Banner image: FiDZ. Transitioning back into the daily grind is always tough. I had a great time last weekend at US Idol Fes seeing YURAPICO, other idols, and a bunch of fellow idol fans like you all. Then I came home to my day job and the work that had piled up from taking a few days off, my laptop got corrupted and died, plus I picked up a cold in LA that's stuck around all week just added to the total drag. But I just have to think back to last weekend for the motivation and energy to power though.

Banner Image: Not Secured, Loose Ends. This weekend, we are coming to you live from day two of U.S. Idol Fes in Los Angeles. Yesterday, YURAPICO kicked off the day one main stage with the first of her weekend performances. She will closing out tonight's main stage, followed by a meet and greet where you can pick up your very own YURAPICO x HOMICIDOLS collaboration T-Shirt!!

Banner Image: MAZARI. It was a strangely quiet week. While some of our favorite art, shoegaze, and dream pop idols dropped new releases, most of the louder and darker units seemed to take it easy, perhaps in preparation for next weekend and Halloween, one of the biggest holidays in the idol calendar.

Let's try this one again: You may have seen a half-baked version of this article post on Tuesday. I wish that I could say it was all an illusion but, no, it was just another one of my screw ups. I could have sworn that I had calendared it to publish on Thursday but, instead, it went up on Tuesday well before it was ready and I had to scrub it from existence. It is one of the enduring mysteries of this site: while there are any number of qualities that contribute to our status of being the longest running English language chika idol blog on the planet, competence is certainly not among them.

Banner Image: NARUKAMI. It’s been a perfectly normal week in the chika idol scene meaning a big unit called it quits, a storied idol announced her intention to vanish into the void, and fantastic new songs and MVs dropped to keep making it all worthwhile. All of that is below, but first:

Banner image: DorothyDrop. Two weeks into October, it's firmly turned into that time of year when everyone else starts flirting with the idea of “dark aesthetics,” while the chika idol scene just shrugs and says, “Welcome to our whole wide world.” With Halloween creeping closer, there’s no shortage of chilling tracks, moody MVs, and ominous member announcements to keep us entertained and/or traumatized. After a while in the chika idol fandom it's hard to tell the difference.

Well, look at us. Almost ten years old. Only a handful of idol groups make it that long and, honestly, we’re just as surprised as you are. What started as a questionable idea (“let’s write about underground idols from half-way around the world who perform in and speak a language that we don’t even understand; how hard can it be?”) somehow mutated into a decade-long obsession that’s eaten up countless weekends, introduced us to innumerable friends from around the world, and exposed us to a legion of idols and oshis and losses that we’ll never emotionally recover from.

Banner Image: MØZU. It's October! This is one of our favorite months of the year because it contains one of our favorite holidays: Idol Halloween. Idols are already getting into the Halloween spirit!

Banner image: THE ORCHESTRA TOKYO. Just a quick reminder that one month from today is US Idol Fest. YURAPICO will appearing alongside kaigai idols from all over the world. Homicidols will be there too. We're presenting a panel and have some other surprises to be announced as well. If you are thinking of attending, I recommend picking up a badge very soon.

Next up in our Best of Homicidols countdown to our 10th anniversary, we would like to revisit one of the most popular articles we've ever published. Back in 2022, Cal and I teamed up for a feature exploring the dearth of male idols in the alternative and underground idol space while, at the same time, boy groups dominate large sectors of the mainstream J-Pop charts. We also wanted to recognize those groundbreaking male idols who were making significant contributions to our favorite genre.

Banner image: EMPATHY. It was a good week in chika idol! For the record, the barometer for "good" is any week where the Oshiloss Corner ends up shorter than Oshifound. Here's the deets: ASP are back in the UK and warming up for their three-date tour with a couple of free events in London this weekend. Today, you can catch them for cheki at Worlds End pub in Camden. Tomorrow they will will holding a free live and cheki in Trafalgar square.

Homicidols dot com turns 10 years old next month, so we have been getting a bit nostalgic around Team headquarters. We have published just slightly less-than 5,000 articles since the site went live in mid-October of 2015, and while we certainly can't remember all of them, there are quite a few that we are particularly fond of. Over the next few weeks, we will be resurfacing some historical posts that we feel are of particular significance and worthy of renewed attention. Perhaps, none more than our first entry in this series:

Banner image: cowolo. I almost hit "Publish" without drafting this preamble which would have been a tragedy because I know how this opening paragraph is what everyone looks forward to the most on every Weekender. For those of you not immediately scrolling down to the idol content, I want to remind you that US Idol Fes is coming up this Halloween weekend in LA. YURAPICO (and many other idols) will be there and Homicidols will too, so we would love to see you there.

