Scandal

With the tag line "The Most Powerful Japanese Girlie Pop Rock" and animated versions of bandmembers doing promotions, there's no question about Scandal being a product of the burgeoning Japanese show biz scene of the late 2000s. The band is unabashedly commercial, but also irresistibly good at what it does: upbeat teen pop-punk with the additional gimmick of lead vocals split between all four members of the group.

Scandal are Haruna Ono (guitar), Tomomi Ogawa (bass), Mami Sasazaki (guitar), and Rina Suzuki (drums). The girls met in a vocal and dance school in Osaka in 2006 and began to play live in the streets, soon proceeding to perform at local clubs, and eventually securing a joint deal with Kitty and Tower Records after a show in Shibuya. Their debut single, "Space Ranger" (2008) sold out in no time, forcing the label to release the single via iTunes as well. The success enabled Scandal to tour overseas straight away, participating in the Japan Nite U.S. tour 2008 and playing Sakura-Con in Seattle, as well as shows in France and Taiwan. After their next two singles topped the indie charts, Scandal went major, signing with Epic Records (they released the indie EP Yah! Yah! Yah! Hello Scandal before that). This opened the doors of show biz wide for them: the band's 2009 songs were featured in a movie, a TV program, a video game OST, a Judy & Mary tribute, and, most notably, the smash hit anime series Bleach, which launched the single "ShoujoS" (2009) to number six in the charts. The girls themselves began to appear in commercials, including one for Nike. It was high time for a full-length, so Best Scandal was released in 2009, charting at an impressive number five despite being comprised mostly of previously released material. The single "Shunkan Sentimental," scheduled for February 2010, was selected as a theme for another wildly popular anime, Fullmetal Alchemist.