DerekVasconi
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Idol Underworld Update- Welcome LAST QUESTION!
🕑 Added 2020-03-24 09:28:27 +0000 UTCHello everybody! Been super busy this past week with a million things, but finally managed to upload another new group that I wanted to work with and am now lucky enough to be able to do so. Welcome LAST QUESTION to Idol Underworld!
Last Question has been around forever. They are a wonderful group with a whole lot of respect in the underground idol scene. Their leader, Momoi san, is super smart, brilliant as a business woman, and very much one of the nicest idols you'll ever meet. Last Question's whole concept is merging their love of video-games, particularly RPGS like Dragonquest and Final Fantasy, with idol music. Their songs reflect this too. If you know me even a little bit, then you know I'm a DIE HARD lover of old school RPG games, particularly from the NES era, so I can't tell you how much I love this group. Some of the most fun conversations I've ever had with an idol have been with Momoi san, as me and her really get all geeky and otaku-like when we start talking about videogames with each other. It's hysterical to here us... we probably sound like total dorks.
Anyway, Last Question has put up a ton of their items on Idol Underworld, and believe me, they have a LOT more, but they are testing the waters with foreign fans. They have expressed a very deep desire to expand their musical reach to the rest of the world. And it's so weird to think how everybody knows them here in Japan, at least in the underground idol circuit, but it's possible that this might be your very first time hearing about them. But they are one of those veteran groups that keep rolling and keep doing amazing things with their music and sound. And now they want to take that next step into the rest of the world. Can you help them out? I hope all of you will crush their items and buy up everything fast. I really, really want to support this group and work with them a long time. They are also a candidate to take overseas (when it's safe to do so again). So please, enjoy them and let them know what you think on their respective twitters! Thanks everybody!
OTHER ADDITIONS...
I FINALLY managed to get NiANiHiL Noi's chekis. It took forever and I'm sorry about that, but now all of you can collect ALL the members of NiANiHiL! Hopefully that group will actually have a cd or something else to sell, which I don't understand exactly why they have nothing else to buy at this time, but I've been told it's all coming soon.
Additionally, I worked for Yoneko at her debut as a solo artist the other night, and aside from being completely blown away by her performance and being asked to record everything that night, I also did cheki for her that night too, and as I did so, I managed to notice that she had a very special Lyric book on her buppan table. I snagged some of those to sell, and Yoneko has some new stuff that will be ready soon, musically speaking that is. So for now, you guys can pick up those gorgeous photo/lyric books that she let me take to put up on Idol Underworld. You can't get those anywhere else, so enjoy people. I hope you'll continue to support this amazing and iconic girl.
I also took more cheki of Hanako San. This time, I took cheki that I guarantee NONE of you will ever have seen before... it's Hanako San on her BIKE! She let me snap some cheki of her on her bike, among other crazy cheki we took, so please enjoy those too! They were fun to take, as it's always a great time to be visited by the ghost girl herself!
Additionally, the following were added:
discounted satanic punish group cheki
a few extra sari cheki
Since Sari has left Satanic Punish, I decided to basically reduce all the Satanic Punish group cheki that I just put up. I hate to see them go to waste, so please buy them if you support Satanic Punish. Sari too... she's gone now, but I have a ton of her cheki left, and that's a lot of money out of my pocket and the pockets of the members of Satanic Punish, so if you can, please support SP and IU by clearing out her stock if you can. It would be awesome if you did!.
Restocks
-Rino Oishi Cheki (sushi special)- Me and Rino had a ton of fun taking these cheki... it looks like she's eating a ton of food... we did a graphic illusion with them! Enjoy!
-Xteen Shion Cheki
-Mel Cheki from satanic punish
Zombie Powder Gyunou Fest Magazines (and I promise I'll get cheki of their newest member soon!)
-Okinawa Electric Girl CDS- Okinawa Electric Girl Saya CD- 沖縄階段~彩の夢は夜ひらく
-Okinawa Electric Girl Saya CD- ぼくらは星砂
-Emomomomo7 CD
My OFFICIAL STAND ON THE NECROMA SITUATION:
So... I've been asked a million times since last week as to my thoughts on Necroma imploding and basically ending an era of what seemed to be an unstoppable group in the idol universe. And truly, I never thought I would see the day that came last week, with Kaki, Rei, and Michelle saying goodbye. But as to what actually happened, here's the thing...
I haven't spoken with the members or with Ricky since October of 2019. I mean, me and Ricky briefly exchanged emails in regards to him asking for all his merchandise back so he can put it up on bandcamp, but that's it. So, I have no idea what was going on or what happened. I also am NOT going to speculate, because I think that's pointless and a waste of time. The only thing I have to say about all of this is that my heart hurts deeply for all FIVE of them. Ricky was like my best friend for two years. He took me into the Idol Universe here in Tokyo, stood by me when nobody else did, and did a million things for me that nobody else did for me. Did me and him clash on things more than a few times? Sure, but who doesn't do that when you are together with somebody for years? Also, Ricky is a very special person... he is a bona fide, actual genius, which is actually kind of rare in the world. So, as a genius person, he may not be the most understood person, or may not be the most social, but God DAMN did he make the most interesting music I've heard in my life! I LOVE NECROMA. I LOVE NECROMA'S MUSIC. I saw magic happen on the stage with the Necroma members time and time and time again. I saw the members pull CLUTCH performances when they should've bombed performances, like when we were out on the summer tour and everybody was so tired and exhausted, the sound levels were shit at the venues during practice, and so on, but when the members got on that stage... EVERYTHING always fell into place, right where it needed to be. And at the heart of all of that was Ricky, pulling the strings, making sure shit worked when it needed to, and coming up with things that nobody else could even dare dream about. So... whatever is going on with him, my heart just hurts knowing that he is going through what has to be something very painful right now. And I feel the same about each of the members... I care very much about all of them and I always will. They were all like my family over the past few years. So... my only wish now is that they each do what they need to do in their lives and move on, or whatever is next for them all, I hope they do it with the same intensity and enthusiasm that they had for Necroma that I witnessed over the course of two years of working together. And that's it. Anything else about what happened or whatever... it's pointless to even talk about now. What's done is done. Let the past be the past, and time to move on. Ricky will bounce back, as he is relentless in his pursuit of art. So will the members. I know they will, because time and time again, I saw them do it on tours we did together, and at shows here in Tokyo. And I am here always to cheerlead for them and support them all. I have only love for them. Only love. And I hope all of you will feel the same.
MORE NEWS....
So, it's been crazy for all of you out there in the world. I realize this as I read more and more on Facebook and see the news online. I feel so bad for all of you. Here in Japan, it's been more of a cautious, slow approach to reacting with stay at home orders and things of that nature. Basically, it's life as usual here. Nobody is really acting all too crazy, except for buying up toilet paper by the shelf loads and masks. Go figure... all it took was a bunch of fucking assholes in the world to make everybody panic buy in every country in the world. Lucky for me, I managed to buy a ton of toilet paper before any of this even started... and I have no idea why I did that. I think it was all on sale or something.
Anyway, I am trying to make a lot of things happen here in la la idol land. Getting Last Question was a BIG accomplishment for me, but I also happened to land THREE more groups that are arguably three of the BIGGEST groups in all of the idol scene today. I'll be adding them here shortly, as I've been slowed down recently by several things happening here. Mostly, I've been overwhelmed because I need to get a photobook completed in a very short amount of time, due to an unexpected deadline I was told to meet, and I'm working on two more photobooks at the same time. And then, I had to take a long break for two days and do nothing but work on my documentary. I needed to come up with a clear path of how to make it all mold and fit together, given that I have terabytes worth of footage. So... yeah, two days of literally no sleeping and very little eating, and I got it done. I met with my video editor last night and presented to him in a two hour conversation, and at the end, he smiled at me and said "we're going to make a great film." So yeah... mission accomplished.
I get into these work spurts, you know? Like... my whole body will fight working until the very last moment, and then, all of a sudden, I'll have this manic rush where I'll end up coming up with a ton of different ideas, or get a ton of work done. Because just as I finished the documentary flow chart (which was REALLY hard to do, but I nailed that fucker and it's perfect now)., I ALSO came up with a fun as fuck concept for the Merry Bad End MV we will be shooting in the next few weeks. The original idea I was given by some people I really did not like, as I felt it was like every other fucking Idol MV you see today. And I don't have the capability of making what others are making in terms of MV's for idols. I'm a one man army, and also it's kind of reminding me of how I didn't know how to play metal guitar, back when I writing the first two albums for my band, From a Second Story Window. A lot of what was on both of those first two albums was me trying to figure out how to play metal, and instead, I resorted to playing acoustic folk songs downtuned with a strange tuning I came up with (LOW TO HIGH: AEADGA), and then putting together about 40-50 parts sometimes in one song, to create the ADD style music that FASSW came to be known for. But had I known HOW to write metal and actually was versed in musical education... yeah, maybe I might not have been so tempted to be that creative.
