01. 1st Single「DOLL」2008 November
02. 2nd Single「Sakura Goodbye」2009 March
03. 3rd Single「Shoujo S」2009 July
04. 4th Single「Yumemiru Tsubasa」2009 October
05. 1st Album『BEST★SCANDAL』2009 November
06. 5th Single「Shunkan Sentimental」 2010 February (misprinted as 2009 in photos)
07. 6th Single「Taiyou to Kimi ga Egaku Story」2010 June
08. 7th Single「Namida no Regret」& 2nd Album『TEMPTATION BOX』2010 August
09. 8th Single「SCANDAL Nanka Buttobase」2010 October
10. Cover Album 『R-GIRL's ROCK ！』 2010 December
11. 9th Single「Pride」2011 February
12. 10th Single「Haruka」2011 May (misprinted as February in photos) 
13. 11th Single「LOVE SURVIVE」 & 3rd Album 『BABY ACTION』 2011 August

Items in bold were editions of CD & DL Data where SCANDAL was featured on the cover; the August 2011 edition was not a cover feature, but had a significant interview. These will most likely come last.

Girls’ Garage Band Gives Powerful Performance!
「DOLL」Single Release

Cute but not sweet. They’re not sexy(?) but they pack a punch. With their emotional & handsome performance, this girls’ garage band travelled to America, France and Hong Kong over spring and summer for culture festivals. It’s SCANDAL’s Major Debut!

「We prefer cool performances more than being seen as cute. The arrangement came naturally and it just kind of took off. Even if people tell us we perform like girls, we tune them out.」 (TOMOMI)

「To begin with, in terms our personalities, we’re all sporty types. 」(HARUNA)

The four of them met two years ago at Osaka’s Vocal and Dance School, where they would「occasionally play with instruments.」(MAMI)

「At first we didn’t intend to form a girl band. But, if we didn’t stay together on the weekends, maybe we wouldn’t have become as close. What we have now is a sisterhood, and it’s all because we’ve seen each other naked (laughs)」(MAMI)

Their debut single, 「DOLL」is a thrilling rock number, that doesn’t sugar coat their true feelings as high school girls.

「TOMO wrote the lyrics for us, but we’re all still high school students so we always get things like, “Don’t dye your hair!” We wanted to say things about this, and fight back, and there are a lot of things we could sympathise with. 」(MAMI)

「Those are our lyrics, but I believe our sound is a combination of all of SCANDAL’s elements. We don’t have a lot of performing experience (laughs) but our current sound is packed full of things only we can do.  」(RINA)

「Please sing along with us and cut loose!」(HARUNA)

After we part ways, there are also new encounters! This is Hello and Goodbye!
「SAKURA Goodbye」Single release


Powerful and headstrong girls band SCANDAL’s second single, 「Sakura Goodbye」 is a bittersweet graduation song¹. With two of the members graduating from high school this spring, the song is filled with realistic descriptions and emotions.

「Ever since we formed, we’ve been playing this at live performances, and on our America tour, this was our last song. So, this song means a lot to all of us. We’re just about to graduate this spring, so if we wanted to release it, we thought that now was the only time to do it!」(MAMI)

 「SCANDAL has a lot of songs that make your head spin (laughs) but this song is one of the listenable ones. We’ve renewed the musical arrangement. Previously, even we didn’t really understand the characteristics of a band, but we’re slowly becoming able to see it. So now we can add a more ‘rock’ feeling to the original version of this song. 」(RINA)

In the midst of the many delicate and emotional ‘sakura songs’, the poignant way in which they sing, ‘In the middle of the wind in a storm of flower petals’² is fitting indeed.

「At the beginning, the lyrics were all sad, but we changed it and made them stronger to suit the new arrangement. Even after we part ways, there are new encounters. That’s what “hello goodbye” means. We’re right about to graduate, and it’s really lonely, but while writing the lyrics of this song, even I felt uplifted. 」(TOMOMI)

「We were quite particular about this song, during performances and as a song in itself. I think it’s become the kind of song that allows you to feel the strength that comes after such sadness, and so I would be happy if we can convey this to people who listen to this song, including people about to graduate.」(HARUNA)

Even for adults who are long past their graduation³, this is a heartfelt rock number. Don’t think of them as just ‘unrefined’ – discover their charm⁴.

And notes, because odd Japanese is odd. 
1.       lit. ‘is a graduation song that looks positively at loss/sadness’
2.       The first line of the second chorus. Credit: mc~
3.       lit. ‘are not connected to graduations’
4.       lit. ‘I want you to feel their charm’. O_O

Shout what you really feel in front of your boyfriend!!
「Shoujo S」Single release

A garage band that’s an explosion of girl power – SCANDAL – has released their third single, 「Shoujo S」. With strong lyrics, helped along by its slightly bluesy sound, it’s a downright feisty rock number.

「I think there are a lot of girls who can’t say what they really feel to the person that they’re dating. But, like in the lyrics, “I hate it when you’re not here”¹, or, “Do you really need me to be with you?”², at these times you would say what you wanted to say the most, but I thought, if you could put what you really felt in a song, wouldn’t you be able to shout it at someone? If you sang it in front of your boyfriend, I think you’d feel better.」 (TOMOMI)

For research, they asked their male staff about hurtful things women had said to them (laughs). Despite only writing it down, it’s outstandingly sharp.

