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Pokemon Live! Original Cast Recording
This CD comprises the soundtrack from the short-lived Pokemon live stage musical that toured the country in 2000. As such, the singers are overall a higher quality than those of the TV show soundtracks. Unlike most of the TV show soundtracks, every song on this disc is supposed to be sung by one or more of the main characters of the show rather than "nameless female singer" or "nameless male singer". Most of the singers are good, if you can get past the oddity of hearing "Ash" and "Misty" sung by adults rather than childlike voices. This is especially noticeable in the duet between Ash and Giovanni ("You Just Can't Win") where Gio refers to Ash as "little boy", and Ash calls him "old man" - while their voices aren't much different from each other. There are background singers in many of the "big" songs, which gives it more of a stage musical feel. Sadly, the weakest link on the disc are the singers who portrayed Team Rocket's Jessie and James. Their voices aren't very good, and they don't execute the famous Rocket motto very well. Jessie in particular has a very shrill voice that tries too hard to be in "character". Team Rocket gets their well-known "Team Rocket's Rockin!" song, as well as another song with Meowth, "The Best at Being the Worst". Meowth is the only character who sings on the soundtrack who keeps his voice actor from the original anime. The original Team Rocket voices are really missed here (while the singing voices of Ash, Misty, and Brock are overall better than their show counterparts). Team Rocket's comic song "The Best at Being the Worst" would work much better if the actors weren't overplaying the parts so much - as a result, the singing sounds off-key, which is especially bad in the harmony parts. The actors do a better job on "Team Rocket's Rockin" since they sing more than overact. As far as songs go, this soundtrack is one part "2 B.A. Master", one part "Johto Journeys", and one part original material. Many of the familiar songs from the show are longer versions with instrumental dance breaks and repeated choruses. Many of the songs also have reprise versions, either sung by different characters or with different lyrics (not all of the reprises from the show are present on the soundtrack, however). Additionally, the musical arrangements are a bit more complex, with harmony parts (although the songs have the same basic sound as on the TV show). 2 B.A. Master Songs Johto Journeys Songs Original Songs
Giovanni's song "It Will All Be Mine", as well as his evil reprises of "You and Me and POkemon" and "Everything Changes" are really standout tracks on this collection. Giovanni is one of the strongest voices in this cast, and the unique songs given to him are some of the few that actually reflect the musical's story. The background music is appropriately sinister and heavy-sounding compared to the rest of the soundtrack. Giovanni plays up the bad-guy role with some appropriately evil laughter, but he doesn't come across as corny like his henchmen do. A lot of the weaker songs on the TV show soundtracks are used with better effect here. The boring "Everything Changes" song about Pokemon evolution is reimagined as a duet between Professor Oak and Ash's mom (Delia). Here, the song is used to explain Ash's growing up, and used later by Giovanni to show Delia how much she's changed since her youth. An otherwise throwaway song becomes a consistent theme throughout the show. It wouldn't be a Pokemon soundtrack without a romantic song from Misty, and her song from 2 B.A. Master is used here. While this doesn't stand out much on the soundtrack, it was used well during the show as a chance to show off some Pokemon puppet special effects. On the other hand, the song sung by Misty, Delia, and Ash ("I've Got a Secret") works much better as a strong emotional piece. It's nice to see a number that has such emotion from three different characters, and the harmony parts work well together. Having "The Time Has Come" sung by Ash rather than a nameless voice works to great effect, since it is a song about Ash losing his Pikachu. This is one of the numbers that would really only work in the musical version, as the TV show Ash isn't known for a strong singing voice. Brock gets his feature song as well ("Two Perfect Girls"), with an extended dance break in the middle. Like Ash, the musical Brock has a far better singing voice than the TV show counterpart. Since he's singing the song by himself, his extra fills and character parts work better than Team Rocket's (who are trying to sing in harmony). His song has a great deal more energy and personality than the Johto Journeys version. This is definitely one of the best songs of the disc. A few songs seem out of place, as if the writers couldn't work out a way to fit all the songs into the score that they wanted. For example, there's an intermission song ("What Kind of Pokemon Are You?") from "Dexter" - the rapper who lives inside the Pokedex - that really seems out of place in the soundtrack. While most of the other songs pull the story together, this one is pure filler. The premise is that Dexter needs to explain how much work it takes to get the Pokemon data right, or his trainer might lose a battle. The instrumental section of this song was a spot for some really terrible Pokemon jokes from the backup singers (that didn't go over well with the audience). This soundtrack is, by and large, a much better set of songs than either the 2 B.A. Master or Johto Journeys soundtrack CDs alone. The unique songs added in are better than the songs that were dropped from the original TV soundtracks. Connecting some of the filler songs with specific characters works well, and only a few tracks (mostly the Team Rocket numbers) are worse than the originals. Overall it's a very good reimagining of the Pokemon soundtracks. This CD used to be available from Amazon.com, but it's been out of stock for quite some time. Copies occasionally pop up on ebay, but there are much rarer than any of the mass-produced soundtracks. This soundtrack is missing a few songs from the show, but it covers all the big numbers. If you're a fan of the Pokemon TV show (at least the first few seasons), you won't be disappointed by this soundtrack. Track Listing
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