Where have I been? New IU merch, New Group, shipping updates, and more..
Added 2020-04-19 17:40:45 +0000 UTCHello everybody? How is the social distancing going? I hope well! I really hope everybody is keeping their sanity and not getting cabin fever, or beating each other up because they are not used to this much close contact! I kind of keep thinking about how we all now talk to each other using text and many people simply don't even talk to each other on the phone anymore... but now, because of being at home all the time together, we are forced to talk to each other. I'm talking about our family members, of course. My question is... is this a good or a bad thing? You let me know, since the only family I have here in Japan I rarely get to see, thanks to the massively unfair and antiquated Japanese laws that I have to abide by everyday. But meh... that's a story for another day.
I got a FUCKING TON of news, since I've been offline the past five days. Let's just say... things are crazy right now, but maybe I can get things back to an acceptable level of crazy? Because, as my sister told me recently when we spoke to each other... I have lived the craziest life. But for all of you, Idol Underworld is continuing to be crazier than EVER, but in a totally good way. Because I got you all covered.. and here's why:
SHIPPING UPDATE:
First, for all of you patiently waiting on your many orders... this month has been difficult because of Japan Post discontinuing shipping services for the time being to over 160 plus countries in the world. At first, Japan Post had only discontinued shipping for 153 countries, and out of those 153 countries, I had maybe three countries who I shipped to regularly that were affected.
Now, I am not happy about even a SINGLE country that I can't deliver my products to, but it couldn't be helped. The people in those countries are Idol Underworld regulars (most of them), and they all understand this terrible situation we are in as a human species.
So it was not THAT terrible of a deal. However, I had heard from friends in the Japan Post industry that more countries would have service discontinuation coming, and sure enough, last week, the recent countries that were announced hit me hard. Seven or eight countries that I ship to all the time can't get service now, at least until Japan Post resumes their shipping to these countries. My feeling is that this will happen in May, but... really, it's ANYONE's GUESS. I suppose it all depends on when Covid Fatigue really starts settling in, businesses really start tanking and going under, that the world is going to be like, FUCK THIS SHIT, and people will start resuming their daily lives again, and getting back to business as usual.
Here in Japan, that looks to be coming in May, since I'm seeing idol lives NOT cancelled for May, and even as early as the end of this month, so... if that holds to be true, and the rest of the world follows in Japan's hasty footsteps, then I can see Japan Post resuming their shipping to all the current countries on the Do Not Ship list.
SO.... that being said, I had waited a long time to ship many orders, for fear of having all the packages come back to me that I've shipped. My instincts turned out to be true with some of these countries, but now... I think the list that Japan Post has on shipping bans is final, at this point at least, so... I have started to really increase my shipping to all the places in the world that are currently okay to ship too, in hopes that they won't suddenly pop up as a country that JP won't ship to during the Corona crisis.
So as of Monday, April 20th, ALL orders that can be shipped have been put into the mail. BUT there are some exceptions, and please read carefully the next part, since it's the most important thing I'll have to say regarding shipping at this time:
-Regarding many of the Hanako San, photobooks, I had to wait until the 12th when the signing period was over to even begin to look at shipping those books out. Hanako signed about 41 copies of the book the first week of April, but that still leaves some of you to need your book signed. So I'll meet with Hanako soon and have her sign the rest of the books. There are also a few cheki sets that she still needs to deliver, like four or them, so those will be coming soon as well.
-Hanako's PINS are not here yet. I am working with an overseas manufacturer who I was told deliver excellent quality pins. I do not have a ship date on those yet, but it should be soon, as that was a week and a half ago that the order was placed. SO, IF YOU HAVE AN ORDER WITH HANAKO'S PINS IN THEM, you will have THAT order processed when the pins arrive. This includes all of you who ordered the deluxe photo set... I can't process anything until those pins arrive.
-For Merry Bad End's personal signed chekis and their Now and Forever Pre-Order CD, ANY Order that has either of these items in it will be processed AFTER I both receive the signed chekis from Merry Bad End and/or when Now and Forever will be available. The same goes for ANY order that has the personal signed chekis in them, for any group doing it now (Bury, Last Question, Odoro, etc.). So please do not expect your order until those chekis are done. For some of you, this means waiting until May to receive those orders. Please be aware of that.
-Some orders had been shipped out to countries that were on the banned list, prior to me even hearing about a ban that would be put in place with Japan Post... I was told that any orders sent out before the ban would be okay, but that was not true at all. My mailbox the other day had about four to five packages that came back to me. Luckily, the Japan Post office can give me refunds on the shipping, BUT that means you will be receiving those packages after the bans are lifted and I receive that refund money for the shipping costs. I will personally contact all of you who had packages come back to my office.
However, this could mean MORE packages are coming back to me... so I apologize if that is the case and you've been patiently waiting for the orders to arrive. This fucking bullshit upsets me too, believe me.
-Last... some orders are being massively delayed, or so I've been told, even to countries without a ban in place. Again, it's out of my hands, but I'm letting you know that ALL orders that COULD go out have GONE OUT... so please no need to message and ask about your order. I mean, feel free to do so, if you are worried, but really, not necessary. If your country is NOT on the list, then you are okay, or theoretically so, unless Japan Post decides to add even MORE countries to the list, AND/OR your country is having a hard time delivering mail on time to you because of Covid bullshit.
Amazingly, you guys are still ordering from IU, and I can't thank you enough for trusting me and for helping all the idols. You guys are amazing and wonderful. Truly.
-Last... all Patreon Cheki sets have gone out (again, to those who can actually receive the sets). I got small ass mailing envelopes that I'm trying out for those... hope you like them!
Now, moving on to the more fun stuff...
NEW GROUP- WELCOME "FRUN FRIN"!
LINK: https://www.idolunderworld.com/frun-frin/
So, Beni (ex-avandoned/apokalippps/Childish Tones) and Nonamera from Kaqriyo Terror Architect (now going by the name of Aku) have teamed up to form a new idol duo group! There are two things about this joining of great minds and idol souls that make me BEYOND excited for what's to come from this pair! First, Beni and Aku were in Avandoned, years ago, along with Miku from Nanomoral. I only WISH I had been cool enough to know about Avandoned back then, when these three powerhouses were together, but sadly, I am not that cool. Now, to see two of the three of them back together again after several years of being apart... it's amazing. I kind of had a feeling this was going to happen, given that Aku visited Beni on the final night of Avandoned's existence. So yeah... because me and Beni have been working together since last year and she is also part of my documentary, she said I can work with her and Aku and bring their goods to the rest of the world.
The second reason I'm so excited for this is because Aku is somebody who I deeply adore and had kind of a fan crush on back in the day. When she was in KTA, I went often to watch her perform. Again, please let me emphasise that this was back when I was a fan and not staff. However, even after I became staff, at least in the early days of my being a staff person, before I fully understood the difference between what being a "staff" person and being a "fan" is, I STILL went to see KTA's lives. The weird part is that I NEVER met her, or talked to her, or even did a single cheki with her, but she often found me at the front of the stage and just... fucked with me all the time. She would slap me in the face, whisper crazy shit in my ears, jump on me and let me hold her hand while she stood on my shoulders... just she went WILD onstage. And now, me and her have finally spoken and she said she would like to work with me as well.
I am SERIOUSLY in 9th heaven right now... because I will be able to serve her and help her in her renewed idol career (because if any of you didn't know... Aku disappeared last year due to some horrible shit that happened to her while she was in KTA. Happy to see her back. Truly, truly happy). I am not going to lie... I get goosebumps just thinking about the idea of taking her cheki and talking with her. It's the best possible situation... and so you all can bet I'm going to be pretty fucking EPIC with those cheki and everything else I'll be bringing to all of you from both her and Beni.
The thing is, right now, of course... I can't do anything because Beni told me that they can't really meet at this point with me, due to everything going on in the world. So when we get a chance after the world returns to normal, I'll have everything they are going to offer for everybody out there. There is a small chance that I can get Beni to ship me the items, so I may have them much sooner than May or whenever we can meet. So do me a favor... Please go tell them on Twitter how excited you are to purchase their items at Idol Underworld!
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RESTOCKS-
I restocked Saka-Sama's DREAM CD, and Kiss Hug's BLOOM CD and DVD. Also, restocked Mari's (from Odoro) cheki and some Merry Bad Items too.
NOTICE-
For the Emomomo deluxe photo packs and regular packs... The first twelve orders will have photos that are slightly smaller than 4x6. I mean, it's really like a matter of a few centimeters. If that's an issue, let me know and I'll refund anyone who ordered the packs. I couldn't get the correct printing done in time to get these orders out. All future orders will have the appropriate 4x6 size photos. Sorry about that!
NEW ITEMS-
Odoro has given me some T-shirts! I'm so happy about this! Please check them out.
LINK: https://www.idolunderworld.com/product/odoro-official-t-shirt/
I also got 2 new XOXO Extreme's LIVE DVDS. Check them both out here:
LINK: https://www.idolunderworld.com/product/xoxo-kiss-hug-extreme-1st-one-man-live-dvd/
Also, got some new RINO OISHI CDS:
LINK: https://www.idolunderworld.com/product/rino-oishi-tasotokyo-demo-cd-15-9/
LINK: https://www.idolunderworld.com/product/rino-oishi-oishi-gannen-cd/
HOMEWORK CHEKI/PERSONALLY SIGNED CHEKI:
So, because of, again... the situation in the world, many idols are doing personally signed chekis that you can pre-order and later, when they can take the chekis, they will sign them to you personally and then give them to me to send out to everybody. At normal idol lives, these are called Homework Cheki (or "shukudai"). Now, not sure when this will be, but looking to be in May that this will happen. More and more groups are doing this, including here at Idol Underworld!
I have Last Question, who decided to join this list. They are offering each member of the group and a group signed cheki option. Please consider supporting these veteran idols!
https://www.idolunderworld.com/product/last-question-signed-group-cheki/
https://www.idolunderworld.com/product/last-question-tsugumi-mugi-signed-cheki/
https://www.idolunderworld.com/product/last-question-misaka-shinogu-signed-cheki/
https://www.idolunderworld.com/product/last-question-misuzu-momoi-signed-cheki/
Also, ODORO has decided to have everyone of their members do this as well. Please check out their page here:
https://www.idolunderworld.com/product/odoro-makoto-signed-cheki/
https://www.idolunderworld.com/product/odoro-misa-signed-cheki/
https://www.idolunderworld.com/product/odoro-meri-signed-cheki/
https://www.idolunderworld.com/product/odoro-shirome-signed-cheki/
Also, RINO OISHI has decided to do signed cheki too! Please check that out here:
https://www.idolunderworld.com/product/rino-oishi-signed-cheki/
And of course, Bury has been doing it with me for awhile. Please consider supporting them too:
https://www.idolunderworld.com/product/bury-sayaka-signed-cheki/
https://www.idolunderworld.com/product/bury-kotomi-signed-cheki/
https://www.idolunderworld.com/product/bury-shihori-signed-cheki/
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Merry Bad End online Sign Cheki Session:
I can't thank all of you enough for going SO far out to support them with this... it's INSANE how many cheki there are now that have been sold for them! Thank you so much! I really appreciate the love and support you have shown for them all. It's truly incredible.
Now, you can STILL order cheki for the signing session. You can also order right at the same time while the session is going on. I'll be checking Idol Underworld during the cheki session, so you can feel free to "Loop" the cheki lines. They are getting rather crazy, so please do consider this! If you guys choose to keep buying, this could turn out to be the BIGGEST cheki session the group has EVER done... and how CRAZY would it be that it's the FOREIGN fan community who makes that happen!!!?? That's a great dream for me for this tiny yet powerful idol group who has a great year ahead of them. Seriously. Let's do this!
LINK TO JOIN THE DISCORD SERVER: https://discord.gg/6mcDGYG
TWITCAST LINK (if you just wanna watch the signing live): https://twitcasting.tv/mxe_official
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Mystery Grab Bags:
I was suprised, but... you guys did good with this... but I think we can do even better. I'm now offering the grab bag at the 5,000 yen level, instead of only the 10,000 yen level. I am really happy about even the few that were sold, since that is really going out on a limb to buy a bunch of idol items that you have no idea about! Seriously... thank you so much!
Lets do it up even more... check out the 5,000 yen level. Same deal as before... you'll get a bunch of amazing idol goods! And you might be able to find a new group to support and cheer for in the process! I feel like this is sort of how I used to feel when I attended idol taibans and only knew like one or two groups at the taiban. I sometimes would come away with lifelong loves for groups that never knew existed before going to the taiban. So in a way, this is how this idol grab bag is going to be, or so I hope. That's my intention anyway for this bag. If it does good, I'll keep this around indefinitely. My goal is to sell about 5 to 10 of the 5,000 bags in the next month, and if that happens, then it will be cool to keep indefinitely. So how about it?
LINK: https://www.idolunderworld.com/product/mystery-idol-grab-bag-you-do-not-know-what-you-will-get/
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Documentary update:
So me and Masa have been very hard at it... and it's going well. Just time consuming, but that was to be expected. The Burst Girl segment is pretty much finished, but it's so long of a cut that it could be its own documentary. So that got me thinking about turning this into a docu-series, rather than just one long, three hour movie. The plan is still to make a movie though, but... we'll see the continuing edits of sections goes. I am all for details (if you can't tell by my ginormous, lengthy posts), and I want to cram as much as I can into this documentary, given that nobody has ever done this like I'm doing it. I am trying to answer the question as to why the idols do what they do? But in answering that question, you have to explore all facets of this industry to get the proper perspective of what these girls are doing for a living and why some may view it as weird or bad and others view it as totally essential and important. I think it all comes down to the fact that idols sell dreams to people, and the people buying the dreams, along with the idols, play along to make the dreams feel as real as possible to each other. And yes.. it's SYMBIOTIC, in that the idols get something of a dream world out of this too. Standing on the stage and having fans literally worship you... don't underestimate the high and the rush that can bring an idol onstage. I know... I've stood up on those stages with many idols and filmed them for my documentary and for their own personal shows that they wanted me to film... and it's exhilarating, to say the least, when the fans are going at full speed wota for a performance. It really does remind me of when I was the person on the stage performing... I guess that's why I like being up there with the idols... I want to feel what they feel. It's almost... nostalgic to me, in some way.
