Afilia Saga East is interesting. I'd checked out their debut album,
whitism, shortly after it released and I have to say that if there is such a genre as "hardcore idol" they'd certainly be it. Not because they do hyper, "positive genki!" music or anything, but more like because of their characters, costumes, and concept. If being an idol means embodying the fantasies and ideals of your audience, ASE certainly does that in a hyper-real kind of way.
Some more idols news...
Ebisu Muscats have opened an
official site and will be releasing their fifth single
Ropponpon Fantasy on 2011.10.12
As usual, the single comes in three editions but this time two of them are CD+DVD:
UPCH-80254 [CD+DVD] [Regular Edition] w/ PV
UPCH-89107 [CD+DVD] [Limited Pressing] w/ live footage
UPCH-89108 [CD Only] [Special Price Edition]
Each edition has a different last track which is a live version of one of the subunit songs that first appeared on their first album back in May.
I'm rather disappointed with the tracklists, to be honest. I'd hoped that with the creation of the subunits (Hercules, Purukawa, and Ebisu Rotary Shimai) there would be new, unique songs on each edition of their singles from now on, but since it looks like they're still scrimping on material, like they've done with their previous singles, I don't think I'm going to bother buying them anymore.
...besides, any new subunit songs will probably end up on the next album anyway. 