06 September 2017

Episode 192: Pinball Music

For one episode only, Brent and Rob do an entire focus on arcade pinball machine music.  They limit the range to 1992 and before to preserve the legacy aesthetic usually featured on the show.  As pinball was never prominent in Japan, it happens to be an all western composer focus as well.  Lots of good music here and more tracks than usual.  Full track listing below.



Game - Composer - Song - Company - Console - Year (North American release unless otherwise indicated)

Time Machine - David Thiel - 1970’s - Data East - arcade (pinball) - 1988

Millionaire - Chris Granner - Main Play - Williams - arcade (pinball) - 1987

Vegas - unknown - Main Play - Premier/Gottlieb - arcade (pinball) - 1990

Big Guns - Chris Granner - Main Play - Williams - arcade (pinball) - 1987

Checkpoint - Brian Schmidt - Jazz Music - Data East - arcade (pinball) - 1991

Earthshaker! - Jon Hey, Chris Granner - Lock 1 Enabled - Williams - arcade (pinball) - 1989

TX-Sector - unknown - Main Play - Premier/Gottlieb - arcade (pinball) - 1988

Gold Wings - unknown - Main Play - Premier/Gottlieb - arcade (pinball) - 1986

Playboy 35th Anniversary - Cy Coleman, Kyle Johnson (arr.) - Main Play - Data East - arcade (pinball) - 1989

The Bally Game Show - Jon Hey) - Main Play - Midway/Bally - arcade (pinball) - 1990

Lights...Camera...Action! - Dave Zabriskie (?) - Stunt Scene - Premier/Gottlieb - arcade (pinball) - 1989

The Addams Family - Chris Granner - Main Play - Midway/Bally - arcade (pinball) - 1992

Night Moves - unknown) - Main Play - International Concepts - arcade (pinball) - 1989

Road Kings - Bill Parod, Chris Granner - Time Lock - Williams - arcade (pinball) - 1986

Swords of Fury - Brian Schmidt - Two Balls Locked - Williams - arcade (pinball) - 1988

Victory - Dave Zabriskie (?) - Main Play - Premier/Gottlieb - arcade (pinball) - 1987

Atlantis - Robin Seaver - Prelaunch - Midway/Bally - arcade (pinball) - 1989

19 comments:

  1. I think the instrument Brent was referencing in the Millionaire tune is called a Vibraslap.

    Great tunes guys! I love these jams, so jazzy and funky :)

    ReplyDelete
  2. wooooow i cant believe you guys didnt comment on how playboy totally has a part that sounds exactly like splash wave! brent was even singing it!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. alright maybe not exactly after listening to it more closely, but it's still pretty close!

      Delete
  3. Woah, that Big Guns tune reminded me so much of some of Junko Tamiya's stuff from Strider on the Genesis.

    Neat focus, boizz. For some reason pinball machine music doesn't register with me -- it's like I don't even hear it while I'm playing -- so it was cool to get a chance to relax and really experience the tunes for once.

    ReplyDelete
  4. so I got this friend who is really into pinball machines. he even has a "checkpoint". he owns 7 or 8 machines and together with others opened a pinball museum with more than 40 machines (they are kind of extinct so it gets more rare to see them around). I made him listen to the show (he's not into vgm). he was amused.

    ReplyDelete
  5. laughed so hard when rob said "have you got something to say?"

    classic switch right there, and i was just waiting for him to say that

    ReplyDelete
  6. Hey! I RECOMMENDED that Night Moves track. It was a long time ago though ;_;

    ReplyDelete
  7. Never realized there was such good music on pinball machines!

    ReplyDelete
  8. I believe the Genesis song Brent and Gabe were thinking of was "That's All."

    Also, I agree that "Are You Lady?" is a more interesting title than "Are You Lady?"! I was just trying to make sense of the apparent non-sequitur when I was re-listening to episode 47 this summer.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. ...of course, that second instance of "Lady" should be "Ready."

      Delete
  9. Oh and don't forget that you made last October's episode (181: Game Grumps) eligible for this Year in Review countdown! (Well, except for that one Skeleton Krew track that Rob decided to make his #1 last year.)

    ReplyDelete
  10. I'm sooo excited for the next episode. Year-in-review eps are my favorite. I really almost get emotional with each one - there is something uniquely satisfying about hearing Brent and Rob choose which tracks were their favorite of the last year. I began creating my own list for the third year-in-review episode, and the process is uniquely satisfying in it's own way. I'll post mine as a comment on the next ep, but I encourage everyone to try and create their own! There are only 11 episodes to peruse through, so this time around is much easier than years one, two, and three.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I'm a new-ish listener. I'm in a weird spot. I am listening to all LMH episodes from the beginning in sequential order, except I have listened to the past few recent episodes out of sequence. I actually just got to the Year 2 year-in-review episode. Now I know what you mean! The year-in-review episodes are really satisfying and I love hearing how much thought Brent and Rob put into their selections for the countdown. I can't decide if I should listen to the upcoming year-in-review though since I haven't listened to all of the current year. All this time traveling is making my head spin.

      Delete
  11. Hey guys! Great topic with week. Just wanted to chime in on the best way to play NES games. These days it's by getting either an AVS ($185) or a Analogue NT mini ($449) system. Both of these are FPGA based system and are not emulator in a box, like the Retron 5 is. They both also have HDMI output for current TVs (720p for the AVS and 1080p for the Analogue NT Mini). The Mini even goes a step further by having analogue output for CRTs with component/S-Video. I own both and would highly recommend getting either to anyone who is serious on how well your FC/NES game look and sound.

    ReplyDelete
  12. The playboy track is a cover of "Playboy's Theme" by Cy Coleman, sorry!

    ReplyDelete
  13. Wow good catch about 181 Stefan! Listening now to see if my top 5 will change. BTW we are doing top 5 now, right? Finding that hard to do. It's interesting - I made a top ten, so cutting it down to 5 should be as easy as cutting off 6-10, but it's a bit more complex than that. Real consideration needs to be given to 6-10 to see if they NEED to be on the list.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. This upcoming Best Of Year In Review will actually be a top ten list (as opposed to last year).

      Delete