Banner image: SITUASION. This week was quite eventful. We had new releases dropping from A-listers almost every day plus a couple of surprise member ADDITIONS which is unusual in a genre that specializes in unexpected member subtractions. We welcome this the new trend! Since there is a lot to get through, let's just jump right in:

Banner image: Teenage New Punk Story. It's a bit of a bittersweet weekend. It is a three-day holiday weekend in the US and, for the last several years, I have spent this time off at Saboten Con having fun with the likes of Candye Syrup, Broken By The Scream, MELON BATAKE A GO GO, Tokyo Psychopath and YURAPICO. This year, unfortunately, Saboten Con has decided not to include idols in their programming, so I am home with little to do, no real reason to attend Saboten Con, and definitely no idol performances or off kais on my schedule.

Banner image: hakanai. Happy weekend dear reader! Thanks for dropping by and reading ye olde idol blog (turning 10 years old in October!!). Being here means one thing: you’re already knee-deep in the world of alt, indie, and underground idols. You know the emotional whiplash of debuts and disbandments . You probably still buy CDs, can't pass up an opportunity to acquire more cheki, and own way too many idol t-shirts and tiny towels. You're probably one of the last people you know who is still on Twitter because that's where the idols are.

Banner image: SITUASION. Here is your weekly digest of some of the happenings in the world of chika idol. I can never fit in everything, so I highly recommend folks join the Homicidols Discord server to catch everything that slips through the Weekender's cracks. It's very friendly over there, and sometimes there's cake (disclaimer: there's never cake).

Banner image: AIBECK. It was a fantastic week for loud idol. Not only did the genre's foundational powerhouse, BABYMETAL, drop the goods, but we got a huge announcement from Broken By the Scream and a flood of new releases from some of the best and loudest voices in the game. It was a great week to be an loudol fan!! (Unless you are a Miyu wota. Sorry.)

Banner image: Candye♡Syrup. It's Tokyo Idol Festival weekend and I guess I will be nicer about it this year. I'm still a bit bitter because, for the past three years, the organizers of the largest idol festival in THE WORLD decided to not only lock TiF live streams behind a substantial paywall, but also blocked all viewers from outside of Japan. This year, a couple of the stages are back on Nico Nico and available to overseas folks for a price, but I'm stubborn, hold grudges, and have abandonment issues, so I'm still basically in…

Banner image: Odoro. Folks may be completely unaware, but Homicidols is quickly homing in on our 10 year anniversary which will hit in mid-October. I have been recently scouring the site archives and got nostalgic about those days back when our beloved founder, Maniac, used to sometimes post two or three updates a day. Meanwhile, between health issues and the demands of my Day Job®, I am currently only averaging slightly more than one post a week. Despite the low production numbers on the front page, I do want to assure readers that there are big and unique things in the works that we are very excited about, and that Homicidols is committed to being here for the long haul.

Banner image: Made in Maiden. It has been a very eventful week in overseas idol news. Isiliel has been performing around London, including a stop at HYPER JAPAN. BABYMETAL announced a secret show taking place next week in LA to their half-a-million followers on Twitter. It sold out almost immediately, so I'm thinking someone may have tipped a few people off. We also got a trio of huge announcements of upcoming shows in Western Europe:

Just a quick note to say that my spinal surgery went well and I am back home and under the care of multiple (prescribed) drugs with hefty street values. I want to finish this up quick so I can pop the pills that make me floaty but also make it very difficult to type. Recovery has been a bit tough. I want to send a special "Thank you" out to everyone for their well wishes and especially to the denizens of the Homicidols Discord server who made sure I didn't miss anything while I was under anesthesia.

Banner image: Jiemei. I am living vicariously this weekend though all of those around the world attending the many overseas idol lives taking place on almost every continent (everyone always overlooks Antarctica and poor penguin wota). Unfortunately, I am at home preparing for surgery on Tuesday. My spine is getting operated on which is good news as it will, hopefully, fix me up so I can get back to traveling around the world and seeing idols. Wish me luck! In the meantime, idols are all over the world this weekend: