#shukamod speaks

[saitou-shuka]

To anyone in Japan for Shuka’s First Live/Kutsuhimo no Musubikata

A bit late to be saying this, but please stay safe! You need to stay alive to see her ⌒°( •̀ ∀ •́ )°⌒

Don’t discard your ticket! Shuka says it will still be valid for the postponed show (at least as of today, further details will be released later)

#saitou shuka #shukashuu #FYI am not in japan but I hope those of you going are safe #for anyone out of the loop her live was canceled because of the typhoon #also tumblr is junk and won't let me upload any pictures #shukamod speaks

[saitou-shuka]

Happy birthday again, Shuka! This time from my timezone (•̀ ∀ •́)ﻭ✧

Today’s birthday setup is a bit more modest than last year’s, but I like the simplicity. Shuka’s favorite food is delicious and I hope she gets many chances to enjoy it today ( ‾▿‾ )ゞ

#I don't know about you #but I'm feeling 22 #/slapped how many times have I made that joke now akdjkdjsk #saitou shuka #shukashuu #shukamod speaks #'modest' I say #not pictured: the absurd amount of bromides that I decided not to include in the shot at the last minute #I may #have a problem

[saitou-shuka]

a dog has revived me from the dead

#check shuka's twitter #hopefully catching up on tweets tonight #when i get home from work #crosses fingers #shukamod speaks

[saitou-shuka]

Voice Brody scan? No??

Okay, okay, okay. Slow down.

Nyamazing, the Chinese group that provides a lot of scans for Aqours magazine features, has scanned VOICE BRODY vol. 2, but they have specifically requested that people not repost their scans.

If you’d like, you can enjoy their scans on their site here.Please respect their wishes and do not repost them.

(Update: Link removed because people are reposting anyway ._.)

Also consider buying a copy of VOICE BRODY vol. 2 here.

They don’t scan Aqours-featured magazines as thoroughly as they once did, probably because (surprise, surprise) other people keep reposting their scans without their permission.

I hesitated to even put this here, honestly. Maybe it isn’t what you intended, but the tone of voice you’re using makes it sound like you’re demanding scans from me. And frankly, I don’t have much motivation to share scans with people who feel entitled to what is essentially leaks of paid content. It is not my job to post scans just for you.

#please....... #I was so tempted to be an asshole and just reply with No!! and nothing else #a wonderfully legal alternative is to buy the magazine and have your own physical copy #amazon japan ships worldwide for basically all magazines aqours has been featured in #but how many people are going to pay money to import a magazine they can't read when they can just bother an internet person for free scans #bitter laugh #ask #anonymous #shukamod speaks

[saitou-shuka]

Happy Holidays and Merry Christmas from @saitou-shuka​! (˘ω˘ ≡ ˘ω˘) 🎄🎁

Hope everyone stays warm and can spend time with their loved ones o7

#right before the date change in japan lmao #happy holidays!! #get lots of rest everyone #love you all #shukamod speaks

[saitou-shuka]

Shukashuu’s own mother sent a flower stand to Aqours 2nd Live to support her daughter!

Did you know? Shuka’s mom and some friends pitched in to send a flower stand in the shape of You-chan’s Koi ni Naritai Aquarium costume to the Saitama arena. Fitting, seeing as Saitama is Shuka’s hometown (இ⌓இ )

The contributors’ names are displayed out front, along with the message:

朱夏の笑顔で世界中の人が幸せになりますように May Shuka’s smile make people all over the world happy

Congratulations, Shukashuu!! We love you (and You) (இ⌓இ )

#love live sunshine #saitou shuka #shukashuu #asklfhdskjfhdskjfhdskjfhdskjfhdsjkfhdskjfhsd #I can't even coherently write tags #I'm just #emotionally compromised #the Goodness runs in the family #shuka's mom MVP #detective shukamod #shukamod speaks

[saitou-shuka]

Hello shukamod! I just want to ask where do you order all your merchandise I'm totally lost on where I could order nesoberi :( I really would appreciate your help thanks

I gotchu anon 👌👌

Earlier this year I wrote a post about nesoberi, as well as one about ways to order merchandise from overseas.