And so it's the same with the MBE MV... I came up with an idea that I do not think any idol group has really done before. Perhaps other musicians have in other genres, but certainly not the idol world, as far as I can tell. I did some research but couldn't find anyone who did it and yeah... I think I'm going to create a one of a kind MV that everybody will hopefully love, and it's within my capacity as a one camera, no experience kind of guy that I am. So I now am working on the storyboard for that MV.
And speaking of Merry Bad End, they just released that SEIFUKU cheki set... isn't it so lovely? I mean, we are trying to come up with ideas for cheki sets, and I came up with that idea, and they all loved it a lot, and so they decided to do that. So I am happy they trusted me to get all school girl like and throw down in the cheki set. The chekis came out amazing, I thought, and hopefully all of you will snag them before they sell out. Only a few are left at the time I'm writing this, but my hope is that they'll all sell out. Please make that happen. The Merry Bad End girls are going through a very rough patch now, as I have had to sit down with them and kind of evaluate them and that caused some issues. I feel bad because I don't like hurting people's feelings or making them cry, but Daisuke, Merry Bad End's producer, told me something very encouraging. He told me what Aki-P, creator of AKB48, had once said: Have the courage to be disliked by idols. Daisuke works directly with AKI-P, as he is also AKB staff, so that felt really good to hear that coming from him. I felt like AKI-P was telling me that himself. Still, it is difficult, because the Merry Bad End girls want to destroy the world and have everybody know them. I just did an interview with them, in conjunction with the Italian idol blog, Idol on Chaos, and I think in that interview, you'll see three really, really young and three really really strong girls who are doing their very best to make their idol music known and heard everywhere. So I hope all of you will really support the girls as they move forward. They are a work in progress, which is why I have joined up with them and not other groups that are more farther along... and yeah, I love watching their growth. But I also want them to do much more, as I'm highly motivated, and I hope to motivate the girls to my ridiculous level of motivation. Not many people can match my enthusiasm, so that will be a challenge for them, but... I know they can do it. Those girls can do anything. I swear.
There is so so much more to discuss, but I'll leave it at this for now. Please do me a favor and realize that in the next month or two, I'll be completing a year's journey with the documentary getting finished. Then I'll also have been finishing up several photobooks and MVS, and also continuing to march towards my birthday live in August and an eventual world tour with some idols, once the world settles itself down over the mass hysterics and panics caused by the Corona Virus pandemic. I do hope that I can also keep growing Idol Underworld. I am looking at actually turning it into a bigger business, with full staff and much more, but I also like how it's kind of my own thing. Everybody knows me here in idol la la land and I like having a personal connection with so many of the producers and their staff and sometimes with the idols who are self-produced. I really enjoy what I am doing, and I want to keep doing it forever, even when it gets stressful, or when things happen that I don't understand (like certain groups on Idol Underworld who have chosen to steer away from working together with me more closely, for various reasons I won't get into here). I continue to be humbled by the fact that there is no loyalty in idol as well, as in I might be enjoying a good relationship with a group today but tomorrow that might not be the case at all. Also, I keep running into simple problems, like needing to take cheki of members of groups or getting buppan items from groups and they just.... they make it very difficult to do those things, for a variety of reasons. I'm learning to not take that shit personally, as I often do, but it's hard. Especially when it's groups I genuinely love and adore. I mean, everybody in Idol underworld I actually LIKE. I'm not just working with them because they are the gaijin flavor of the week and I want to get their items to sell to all of the Kaigai fans out there so I can make some money. I actually LOVE these groups, have done countless favors for many of them, go to their shows when I can, and talk regularly with some of them as well. I don't just look for groups to profit from, unlike other people in this business. And honestly, this is who I AM. This is my life. So I want to keep doing that, but hopefully with more like-minded people that feel exactly the same way and can match my passion. But yeah... that's hard to do. I know. Trust me.
Anyway, take care all of you. Please keep supporting me here at IU. It would mean a lot if you did. Especially now, as I know it's burdensome for many of you, but trust me, in the weeks to come, I'm going to be doing my best to make all of you smile and forget what's going on everywhere in the world. And maybe I'll even get this fucking new sister website done for all of you to play on and have a good time with. It's MUCH more interactive, and if I pull it off, you guys will have a fun time on it while being stuck at home waiting for the governments of the world to realize just how ineffective their stay at home orders are going to end up being the second people start running totally out of money and need to feed their families. But good luck to everybody out there and I mean that. And stay happy and stay idoling!
