Action to Reach Your Dreams
From daily trivialities to big dreams … everything starts with an action. As we step forward and take that first step, SCANDAL’s new album, BABY ACTION, gives us courage. The four members talked a lot about this work, which is full of their honest feelings.
What did want to do with this third album?
RINA: This time around, we decided on the title beforehand. We discussed ideas and things we liked, and decided it in the studio when we were rehearsing.
HARUNA: We had a lot of things we wanted to say, but as expected, the aftermath of the earthquake had a big impact. [T/N: i.e. the Great Touhoku Earthquake on March 11, 2011. If you forgot about this … I have no words for you]
RINA: So, from the start, this wasn’t a “this is us” kind of an album, it was something for the listener, a “for you” kind of album that we wanted to make.
TOMOMI: When the earthquake happened, I really thought we were powerless. We could only sit in front of the TV and watch the footage, like we had no energy. But then, even though I really had thought we couldn’t do anything, we heard a lot of voices through twitter and message boards telling us, ‘When I listen to SCANDAL, I feel better’, or ‘I’m able to get through this’. So, I was able to believe that we could do something. We had something we could do, we had something we wanted to say, and we knew that there were people who would accept that. With these things in mind, we also changed how we recorded the album. “We want to inspire action with our music” – this idea is connected to the title, BABY ACTION.
RINA: Since we said the Dreamer tour was about ‘inspiring action towards our dreams’, as expected, we talked about wanting to include the word, “ACTION”. “BABY” refers to us. We’re still immature, and even though we’re just starting out, we won’t allow our intentions to be compromised; but it also refers to our ‘devilish’ side.
MAMI: When it actually came down to the tour, I think it was a big deal that we were able to go to Sendai. We didn’t know whether or not we could do a show at Zepp Sendai up until the last minute. But, if there was even one person who wanted to see us, we definitely wanted to do a concert there, even if we had to do it in the streets! That was what we went in mind with. Like TOMO said, the only thing we can do is make music and, with regards to the concert in Sendai, we felt strongly that we could reach people with our music. Thinking, ‘can’t we inspire action as well?’, even for the people who couldn’t come and see us, we planned a high-energy show. We made the album between the first and second halves of the tour but I think this album was greatly influenced by amazing things like the audience, and the desires and the feelings that each of us wanted to express when performing.
HARUNA: I think the word “ACTION” has really become this year’s theme for SCANDAL. The tour was named ‘Dreamer’ before the earthquake. We can start some kind of action amongst ourselves, and therefore, it’s good to have a common dream – that is where the title came from. This is something that we had already started talking about around the time of ‘Pride’. Well, if I had to say, around the end of last year, we recorded ‘Pride’ with the mindset “2011 is the year for action!”. This time around, I think the album is a compilation of all of these thoughts. Along with songs made for us by our sempai in rock bands, this is our first attempt at pulling all these things together – these are our own actions.