BUT… I think the general guide to buying Love Live! merchandise here is gonna be more helpful than either of those posts. It covers nesoberi pretty extensively, since they’re super popular as far as merchandise goes.

My short answer will be: Most of my nesos I bought off friends who went to Japan. If you have friends visiting Japan, it’s cheapest to have them catch one from a machine or buy one secondhand for you and then give it to you. Otherwise, you’ll have to find a way to buy them online (see merch guide). Cons will sometimes stock nesoberis as well, if you’re patient. In that case, popular characters like You and Yohane tend to be either rare or marked up a ton.

Let me know if you have any questions! ( ‾▿‾ )ゞBut read the merch guide first

#though I also have a neso from a con (AB) and my santa neso is from amiami #oops that short answer is not short at all #but srsly that merch guide is pretty dam gud #picup put so much work into it #it covers like everything #ask #anonymous #shukamod speaks #info

[saitou-shuka]

あああああああああああああああああああああああ！ しゅかしゅー ヤングジヤンプ 3 & 4

(TL:  AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA! SHUKASHUU YOUNG JUMP 3&4)

me rn tbh

#；」￥４３；；；；；；； #still feeling those aftershocks #and the regretti from not staying up until 7am like a normal person #I feel u anon #ask #anonymous #shukamod speaks

[saitou-shuka]

I know those last pics are from Brody, but you could say she made a Young Jump heh. Merikuri Shukamod o7

Eyyy nice one ✧٩(•̀ ⌄•́๑) メリクリ to you as well~ (⁄ ⁄•⁄ω⁄•⁄ ⁄)

#young jump is definitely one way to describe her #ask #anonymous #shukamod speaks

[saitou-shuka]

Holiday Giveaway CLOSED!

Thank you for an impressive 1,894 entries! I will pick and contact the winner shortly o7

#thanks for participating everyone! #outside rn but will pick the winner once im back #will post the winner once they accept #shukamod speaks

[saitou-shuka]

Shukamod! If I may ask, what shipping service (UPS, AirMail?) will you be using to ship You-chan? I want to enter, but I don't trust PH customs enough to risk it...

Hmm.. I normally just use whatever my post office recommends me, which is either some USPS or FedEx International service. 

#never tried shipping to PH before #ask #anonymous #shukamod speaks

[saitou-shuka]

All set for NYC's Delayed Viewing of Aqours 2nd Live @ Saitama!

All there's left to do is to go full speed ahead and enjoy the weekend! o7

Come hang out with us in line before the 11am showings on Saturday and Sunday! We will be signing the r/LoveLive banner, passing out callbooks, crying as we miss the Episode 2 broadcast unless a kindred spirit wants to stream it on LINE LIVE using data, and jamming out to Aqours! I might pass out some name cards as well :>

The weather is projected to be mid-70s! Much better than the 1st Live viewing's weather 🙃

#shukamod speaks

[saitou-shuka]

The silhouette looks like Roger Rabbit to me, for some reason

(original post)

Oooh. Looks about right, good eye.

#cool cool anon #the hair tuft and the four-fingered hands match up #his eyes scare me though #ask #anonymous #shukamod speaks #not shukashuu

[saitou-shuka]

Aqours 2nd Love Live! HAPPY PARTY TRAIN TOUR in Nagoya, Day 1 Setlist

HAPPY PARTY TRAIN [HAPPY PARTY TRAIN costumes]

Pops Heart de Odorun damon! MC 1 (Intros, Call & Response)

Shoujo Ijou no Koi ga Shitai

Sora mo Kokoro mo Hareru kara [Sailor-style dresses]

Waku-Waku-Week! [Some other kind of pretty dress]

G Senjou no Cinderella [FANCY DRESSES] MC 2 + Intermission PV

Koi ni Naritai AQUARIUM [Koi ni Naritai AQUARIUM costumes] MC 3

Daydream Warrior

Thrilling・One Way Intermission PV CYaRon!

