Thanks goes to Jessica Stan for sending this disc in for review!
This disc, which technically has the longer name of "High Touch 2009 C/W Get Fired Up, Spiky-eared Pichu!", is a mild oddity. It's based around the 2009 Pokémon film... along with the opening and ending titles that played as part of the 2009 season of the TV series. It feels like a hybrid between a single and a sampler, as includes a few themes from the movie. Those themes also appear on the Pocket Monsters: Arceus: To a Conquering Space-Time - Music Collection (ZMCP-4912). As a result, if fans already have the music collection and the Antenna of the Heart (SRCL-7066) single, the only special thing about this release are karaoke tracks. We are getting ahead of ourselves, though. So let's examine the contents of this CD.
Now, before diving into the review and as a side comment, it's crazy to think this is the 12th theatrical entry in the Pokémon franchise. These movies' popularity transcend the cinema screen there are many online slot games that pay homage to this formidable fictional monster and they can be found from a number of providers that are listed on the official NoDepositFan website. At the time of writing, the films continued for quite some time, although there was a brief pause to remake the original movie before they stopped making more of them as of 2020.
Anyway, back to the CD and starting with the first track, we have the song "High Touch! 2009". This is a remixed version of a theme prior theme song from the TV show. This remix was used for about 23 episodes, which is typical for the show as they tend to rotate through new opening themes regularly. The song is performed by Rica Matsumoto and Megumi Toyoguchi, who voice Satoshi/Ash and Hikari/Dawn, respectively. Now this song did also appear in the Pokémon: Arceus and the Jewel of Life movie, but the version there is different, and frankly a little better as it's a tighter two minutes versus the four minute version here. In all, to best describe the song, it feels like a sugar overload, as it's very bubbly and "cute". Can't say I'm a fan, but I wouldn't call it bad as much as an acquired taste.
Next up we have the "Get Fired Up, Spiky-eared Pichu!" song. This also appeared on the Antenna of the Heart (SRCL-7066) single and is sung by Shoko Nakagawa, an idol that beyond doing music is also a illustration artist and writer of a very popular blog. It's an end-credit song that played for about 23 episodes of the TV show, overlapping with "High Touch! 2009" for around 10 episodes. As for the song, I said "High Touch! 2009" felt like a sugar overload, this one takes it up a notch. It has a super fast tempo and feels like it caters specifically to a very young crowd.
In terms of the orchestrated music, there are four tracks here although only three are done by Shinji Miyazaki. For clarity, these are the exact same cues that appear on the Pocket Monsters: Arceus: To a Conquering Space-Time - Music Collection (ZMCP-4912). Seeing as how this predates that CD by around a month, it's possible Media Factory was looking to have hardcore fans double dip by buying both. Regardless of the original reasoning, this disc contains tracks 9, 19, 24 and 29 from that CD. If one was only taking four tracks from the film, this isn't a bad selection. "Journey ~ Antenna of the Heart ~" is a nice soothing piece of music. On the flip side, "Satoshi vs. Gishin" is a nice battle theme that has an energetic and great start to the theme, though it loses some momentum toward the end.
Rounding out the disc, we have two karaoke tracks. These are for "High Touch! 2009" and "Get Fired Up, Spiky-eared Pichu!". I... I want to say they are unique to this disc, but I don't have a ton of confidence in that statement. The Pokémon franchise has a massive catalog of CDs but these two songs tend to get skipped over, like the 2009 version of High Touch didn't even make the eight disc Pokémon TV Anime Theme Song BEST OF BEST OF BEST 1997-2023 set. Anyway, I couldn't find another CD release that had them, but not willing to say definitively this is the only way to get them.
Overall, while I didn't find the music from the 12th Pokémon film to be particularly stellar, if you are a fan I would recommend just going for the Pocket Monsters: Arceus: To a Conquering Space-Time - Music Collection (ZMCP-4912) release. If you are a super fan, I would recommend the music collection alongside the Antenna of the Heart (SRCL-7066) single. If you are a diehard completest, maybe then also pick up this one for the two karaoke tracks belonging to the TV show.
One final note: the cover art for this release is far superior to the one for the full music collection. It's a bit of a missed opportunity that the more striking cover wasn't used for the larger soundtrack. |
