Lyrical Deep Dive: 躍るFLAGSHIP - Did someone say PIRATES!?

The 3Chord album series tell a story about a pair of lovers in 3 different perspectives. The concept of the story is the idea of fixing the "time" of the story but instead the story is retold through different people. Drawing from the names of the individual tour stops of 7th live, Comical Pops, Funky Dancing and Glowing Rock, we get our CFG song trilogy in the form of Furachi na CANVAS, Odoru FLAGSHIP and Ikenai GO AHEAD. Flagship originates from the 2nd album in the 3chord series and is (obviously) also the 2nd perspective in the story. This time the song is from the perspective of the female lead.

Flagship is pretty heavily EDM. That should come as no surprise considering the F leg of the tour is Funky Dancing. Mifumei delivers yet another strong entry into the world of Cinderella Girls. This song was particularly exciting at the time because it was the first confirmation that the CFG series would feature another connected story. The last time this was done was during the Seasons series. (Maybe I'll get around to writing more about that someday but for now our focus is on 3Chord)

CANVAS talks about a guy who's been looking to pick up a girl sporting a red tote bag, so you could probably imagine the excitement when this album was previewed and the album art literally featured Miho carrying a red tote bag in the illustration. The song being so incredibly exciting considering the wild success that was Mifumei's Babel (his debut in Cinderella Girls) the hype train for this song was pretty much full speed ahead since the beginning. Fortunately for us most EDM songs come with pretty simple lyrics to follow so we don't have to reach out to the deep end to wrap our minds around this one. In my opinion, Flagship is the easiest song to understand in the trilogy, so let's get started.

Who can forget the absolutely iconic whisper right at the start of the song. It's a really cool touch that the song starts off with the quiet, drops the bass and then immediately comes to a stop for a brief moment just like that.

Fun trivia: In the Magical Extra Time for this song Mifumei mentions that the song was composed without much of an idea of what the lyrics would end up being. It was initially a demo floating around in their catalog that they found to be very suitable for the theme of this song and was expanded to a full version. Eventually the theme of the composition would end up being "Troubled Young Women (悩んでる女の子)" as mentioned during the Magical Extra Time

But wait, before all of that we've actually already missed a slight detail here. If you listen real closely in the intro, you hear the sound of inhaling during the quiet parts before the bass drop. This is completely absent in the instrumental version if you're also curious about that, because they literally got the seiyuus to record deep breathing as a sample. The significance of this will be discussed later in the writeup, but it's a nice exercise to pick it out with your own ears for yourself.

渦をまいてる　青いゴッホみたいな空が
進んでいくのを　そっと眺めてた
急に真面目に　好きだなんて告るから
スカートの裾が　揺れて乱される

The blue Van Gogh like sky swirls
[I] gently gaze at it moving by itself
After you suddenly confessed that you like me
The hem of [my] skirt was thrown into disarray

Given the name of Odoru Flagship you would understandably expect a lot of comparisons to a ship sailing on water to this song. The piece immediately opens up with something that I didn't understand for quite a while due to the phrasing. What the heck is ゴッホみたい anyway? So ゴッホ (GOHHO) in this statement probably refers to Vincent Van Gogh and the whole statement in it's entirety ("I gently gazed at the spiraling blue Van Gogh-like sky, moving by itself") is a description of The Starry Night, an oil on canvas painting by Van Gogh widely regarded as his magnum opus. This description sets the stage for the rest of the song and is a surprisingly powerful metaphor if you could somehow wrap your head around what the line was initially supposed to mean. The next lime jumps context immediately to the confession from the male lead. The lyrics talk about how ever since the confession the "hem of [her] skirt gets thrown into disarray". Thinking about this from the direction of the whole ship analogy leads you to believe that this is painting (heh) the picture of a strong gust of wind. I believe a few more interpretations of this line in particular are possible once you've covered some more of the song.

Next, we have another section that has given me the most trouble with interpretation. The main problem with this paragraph comes with how awkward it is to phrase the idea in English.

私たちはいつでも
悩んでたたかったり　はぐれたり
仲のいいグループだったね

"We are always..."
"Struggling while straying from each other"
"We were a close group/Weren't we a close group?"

The main difficulty in this section is trying to connect the description of the relationship with the strange comparisons in the 2nd line. たたかったり stems from 戦う which means "to fight" and はぐれたり stems from 逸れる which could also mean "to miss one's chance". I think several interpretations of this section is possible, but maybe its supposed to symbolize the push-pull nature of the relationship? It's also possible that this section and the usage of "group" is a hint towards the 3rd character in IKENAI GO AHEAD. But since this song doesn't really mention much at all about this person, we won't be covering that just yet. (A subject for another event most likely, be sure to smash that Subscribe button, notification bell and sign up for my patreo-)

勇敢でいたい　おそれないFLAGSHIPのように
風をはらんだら　女の子は強いよ

I want to be brave like a fearless FLAGSHIP
Engulfed by the winds, girls are strong

Ah the chorus, the beautiful, heavy thick bass drop accompanying the lighter instrumental synths. I think this song has the full spectrum very well balanced, no part of the song sounds too heavy or crowded, nor too empty or lacking. The pairing of higher, lighter sounding instruments is a contrast from Mifumei's Babel which is mostly very heavy on the low end. A good job on both the mixing and mastering for this track as the overall CD mix turned out to be excellent. The lyrics of the chorus focuses on the core "problem" in the song. The girl talks about wanting to become brave and fearless like a flagship, engulfed by the wind. This describes her image of a strong woman.