Kinmirai Happy End [Kinmirai Happy End costumes] CYaRon! MC

Kaigandoori de Matteru yo AZALEA

GALAXY HidE and SeeK [GALAXY HidE and SeeK costumes] AZALEA MC

INNOCENT BIRD Guilty Kiss

Kowareyasuki [Kowareyasuki costumes] Guilty Kiss MC

Shadow gate to love VTR

Aozora Jumping Heart [Kimi no Kokoro wa Kagayaiteru kai? costumes]

SKY JOURNEY MC 4

Kimi no Kokoro wa Kagayaiteru kai? Intermission PV ENCORE

Sunshine Pikkapika Ondo (feat. Uchicchii!) [2L Happi and Nagoya T-shirts] TV Anime Season 2 CM MC 5 (Closing Comments)

Taiyou o Oikakero!

#love live sunshine #aqours #WTF THE SETLIST IS SO HYPE #ONLY 3 RECYCLED SONGS WHTFAGLKFASHjfas #NVM 4 I FORGOT POPS HEART #ITS SO OP WTF #fI'MLL CRY IF NO LV #AHVXKLHtqkledhdsgl;adjasf' #shukamod speaks #THANK YOU HELLFIRE

[saitou-shuka]

hello shukamod this is embarrassing but what is a UO that you and other people that watch the live is talking about?

Nononono it’s totally fine! I’ve found that it’s actually really hard to learn about this stuff unless you’ve actually been to a live concert or viewing. Which… as some of you may know from experience, is excruciatingly difficult if you’re an overseas fan (꒪⌓꒪)

The short answer: UO stands for “Ultra Orange”, and is a chemical glowstick that glows bright orange, often only for a couple of minutes before it burns out. Because of how short-lived they are, people usually save them for their favorite songs at concerts.

The long answer: I’m gonna talk about glowsticks under the cut! Yayyy :DSkip to the Cyalume section for the full explanation on UOs :)

Disclaimer: I’m pretty new to all of this too, so any of you more experienced eventers please don’t hesitate to correct me if I say something inaccurate. Thanks!

Glowsticks are a staple of anisong and idol concerts, where audience participation is super important. The audience section is dark during concerts, and waving around glowsticks helps the performers know that you’re enjoying the show!

There are two types of glowsticks: battery-powered penlights and cyalumes.

Penlights

Pictured: @dyreatic​​‘s impressive penlight collection :^)

These are battery-powered LED glowsticks. Many of them can change color with the click of a button. It’s pretty much a plastic tube mounted onto a handle with buttons. You can almost always unscrew the tube off, and then the handle is basically a multi-colored flashlight. Most of them also come with wrist straps, so that the penlight doesn’t come flying out of your sweaty hands at a concert. The brightness and colors will die as the batteries drain, so I always recommend packing some fresh batteries for concerts.

If you’ve ever watched a live (whether in-person or not), you’ve probably seen plenty of these. I’ll cover some of the more known brands from the perspective of a Love Liver.

King Blade

Overview:Price: $30-35 USD, 4500yen (official Love Live! Blades, firsthand)Batteries: AAA x3Buttons: 2, on the bottom of the handle (Forward/Backward)Strengths: Custom colors

One of the most popular brands of penlight. The newest version (x10iii) comes with an app that allows you to tune the penlight to have whatever color palette you want (e.g. you can make specialized blades with the colors for μ’s, Aqours, or whatever you favorite group is!)

Most of the official Love Live! penlights are King Blades. They’re often colloquially referred to as “kbs” or “blades”. The King Blade is so common (at least in the Love Live! community) that sometimes you’ll hear people use the word “kb” as an umbrella term for all penlights.

Pictured: The official Aqours Blades for 1st and 2nd Live.

King Blades are in stock on Amazon with free shipping!King Blade x10iii Shining - $31 USDKing Blade x10iii Smoke - $31 USD

The Smoke version has a matte cover over the penlight tube, while the Shining version has a glittery cover. In my experience I’ve found that most people prefer the Shining version.

