tugs at me when I’m in India. The result? I’m part of that strange in-between tribe, the “gaijin everywhere” generation. Never fully here, never fully there, but somehow belonging to both.

Most of my friends and me took a “JUMP” or a “leap” of faith beliving that Japan had the best to offer and in many ways it did. The word JUMP (as in jump on a plane to Japan) is something I can very closely relate with and it is no surprise that I like the song JUMP filmed in TOKYO by Madonna and released 10 years ago. Those words by Madonna and a team of Parkour performers in the backdrop of Shibuya /Shinjuku /Azabu-Juban was a real inspiration. Crazy parkour techniques in the bylanes of Shibuya was something which always was a treat to watch and this video song is one of my first purchase on the Apple iTunes Store.

It’s ten years from the release and I decided to take a JUMP and go to Shibuya and try to locate all the filming locations. Without further talk here you go, snap comparison of Shibuya of 2006 and 2016.

Shibuya : Place of Opportunities, my personal experience

Shibuya is a crazy town a glittering world which attracts teens from across Japan who some times run away from their homes and land up in Shibuya, trying to figure out life. Some get successful, my personal experience was with a brand F-Mode in 2005, I used to work for in this lane. Run by a group of girls in their 20s designing clothes for youngsters and were wildly popular on the i-Mode iMenu service run by NTT Docomo. I remember that the moment they announced a new clothing line, the server cluster our team had hosted went down on day 1 with over 6000-7000 concurrent user access. F-Mode used to run limited stock promotion and the youngsters in Shibuya used to mob the site like crazy. Used to work around this area and this is a nostalgic location. 

SHIBUYA = GRAFITTI 落書き?

This is an awesome choice of a filming location. Shibuya bylanes as you move ahead of the famous traffic intersection and Dogenzaka has some awesome grafitti walls. The surprise is that the wall art IS STILL THE SAME!!!!!! Unbelievable, little bit faded, but still lives on! 

Shibuya Station

Tokyo probably triggers “neon” signs in the tourists mind, and this stop is just next to the JR Shibuya Station. That electrical pole feat, they must have been required to take so many permissions to do such a video! 

Shibuya = Video Box(個室ビデオ)?

Just next to the tere-kura lcoation is this video box where you can sit and watch videos VHS then, DVDs now in a room selected from a library in the same establishment. The video box is still there, so is the overall building layout including the air conditioning you can see on the right. If only I was a physically fit chap I would love to do this jump too.

Shibuya = Extinct Record Businesses?

Shibuya had many record stores until early 2000s when people used to travel all the way to visit these stores and BUY physical media. The online services have KILLED all these businesses and all the record stores have vanished replaced by Coffee Shops. Below 2 snaps are all outside a popular record store MAX RECORDS which no longer exists.

Shibuya = Ramen ラーメン屋?

When you shoot in a location so central in the city, commercial establishments will always feature in terms of sign boards and permission is required whether they want to be in the video. Supposedly this noodle establishment did not want to get featured, I don’t know, but the Madonna’s video was edited where the shop name has been masked with the KATAKANA letters マドンナ meaning MADONNA. WOW!, hope ths shop does not mind me posting this image…  

Shibuya Neighborhoods

A few shots of neighborhoods which have stayed more or less the same in the past ten years. Ten years is not a long time, so understandable. 

Shibuya Inokashira Line 井の頭線?

The parkour performer had perched himself on the electrocity pole box, just next to the Inokashira Line over bridge, which you can see below the glass exterior overbridge. Just outside the Shibuya Inokashira Line Exit.