 「The arrangement and the lyrics came together at the same time, so the emotions are also embedded in this song. When we perform it, we feel refreshed. I want people to feel its hype.」(MAMI)

「We wrote this while we were on our end of year training camp. We were in an environment where we were forced to face our music, but at the same time, we had just formed as a band and the four of us were writing songs together. So, this sound we made helps us to remember our original intent. I think it’s a song that really fits us.」(RINA)

It’s being used as the opening theme for the anime, 「BLEACH」, but the topic also turned to comedy duo Shinagawa Shoki’s Shinagawa Hiroshi. This was the first PV he had directed.

「I was talking about how I had been impressed by the film 『Drop』(2009, directed by Shinagawa Hiroshi), and I was surprised because I didn’t think it would actually happen. While we were filming, we all meshed well together.」(HARUNA)

「We’re playing in the rain, so the I guess the highlight is everyone’s makeup coming off (laughs). Please take a look!」(RINA)

1.       Lyrics of the song – あなたがいないとイヤだ
2.       A normal question – ほんまは私がいないとアカンのやろ?

A message that says, ‘If you have a dream, you can discover your courage.’

「Yumemiru Tsubasa」Single release

With their previous work 「ShoujoS」 ranking 6th in the charts, and a television performance in the “rain”, SCANDAL has everyone talking. Continuing with their fourth single, which is a “renewal cover” of 80’s band, Hillbilly Bops’「Yumemuru Koro wo Sugitemo」, it’s a surprising work.

「We’re starting to work on our album but, before that, we wanted to express how we felt about everything, from our formation up until the present. When we were thinking about a song that could express how we felt, we came up with doing this cover.」(HARUNA)

「In any case, the melody was simple so we felt it was more important to choose words that would convey how we felt. It’s not like the songs we’ve been doing up until now, where we could clearly come across with a strong message, we wanted it to be the kind of song that grows on you the more you listen to it. 」(TOMOMI)

You’ll know what the sentimental, original song is from the title, but this is 「Yumemiru Tsubasa」, arranged in SCANDAL style.

「Wouldn’t you say you need a bit of courage to talk about your ‘dreams’? But, with the four of us singing together, I guess you can say that it’s the kind of courage that strengthens your heart. That’s what I also want people to hear in this song.」(MAMI)

「For the past three years, it’s because we’ve had dreams, dreams that have spurred us on from the start that we’ve been able to get this far. Because we are holding on to our dream, we were able to realise our own courage – and I believe this is precisely why we are able to express this message.」(RINA)

This is a medium number that gives you the courage to feel like, with the beat of large, outstretched wings, you can soar as high as you want. It seems as if they’ve touched upon whole new aspect of their charm.

We want to show the power of Girls Bands!
「BEST★SCANDAL」Album release

The fruit of their sweat and tears; they’ve finally completed their first album!! With all 13 tracks overflowing with their unrefined rock band sound, it’s thanks to this they can express their unrestrained power.

Influenced by popular anime, there’s something like a band boom between these girls right now. Maybe each of them is playing a part in SCANDAL. Their first album, 「BEST★SCANDAL」is packed full of the “fruit of their sweat and tears” from the last three years, ever since they first picked up their instruments.

「I felt this when we were making the album, but it felt good to give it everything we had. Working song by song was really challenging, but it was because we kept going without giving up that we were able to savour this incredible feeling of accomplishment.  」(HARUNA)

「When we were making this album, our key phrase was ‘Let’s do our best!’ And we just took the album title from those words (laughs). I think it’s become the kind of album where, from now on, if anything happens, we can listen to it again and go back to basics. 」(TOMOMI)

It’s been one year since their major debut. As for the high energy content of this album, it’s been influenced heavily by the things they’ve experienced at a number of live performances and events.

「At first, when it came to choosing songs for set lists, we went with our instincts, like ‘This one is the best for the opening song!’ but within that, we’ve gradually become more conscious of how concerts work.  」(MAMI)

「Like thinking, ‘It would be cool if we could play this part of this song in this way.’」(HARUNA)

「That’s why recording was fun. When we play, everyone becomes naturally high and our mood just goes through the roof. There are times where we just get too carried away and die, though. (laughs)」(RINA)

Nonetheless, in order to overthrow this unrefined garage band image they’ve maintained up until now, they have composed some longing ballads.

「This was our first ballad so our first concern was the best way to approach the song’s emotional expression. But, when we added the lyrics for the song, I almost cried … the vocals are quite expressive (lit. tremble or quaver) so I definitely want people to give it a listen.」(TOMOMI)

RINA wrote the lyrics for this song, 「Kimi to Yoru to Namida」, and the last phrase is, 「I love you, goodbye」. This phrase is symbolic of the ‘strong girl’ image; a common theme in all their songs.

「The four of us have written various songs, but that is the running theme. Full throttle girl power (laughs).  That’s what we wanted to express through this album; we’re a girls’ band so all the more reason for this power, right? 」(RINA)

「At the beginning, the four of us just enjoyed hitting the right notes, but now we’ve been able to think about things like, “what about if we tried this here?” So it’s become even more fun. It’s definitely the kind of enjoyment you can’t experience alone, so I can hope that we can express that. 」(MAMI)  

This album reverberates, exhilarating the hearts of girls everywhere. Perhaps the number of girls wanting to start a band will increase.