Lumiace

Overview:Price: $25 USDBatteries: AAA x3Buttons: 3, on the side of the handle (Left/Confirm/Right)Strengths: Cheaper than KB, 24 colors

Another good penlight brand, and a somewhat cheaper alternative at $25 USD vs. the King Blade’s $30-35. The default color palette on the latest version, Lumiace 2 Omega (abbreviated L2O) is 24 colors rather than the King Blade’s 15 colors. However, the L2O cannot be programmed to have a custom palette like the King Blade x10iii.

The official Aqours in Los Angeles penlight from Anime Expo 2017 was a Lumiace 2, and comes with the nine official Aqours image colors rather than the Lumiace default palette. As far as I know, this is the only official Love Live! penlight that isn’t a King Blade.

Lumiaces are also in stock on Amazon with free shipping!Lumiace 2 Omega Sparkling - $25 USDLumiace 2 Omega Matte - $25 USD

The two different styles are the same as the King Blade ones — the former has a glittery tube, while the latter has a matte tube.

PENLa

Overview:Price: ￥2500-3000 without shippingBatteries: AAA x4Buttons: A switch on the side of the handle (very easy to flip by accident)Strengths: Very bright but don’t die like chemical lights

A slightly different type of penlight. PENLas don’t actually change color, but they have three different brightness settings. The first brightness setting is about as bright as your King Blade or Lumiace at full battery. The second and third are much, much brighter. The primary advantage of PENLas is that they are just as bright as chemical glowsticks (covered later), but they are reusable.

They are suuuuper bright. My eyes.

A fan compares a PENLa UO to a KB x10ii. Jeez they are bright.

PENLas come in three tube sizes (S, M, L), but I recommend the S because same brightness + smaller tube = brighter penlight :)

Unlike KBs and Lumiaces, they also come with a small bag. I’ve heard complaints that the wrist strap that comes with PENLas isn’t as secure.

You can buy PENLas from Amazon JP with DHL shipping!PENLa Orange (S) - 2970yenPENLa Blue (S) - 2563yenPENLa Green (S) - 2950yenPENLa Yellow (S) - 2970yen

Cyalumes

These are chemical glowsticks. You crack them to cause a chemical reaction that makes the glowstick… glow. And boy do they glow. They’re much brighter than penlights, but they only glow for a couple of minutes before dying. And they’re one-time use only, so they’re useless after that. By the way, cyalumes are also kind of fragile. Don’t drop them unless you want to crack them by accident and have them dead before you actually need them (꒪⌓꒪)

Cyalumes are almost always colloquially referred to as the abbreviated form of “Ultra [color]”, regardless of brand. Ultra Oranges are UOs, Ultra Blues are UBs, Ultra Greens are UGs, etc.

The UO in particular has chemicals that make it much brighter than any other color of cyalume, making it the most popular color by far (regardless of who your best girl might be!). They’re an irreplacable part of idol concerts. Because of how bright and short-lived they are, people will save UOs for special moments such as solos or the choruses of their favorite songs. They’re also smaller and thinner than penlights, so it’s easier to go crazy and hold like 8 of them at once.

Exhibit A: Honoka’s parents with a whopping 16 UOs total.

For even more hype, you can take two UOs and do a rapid cycling motion above your head. This is called “cycloning”. At concerts you will often see people cycloning during the chorus of fast-paced crowd favorites such as Strawberry Trapper or Thrilling・One Way. You can also cyclone using your kbs, but it’s more exciting if you use brighter glowsticks like UOs or PENLas. It’s also way easier to cyclone with UOs — if you try to cyclone with bulkier glowsticks like kbs without practice you’ll probably end up hitting them on each other.

Perhaps the most famous use for the UO is during Honoka’s solo in Snow Halation. At Final Live, everybody popped a UO. No kidding:

The whole dome was orange (இ⌓இ )

Other colors are less common because they’re not as bright. Even so, in recent years, more and more Love Livers are starting to use colors other than Orange. I’ve seen people cracking UBs for both Koi ni Naritai Aquarium and MIRAI TICKET, and I know at least a couple of others who are considering UGs for HAPPY PARTY TRAIN.

