Greetings from Japan! I arrived safely earlier this week and am experiencing that bizarre time warp where it's Saturday evening and I am finishing up this Weekender so it can publish at 8:00 am this morning, 15 hours ago. So far, I've had a great time in Tokyo. I've seen RAY, ponderosa may bloom, YURAPICO, PLANCK STARS, CIRCLE CRUSHER, SUPER MACARONI SALAD, and more. I need to wrap this up an head off to Shihatsu-machi Underground and RETRORAIN soon. I am enjoying myself so much that I've forgotten to post a single thing to Twitter.

This is it. The final task to put that last nail in the coffin of the year that was 2025. The greater Homicidols community had their collective say about what were the best releases and moments of 2025 (congratulations to NEO JAPONISM!), but now, it's Team Homicidols turn to voice our unfettered opinions. While we may not always be objectively correct, we do keep the site running and pay all the bills so it's only fair. So, before we turn the final page on 2025, we wanted to make sure that there a were a few things written down for posterity.

Banner Image: The Idols of Be Rise Lab. We did it!! We collectively survived 2025 and came out the other side. Happy New Year! Compared to last year at this time when I couldn't walk and was in constant and excruciating pain, 2026 is already a huge improvement. To celebrate this wonderful new start, I will be heading off to Japan on Monday for three weeks of idols, idols, a couple of bands, and more idols.

Happy 2026!! The ballots have been counted, the results certified, and your winners are announced below BUT before we get to that: I want to thank everyone who participated in this year's Best of the Year activities. We had a 30% increase in voter participation over last year which I really appreciate. Ten years into this venture that is Homicidols, it only means anything because of you all, so "Thank you!" for supporting our collective mission of promoting underground and independent idols to the wider world.

Banner Image: Kaishin no Ichigeki. Four more shopping days until Idol X-Mas, and as we get distracted by the season, don't forget that we are also in the midst of the Homicidols Best of 2025 voting period. Head over and cast your ballot if you haven't already. As a special holiday treat, we have far more items in the Oshifound Corner than Oshiloss. Kamisama bless us, every one!

VOTE NOW!! Here’s Your Homicidols Best of 2025 Ballot | homicidols.com

It’s that familiar point on the calendar where we stop pretending we're going to remember everything clearly and put it all down for posterity. Another year of alternative, indie, and underground idol has burned past in a blur of debuts, disappearances, reinventions, surprise highs, devastating lows, and orchestrated chaos. You debated, evangelized, and quietly fixated on the moments that stuck with you the most. We took all of that collective noise, filtered it through community consensus, and emerged with our OFFICIAL nominees for Homicidols Best of 2025.

Banner Image: RETRORAIN. I am spending all weekend putting the finishing touches on the Homicidols Best of 2025 nominations. Look for the nomination post including your ballot to drop early in the coming week. The fun part is finding images for all of the nominations from over the course of the year which has been complicated by Twitter's advanced search function failing to work entirely. Or maybe the function still works but is just locked behind a pay wall because the richest man in the world wants even more cash. Whatever the case, the world got just a little bit shittier.

Banner Image: Gekkan PAM. Yesterday was the last day to get nominations in for Homicidols Best of 2025 consideration, but since we're friends, I will leave the nomination form open until midnight just in case you haven't gotten around to submitting your favorites yet.

It is the last weekend of eligibility for Homicidols Best of 2025 awards consideration and a ton of our favorite idols turned in their final assignments just under the wire. Check out the last minute releases below and then, if you haven't already, be sure to submit your award nominations here: Homicidols 2025 Best of the Year Nomination Form We are only taking nomination through this coming Friday, December 5th so, hop to it!

We are hurtling towards the end of 2025 and the completion of one more trip around the sun. Here at Homcidols, we mark this annual occasion by scouring our playlists, memories, and therapists' notes for the best new songs, impressive performances, and most traumatic events of this past idol year. As per usual, the sheer volume of superb material we saw from our idol oshi and their contemporaries over the past twelve months was simply overwhelming. As always, we here on Team Homicidols desperately need your help in identifying the nominees for consideration for…

Banner image: THE ORGANICS. We are closing in on the end of the Homicidols Best of 2025 awards eligibility period. For those who have been around the sun with us before, our "year" runs from December through November, so units only have one more week left to drop an album, MV or explode in heartbreaking enough fashion to make it onto the short list. I will be sending out the nomination form early next week to get the ball rolling, so look for that. This year, I am hoping to have the voting in mid-December and the results published on January 2nd since I am heading to Japan shortly thereafter.

It was an odd week in chika idol but I guess that's normal? I've given up trying to recognize patterns in how the scene operates, but the seemingly weird thing this week was a noticeable lack of new singles, EPs and albums, but a flurry of new MVs. I know that Homicidols Best of the Year nominations will be opening soon (look for them in a couple of weeks) so, perhaps, groups just want to get their last minute videos posted for consideration. There are definitely contenders among this week's offerings.

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.

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:

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: 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.

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: 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.)

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