June 11, 2012
Venue: Junk Box
City: Nagano
Capacity: 400
Intro Song: Drive My Car - The Beatles
Set List:
1. Taiyou To Kimi Ga Egaku Story
2. S.L. Magic
3. Sono Toki, Sekai wa Kimi Darake no Rain
4. GIRLism
5. Shunkan Sentimental
> Talk
6. Ring!Ring!Ring!
> Tomomi Bass Solo
7. Rock 'n' Roll Widow
> Talk
8. Welcome Home
9. HARUKAZE
10. SWITCH
11. SCANDAL BABY
> Talk
12. Taiyou SCANDALOUS
13. LOVE SURVIVE
14. BEAUTeen!!
15. EVERYBODY SAY YEAH (Extended Funk-style Intro)
16. DOLL
Encore:
> Talk
- Space Ranger
The Experience:
This live was exhilarating, wonderful, and horrible all rolled into one. The venue is the Junk Box which sits on the top floor of a department store which was interesting. In fact, one floor below is a Daiso.
As with every SCANDAL live that I've been to, the line up to get in was confusing. The doors opened at 7:30pm but I decided to swing by early to make sure I could find the place. I dropped by at 3:30pm and to my surprise, there were about 40 people in line already. Team SCANDAL was still setting up the merchandise table so I decided to come back later.
When I returned at 5:00pm, the merch table was processing people at full speed. As it turns out, the line I saw wasn't the line to get in but the line to buy stuff. I got in the long line but it went super fast. After I got my souvenirs, I looked for the line for the show itself. Everyone was loitering around with no line to be found. I situated myself at the entrance among a cluster of other people.
Team SCANDAL finally came out and yelled some unrecognizable things over a horrible bull horn. I went over to investigate. As it turns out that even though the tickets were for standing room only, they had a line up order number on them. People were To line up according to the number to get in. The official capacity of Junk Box is 400, I had ticket 325. This wasn't good. Also, I noticed that others had ticket numbers over 430. I'm wondering if they packed more people than they were supposed to.
So I file in, and it's just as I thought. I was 3/4 the way back. It was a small room, and it was already getting hot and sweaty inside even before the live started. My friend (who is a girl) and i were sandwiched by people from all sides. I felt bad for her because she couldn't see a thing other than people's backs.
When the intro music started, people started pushing and all of a sudden we found ourselves riding this wave of humanity closer towards the stage. By the first song, we ended up about 7 rows of people back from the stage.
We were squished to the point where I couldn't even bring my arms up. You had no control of your body, people were just smashed up against you. This was not pleasant. My friend still couldn't see a thing, in fact I noticed a lot of girls got smashed and were pushed aside by the rowdy guys. I was very surprised SCANDAL didn't have an all girls section like they've had before at their other lives.
So mid way through the concert, a couple of people were removed near the front for nearly passing out due to the heat and pressure. My friend impressed me, she decided to try to push her way to the front so she could see something. I followed and helped her push our way forward. Mid way through the concert and she still hasn't seen the girls at all. And we were only 7 rows back. That's how crazy that place was.
Soon we were only 5 rows back, center stage and for the remainder of the live we were more or less in that position. Being only about 7 or 8 feet from the stage, she still couldn't see anything. At most she could see the top of Mami's head and catch a quick look at Haru or Tomo when peoples heads were lined up right. She couldn't see their uniforms, their instruments, or even their complete faces. She never got to see Rina. That sucks. Especially since we were right in front of them! Being 6 feet tall, I luckily got to see most everything by jumping up or standing on the tips of my toes.
The heat and sweat in there was gross and unbearable. On my right I had a guy's armpit sweat soak the right sleeve of my t-shirt so that his sweat dripped down my arm, to my left there was this guy that kept pushing has long dripping with sweat hair into my shoulder soaking my tee. Gross gross gross. When people twirled their towels, sweat droplets rained down on your face. I got other people's sweat in my eyes and on my lips. It was really nasty. And that's not even mentioning the smell. Sour, mildewy, just gross.
I know why the venue is called the Junk Box. Because the guy behind me kept grinding his "junk box" onto my rear end with great ferocity when he jumped around - which was the whole time. I had to elbow him in the gut a couple of times to let him know that I was not interested.
A lot happened during the live and I was so distracted by the crowd I can only give glimpses into how the live went.
Those hand drawn IDO LIVE signs you see Rina post of her blog - all of the members came out with their own drawn signs when they made their way on stage.
They talked a few times during the live. They talked about Nagano, mainly about the food. Haru talked about bringing back old songs for this live and how they are releasing their new album soon. Mami lamented about not being able to see the temples or go to an onsen this time in Nagano. She had a funny pin on her vest that asks "What's for dinner?" Timo apparently spoke a lot of funny nonsense. She did a few cheers to pump up the crowd. Rina, as usual has some insightful things to say. She mentioned that when nothing is going your way and your spirits are down, come see SCANDAL, they will bring you back up and give you power.
Tomo played an awesome slow but powerful bass solo that lead into Rock'N'Roll Widow. That was sick.
They played a great funk style intro to ESY that threw everyone off to what song it was in the beginning.
The new songs, Taiyou SCANDALOUS and WELCOME HOME are absolutely fantastic. I can't wait for those singles to come out.
It was so tight in the crowd that I couldn't see what instruments they were playing. I did see Tomo use her blue Squire most of the time but I saw she had her red bass as well. Haru had her telecaster as well as her squire and used both. Mami had her strat, falcon, and squire on a rack to her side slightly off stage although I saw her use the strat and falcon bit i don't recall seeing her use the squire or i just missed it.
I'd add that the mix of people was about 80/20 guys to girls. All ages, mostly people in their 20's although I saw some in their early teens through their late 40's.
Mami threw her pick out into the crowd, I don't think Haru did. Tomo didn't use a pick at all, there weren't any in her mic stand.
At the end, I was drained from fighting the crowd, my clothes were soaked, my ears were ringing, the arches of my feet were cramped from tip toeing the whole time. But it was great and I'd do it all over again.
Here are a few pics from before the start of the live:
..
I wonder when will Mami perform her solo guitar..Hmmm.
You are truly a SCANDAL fan for still appreciating that live amidst those "horrors". 
Sight
.nerd.