How long do cyalumes last? A good rule of thumb is that the brighter they are, the more short-lived they are. The Lumica Daisenkou Kiwami Orange is one of the brightest brand of UOs available, and one stick lasts 2-3 minutes. Nice duration if you want to crack for a solo or chorus and have the UO last through the rest of the song before dying.

You can also buy standard Lumica Daisenkou Orange, which are not as bright as the Kiwamis (side note: kiwami means “extreme” lol), but last for 5 minutes instead. On the other hand, UBs are not much brighter than a KB at full battery, but they last for a good 15 minutes. In my experience, Kiwami UOs are always better than the normal UOs. The extra brightness is 500% worth it (•̀ ∀ •́)ﻭ ✧

You can either buy a box of 25 (left) or single glowsticks packaged separately (right).

The best brand of cyalume for buying in bulk (and trust me, you don’t want to buy just a single chemical glowstick. Especially if you’re importing from Japan.) is the Lumica Daisenkou. You can buy cyalumes in boxes of 25 from Amazon JP with Global Priority (DHL) shipping. Be warned: the shipping is not cheap. They’re also available on Amiami sometimes, but as of right now they’re sold out there. My personal recommendation is to always buy multiple boxes if you can afford it and just save the ones you didn’t get to use. Go to concerts with friends and split cyalume orders with them! ٩( ᐛ )( ᐖ )۶

Overview:Price: ￥2400-2500 for a box of 25, without shippingBatteries: None! :DStrengths: very bright, very hype, less bulky than penlight

Lumica Daisenkou Kiwami Orange (2-3min duration) - 2400 yenLumica Daisenkou Orange (5min duration) - 2400 yenLumica Daisenkou Blue (15min duration) - 2500 yen“Daisenkou” on Amazon JP (for other colors)

If you live in the U.S., you can also order Lumica Daisenkous straight from Lumica USA via email: [email protected]

Why buy cyalumes at all when PENLas exist? They’re short-lived, and don’t seem very cost-effective.

The way I see it, the point of having chemical glowsticks is to show both the performers and the people around you how excited you are for your absolute favorite songs. As a novice concert-goer I’ve found that I really enjoy cracking UOs (and UBs) in the heat of the moment and seeing other people get fired up cracking UOs for the songs they like best. They may not be very cost-effective, but at the end of the day, they truly enhance your concert experience.

shukamod recommends at least one penlight and a handful of Kiwami UOs for the first-time concert-goer! For best results, at least two penlights and a box of 25 UOs! If you’re like shukamod, then be sure to bring a box of 25 UBs as well o7

As always, thanks for reading (` ･-･´)ゞ

#wow this post took me like 4 hours to write on and off wtf #but it'll be useful reference for my concert reports that I haven't written yet #(innocent whistle) #fun fact I've used more UBs than UOs in my short concert-going career #UBs are not very bright but nothing beats breaking 8 of them at once for koiaqua #thanks shuka #I didn't talk about them here but you can also buy Mega UOs #which are basically giant UOs #im talkin forearm-sized they're massive #megas are fun but you'll look super obnoxious if you use too many of them #especially in japan idk if anyone even uses them there #they're pretty distracting #use at your own risk #ask #anonymous #shukamod speaks #detective shukamod #info #long post #not shukashuu

[saitou-shuka]

should I show up to the screening 2 hours early or? last time I went, it was 30 minutes before and the seats were packed.

The NYC venue is free seating, so people tend to come extremely early to ensure they get good seats. I’m not too surprised that the theater was already packed if you arrived 30 minutes before the show started :’)

For reference, a line started forming around 8am for the 12pm showing of 1st Live…

Of course, you don’t need to arrive that early. I think I went somewhere in the neighborhood of 1.5-2 hours early, and I was fine. Come a bit early and hang out with other Livers! It’s fun :D

#im on mobile answering asks from my nyc airbnb #it won't let me add a picture :( #but yeah 2 hours is pretty safe #I think #ask #anonymous #shukamod speaks