バランスを欠いた呼吸を立て直せるまで
優しく待ってて
そんな自分に驚いてる

Until I restore balance to my breath,
[I will] gently wait [for you]
I'm surprised at myself.

The next half of the chorus goes on about her reaction to the confession. I think the chorus really brings to life the theme of the girl being troubled, as it illustrates the difference between her expectations and reality. She thought she was a strong lady but the events that followed the confession have left her flustered.

Starting in the second half of the song we get some interesting lore. The whole verse section here seems to be talking about her past experience with love.

本当を言うと　他の人のこと浮かべてた
溺れそうな恋と海賊に出会った話

Truthfully speaking, [I was actually] thinking about something regarding another person
A tale of meeting pirates drowning in love

So this is where we start talking about PIRATES! It is from this section of the song where we're starting to realize the reason she reacted in such a way to the male character. This mentioning of pirates is also particularly interesting, because there's actually a pirate shipwreck on the album art hidden in the artwork. You can't see it on the album cover itself, but on the limited edition poster or the zoomed out version of the background without the idols in it on the back of the CD, you will be able to see the pirate ship. (They sneakily covered it with another CD when previewing the poster, if you wanted to check the official sources.) Fortunately for us I happen to own a physical copy so here's a picture of the back.

記憶のなかでやっと　あいつを倒せた　けど
忘れ去るためだけに
新しい物語の旅にでたりはしない　決めたルール

In [those] memories, I finally defeated that person. But...
Just in order to forget it completely
I decided to make a rule to not make a new story emerge from this journey

If you give this section just a bit of thought you'll realize the whole part is talking about how her past experience has scarred her. She's become closed off from the idea of a relationship and that's also probably what lead her thinking towards the idea of wanting to be a strong (and independent) woman. This is the kind of backstory that you'd get like a character development anime episode for or something...

くるくると　(まわるビル風)
飛ばされる　(カフェのポスター)
白い　飛行機雲がくる
ひたむきに　(線を描いて)
心に　(フラッグたてた)
乗りこんでみようかな
真っ赤なトートバッグで

The whirling wind going around the buildings
Throws the cafe poster into the air
The white airplane vapor trails come
and draw a single minded line
The flag in the heart erects
Would [you] come on a ride with me
Together with [this] deep red tote bag

This bridge section of the song strongly ties in with the plot in the entire series. The whole concept of buildings and airplane vapor trails and a red tote bag are symbols that are constant throughout the entire trilogy of songs. To the girl her main element in the story is the usage of wind based analogies, while the guy has a lot of painting analogies. In this section the wind is described as a force for change (sweeping up a poster, engulfing the buildings and flags) Also in this segment is the most dramatic harmonization over a red tote bag you'll ever hear. It's beautiful.

強いひとが好き　そう思い続けてたのに
戸惑うことも　純粋だと思った

I like strong people... That was what I kept thinking
But the things that troubled me, I thought they were genuine as well

This is the reflection point of the piece. Accompanying this section we get a very pleasant piano backing for this part. It's awfully quiet compared to the rest of the song. She gets some time to think over what she had her mind fixed on, and the reality of the things she's been struggling with.

勇敢でいたい　踊り出すFLAGSHIPのように
風をはらんだら　女の子は強くなれる
進みだせる　答えだせる
光の中　そんな自分に　ひらめいてる　驚いてる
深呼吸する　少し待っていて

I want to be brave like a dancing FLAGSHIP
Engulfed by the winds, Girls become stronger
To be[come] able to move forward; To be able to find answers
To be amazed at that version of myself, fluttering in the light
To take a deep breath and wait a little bit

The piano distorts back into synth waves and we immediately jump right into the final chorus as everything kicks in full force again. The lyrics at the start are similar but not quite the same. This is like the character development in the piece, the circumstances haven't changed but her perspective on it seems to have. The description of the flagship has changed from fearless to dancing. The best way to explain this would be about how a ship will ride the waves of the ocean. During a storm or strong wind, the ship could have the appearance of dancing in the sea. (It's a stretch but I guess thats literary language for you.) The next lines talk about the change towards a mindset of growth. The winds have turned into an opportunity for self development. The same winds of fate that brought these two characters together, that will enable her to move forward and to find answers. This would be something that would lead to the creation of a new "her", one that flutters in the light.

Right at the outro of the song we hear this very interesting and different arrangement consisting of nice softly spoken words, but the interesting detail to pick up here is that the breathing sounds from the intro have made their return. Listen closely for them. The last line of the song talks about taking a deep breath. (深呼吸する) According to the composer Mifumei, the usage of the breathing signifies the start and the end of the tension and troubles in a figurative sense. At the start, the deep breaths is a kind of symbolism for bracing oneself for tension and by the end of the song, the breath symbolize relief as the girl has finally sought out the answer. The very last thing you hear in this song is actually the breathing sample. Much easier to catch than in the intro.

Putting the whole thing together, Odoru Flagship is about a girl, who when faced with a sudden confession was challenged to rethink how she thought about herself and how she saw relationships. It describes the process of her coming to her answer, and how that perspective has changed.

This concludes the writeup on Odoru FLAGSHIP. The 3chord seasons album contains some really great songs and I'm glad that I was able to write about my 3rd favorite song of 2020. (So of my top 3 from 2020, It's only Hinako's solo I haven't written about) Maybe if I have time I'll continue writing about the 3Chord series, since there's Ikenai go ahead at some point coming in the future between now and the end of service. Thanks for reading and I hope that this helps you appreciate the song more.