Anyway, the documentary is ploughing along. Right now, working on the history of idols and then Beni's segment, along with Mizuho's segment. After that, Lilii Kaona, Nanomoral, and Chihiro, and then the documentary will be on it's middle section (where I'll introduce Moe and Hanako San), and then the final segment, where everything concludes.
So far, so good. I've had to really write more than I thought I would for this documentary, but that comes naturally to me, so I've been sort of enjoying coming up with narrative captions and segues... the question I have in my head, though Masa kind of opposes this, is... do I get an idol to speak those segue parts, rather than putting those written parts on the screen to read? I kind of like the idea of adding an idol voice in the documentary but... who would I pick? That's the question.
Ha ha... I thought of Aku, but her helium voice might be more distracting than engaging. Every time that girl speaks, my heart flutters though... her voice is sooooo unusual sounding and interesting. I love interesting people like her!
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What's next...
Well, first, life needs to get back to normal. The idol scene is all but dead here now... no shows, nobody really feeling up to doing anything except broadcasting from home. Actually, to be more accurate, it's more like nobody CAN do anything, since Japan's government basically came out and said Izakayas and live houses need to be closed down until further notice (the izakayas mostly at night). So... once things pick back up, I plan on restocking a lot of idol merchandise that is running super low, including some sold out cheki stocks (thank you everybody who keeps selling out those stocks). I also plan on trying to get more groups of course, though I have two for sure coming as soon as possible, and maybe two more if I can pull it off (we'll see... I want to get a few more groups and then kind of focus on my documentary and promoting that and selling it. Oh, and the photobooks that I have planned too).
I would also like to hire an actual part-time employee to fill orders and run some online stuff for me, as well as improve the quality of everything I'm doing. That's difficult though... I don't trust people so much, so it's hard to bring anyone else into this mix. We'll see who I can find though. I did convince a friend to come out and help me this weekend pack the several hundred orders I had that needed packed. But that was also more because I needed this friend's help with something else that is going on in my life, and this friend was one of the only people I trust to help me with what's going on. So... two birds with one stone, I suppose.
Anyway, anyway, anyway.... I hope all of you are happy, safe, and still loving and supporting your idols that you appreciate and adore. I think, if the net signing session goes well and I do it again and it keeps performing really good, then I might do this every month for foreign fans. I mean... why not? It's just like a cheki session, but virtual, and I keep having this vision in my mind of seeing somebody do one of these net signing sessions, connecting really well with an idol, and then booking a flight to Japan to meet the idol for real. And then developing a lifelong obsession with idols that ultimately results in lots of idols happy and the fan being happy too. And me as well, since I brought them together! That's my joy and my gift in life... to bring everybody together as much as possible.
So, new groups, restocking a lot of stuff that needs restocked, focusing on the groups I have and getting new merchandise from them, my documentary completed and sold and the kickstarter put up for that, and my photobooks I want to make all finished.
After that, the two long term goals I have would be to do an American and European tour of some kind, or maybe a festival in one or both places, for some idols that I want to take overseas. And then after this, I will start my own idol group and write the music for them and possibly play with them too.
First, I need to become much more fluent in Japanese, and then I'll consider that, so I guess somewhere along the way in all of this, I need a serious smackdown of Japanese learning.
And while all of this is going on as well, I want to finish up my novels, and then the last last thing I want to do is create an old school RPG game for some gaming system, something that will take a year or two to complete, will have thousands of playable characters and creatures and items, and has a story that will be deep and has a twist to it, something I haven't quite seen done yet by games currently out there (I already wrote the story for it too). And then after all this, I'll keep doing idol stuff until I retire and then when I retire, I'll play videogames the rest of my life until I die.
That's the perfect story here. Maybe add in there a cute Japanese girlfriend who will be super kind to me and willing to have fun with me and also put up with my horrible bullshit. But I'm not going to hold my breath on finding somebody like that. But you never know!
Anyway, I miss you guys. I really do. I'll try to keep all of this regular for you. Enjoy, and talk to you soon!
