Idol Metal

For pages and posts that relate to heavy metal music performed by idol groups.

The Evolution of XTEEN

/ Homicidol Maniac

The worst thing about not having time for your #1 pastime in life (idol) is always feeling out of the loop. So it was yesterday, when I caught a few spare minutes and was cruising through Twitter to find interesting material for the Weekender, and lo and behold caught this tweet from XTEEN. It doesn’t seem like much more than standard-issue boasting of the type that certain chika corners will get into, but XTEEN’s always been the best at that and hell, there must be more to this clip and link and stuff. What could it be? What have I been missing? Well, friend, let’s look at it, and oh holy heck look, I made a post this week!

ALL CLOWNS indeed

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Let’s Talk about a Fun Debut: Zsasz Is Here and Also a Palindrome

/ Homicidol Maniac / 1 Comment

I think our brains could use the little bit of relief, don’t you? Like, you watch all of these graduations and suspensions of activities and whatnot and think, man, idol must be in a terrible tailspin, if only there were something that could add some new life before chika becomes a literal graveyard.

Then let me present Zsasz (Twitter)!

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The NECRONOMIDOL European Tour Experience: A Play in Three Acts

/ Homicidol Maniac

I’m deeply sorry, this thing wrote itself

What next twist for our heroes?!

So Good to See FRUITPOCHETTE Back to Mostly Full Strength

/ Homicidol Maniac

I haven’t smashed a Play button so hard and so fast in a long time as I did yesterday when YouTube actually sent me a timely notification for once, and it was for FRUITPOCHETTE’s new single on what felt like a slightly delayed delivery but who cares it’s motherhubbard FRUITPOCHETTE. Damn that was exciting. This is the one that they crowdfunded for, which is to say in part that it’s the first whole-on real-deal single since the OG group re-formed last year. It’s not exactly completely new to us — we even got to tease it a little while ago — but now that it’s here in the flesh and MVed, it feels real and alive and this opening shot of Mina just about made my heart stop:

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This Is What AIBECK Sounds Like Now

/ Homicidol Maniac

It was with a heavy heart that I had to acknowledge, from a time of my not-quite demise, that AIBECK — somewhat-longstanding not-quite-doyens of the chika scene, gamely ambitious and well-supported — had a mass graduation and was now moving forward as a duo. It gave me a sad, especially at the thought that I wouldn’t be seeing my girl An’z around anymore, probably, and she was the first idol to ever tweet an English phrase back at me, which practically means that we were bound at the soul.

Nevertheless, idol never truly rests, and it was good and necessary that the resultant “new” duo version of the group would make good on a release in October. Maybe this is where we land today!

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My Appetite for “Metal Galaxy” Is Not Sated, Babymetal

/ Homicidol Maniac

You may have noticed yesterday that Babymetal — the literal reason for the season, the thing that brought me here, still capable of being the most powerful entity in the universe — dropped another video in the run-up to the impending release of the extremely-anticipated Metal Galaxy album next month. I thought about just tossing a post into the ether in response, but no, friends, the Official Policy of Homicidols Dot Com is that Babymetal is supreme for a reason, and when a thing is supreme and also one of the only reliable cornerstones of the Legends category that sorts our content, that thing deserves more than a hastily scribbled ZOMG reaction. Let’s do whole paragraphs instead!

So the song is “Shanti Shanti Shanti”, which by the title alone would give away a certain touchpoint with the subcontinent; if you’re still unfamiliar, though, and you’re either personally South Asian or as personally adjacent as yours truly, you may find yourself surprised at how few non-Babymetal tropes are actually employed.

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A New Kamen Joshi Thing Emerges

/ Homicidol Maniac

Actually, I’m not sure what’s even what anymore in the world of Alice Project. Other than throwaway references to graduations and goddamn tragedies here and there, I haven’t had a post dedicated to any part of the PARMS family in almost two years. It’s not even for reasons that you might suspect, either — the whole collective just seemed to stop doing new material, and though there was no shortage of stuff in their orbit, there was a shortage of what I really have this website for. So, ergo, no Alice Project.

And then this thing dropped out of the blue yesterday!

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We Interview Idols: Broken By the Scream

/ DAEMON

Broken By the Scream is one of the most unique, talented and loud acts in alternative idol and, over this past Labor Day weekend, Saboten Con played host to their U.S. debut in Phoenix, Arizona. 

Although harsh vocals in chika idol have been normalized over the past few years, most groups still only use death voice elements to provide an occasional emotional emphasis or shock.  Broken By the Scream, however, has flipped this norm, embracing harsh vocals for the lead part in the majority of their songs. Having a dedicated screamer (Io) and growler (Kagura) also lends a signature contrast to the vocal delivery, oftentimes in a call-and-response style reminiscent of a collaborative rap.  In this harsh environment, it is the entry of the clean vocals of Yae and Ayame that oftentimes serve as a purifying and cathartic shock.

Towards the end of Saboten Con weekend, Team Homicidols was fortunate enough to be given the opportunity to sit down and speak with the four talented idols whose singular voices combine to make Broken By the Scream the vocal powerhouse that it is. 

Broken By The Scream Homicidols Interview

Yae: This is a genre that you’ve probably never heard anywhere else in the world.

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Broken By the Scream Breaks the States

/ DAEMON

Broken By the Scream made their debut performance on U.S. shores this past Friday night at Saboten Con in Phoenix and it was spectacular. Ayame, Yae, Io and Kagura brought a ton of energy to the Arizona desert and left it all onstage. The vocals were appropriately brutal and angelic in turn, the choreography crisp and emotional. Fans had flown in from across the U.S. and up from Mexico to give BBTS a proper welcome to the West. Altogether, it was a fabulously brutal evening.

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Broken By the Scream Drop New MV and Album Release Date in Lead Up to U.S. Debut

/ DAEMON

Broken By the Scream will set foot on American soil for the first time in just under three weeks unleashing their kawaii-meets-deathcore stylings on a live crowd at Saboten Con in Phoenix, Arizona.  Because the one thing hype needs is more hype, BBTS also dropped a couple of  bombshells over the weekend:

  • The release date for their second full album, Noisy Night Fever;
  • And the MV for “Aihakimino”, the theme song for the upcoming PS4 game “Onechanbara Origin”.

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