I’m legitimately kind of excited.
Gang, much thanks to everybody who participated in the first round of the Adopt-An-Idol pilot a while back and then chimed in when I put out the call last week. I’ve taken down the poll so as not to ruin the surprise.
When we talk about Adopt-An-Idol, the point isn’t to build something unique for one group at the expense of others, nor is it even to make a huge difference for the adoptees; frankly, our gaggle of regulars has grown remarkably, but we’re still not all that large and aren’t in a position to do much more than make some idols feel really awesome that people are paying attention to what they do and encouraging others to be their fans.
Homicidols.com was created not to be a starmaker, necessarily, but to help more people in the English-speaking world connect with the really unique world of idols doing music in a way that’s fun, exciting and often some of the most unique stuff you’re going to find. It would be amazing if we ever got to be in a position where somebody on the cusp of international stardom were taken over the edge thanks to this site existing and our little community genuinely firing on all cylinders to get other people interested, but that’s definitely not happening today.
Instead, it’s little stories like folks discovering Zenbu Kimi no Sei Da for the first time and buying the album, or Bokura no Oyugi scaring the shit out of us and getting people excited about what they might put out there next. It’s the rise of Yukueshirezutsurezure, the discovery of The Spunky, the conversion of many from Kamen Joshi doubters to Kamen Joshi supporters. Deathrabbits. Necronomidol. DisDol.
In that sense, a little bit of an impact has already been made. And so I’m happy to announce the future of Adopt-An-Idol.
I’ll let one of my favorite Metalocalypse moments do it for me:
That’s right! The results of the poll were actually fairly well split up among the announced candidates, and there were more votes for “Other” than any one group, but the #1 vote-getter was actually “This is stupid, Maniac.”
And I’m okay with that. This is meant to be a community site where, yeah, I’m the host, but a good host listens to the guests and makes sure that everybody has a good time. If the closest thing to a consensus is that we shouldn’t embark on this kind of activity, that’s fine.
And rather than try to gin up support where there isn’t any, I’m going to make an appeal: When you see something that you like, share it. Put the link on Facebook. Retweet. Literally take a pen and paper and write your Aunt Linda a letter explaining why this idol group doing metalcore is something that you’re excited about and she should tell everybody down at the Jaycees.
I hope that you all have discovered something that you didn’t know before because of this site. Goodness knows that I have, and I’m grateful just to have had the opportunity. Those little success stories so far, of albums purchased and new things shared with friends, those make it feel worthwhile.
So we won’t be formally doing Adopt-An-Idol, but we can still continue to make a positive difference for idols. Maybe instead of elevating an unknown, we’ll be part of the mechanism that helps BiSH or PassCode or Kamen Joshi or somebody we don’t even know yet become known well enough in our countries that an international tour isn’t just an April Fool’s joke. Babymetal may be a once-in-a-lifetime development, but other idols can and should ride that wave west, and we can give them a nice push.
And going forward, trust me, we have plenty of activities even better than the Corenament in the making. I’m also working on some site enhancements that I’ll hopefully be able to roll out at appropriate times to improve everybody’s experience. And I’ll continue to solicit your feedback; not as a gimmicky thing or a fun thing, but because I want to hear what you have to say about the future of this community.
