This article was originally published on THUMP Mexico.According to Fortune, Pokémon Go has already been installed on more than 5% of all Android devices in the US in just it's first week in existence, so there's a good chance you've already heard about the app that's giving Twitter engagement a run for its money. But what you may have not read about in the multitude of thinkpieces across your news feed is how the game's music adds to Pokémon Go's addictive power. If you've never delved into the music of the games, you should head to a steaming platform like Spotify, where various Pokémon game's albums have increased already more than 360% since their launch.This game's tunes are all the work of Japanese composer, Junichi Masuda, who has been commissioned to oversee and create the tracks of each and every Pokémon game since the series first launched on Game Boy in the 1996. But what is about Masuda's Pokémusic that creates such a perfect environment for the epic adventure the world can't get enough of? In a recent YouTube video on a channel called Ongaku Concept, presenter Joshua Taipale suggests it's all a result of Masua's use of something called Modal Interchange in his compositions.To put it in simpler terms, Modal Interchange is a method of borrowing chords from a parallel key without abandoning the original tone of a note. By doing this, a composer can extend beyond the normal scale that applies to specific key, like F Major for example, by borrowing from the parallel minor scale (F minor) that has a similar sounding tone. This can often evoke a more powerful emotion in a musical cadence.The technique can prove useful in many genres, and as Taipale explains in the video, its use can help generate instantly heroic and exciting feeling, especially when mixed with the built-in cinematic nature of orchestral sounds. This is certainly the case in the music of Pokémon Go, which is full of sounds, strings, modal exchanges, and many synths that help provide a little extra pizzazz to your quest.Check out more in the video below, and happy hunting.
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