There’s a detail from a photo of some Rolling Stones pinball game that sometimes appears in our rotating banner. Have you ever noticed that? The other day this image popped up for me and I noticed the words “Watch It!” near the image of Mick Jagger. You can see it in context in the second image at the following page I finally found, which includes multiple perspectives on this game. I thought about those words for a second, wondering what I might be watching for. Then it occurred to me: Is “Watch it!” the opening phrase that Mick exclaims before the riff of “Jumping Jack Flash” kicks off? Considering the game features Stones-related phrases throughout its face, perhaps that is the reference. I’ve never known what he says at the beginning of that song!
I learned that there were multiple versions of Rolling Stones arcade games. This cheesy Start Me Up version is not remotely appealing to me.
This is a pretty excellent game.There’s at least one KISS pinball game out there. They’ve probably branded a douche.
It figures there are Beatles pinball games, including Yellow Submarine and Beat Time. A driving game involving the Abbey Road album cover may have been interesting.
Did Bally ever make an actual Who Pinball Wizard game? You would think that would have been a gimme. Here’s an interesting nod to the cinematic Pinball Wizard. Perhaps this was Bally’s way of getting around licensing issues. Oh, look here! Pete Townshend must have had a stick up his butt against officially licensing his song to Bally. An even more blatant workaround follows:
Ann-Margret: A Wizard, A True Star.
An AC/DC pinball machine exists. I betcha Aerosmith got a game. Was Metallica popular early enough to warrant a pinball game? I could see their fan base meeting the pinball demographic.
Did a punk band ever appeal to Bally pinball game makers? What do you know, they did!
I was never a big pinball/arcade player. I only liked a couple of mechanic sports games, the tabletop video football game, and Super Mario Brothers (I think that’s what it was called)—what my band friends and I referred to as “Big Man,” in our elusive quest to get powered up into the larger size character and crawl up some beanstalk. I don’t recall ever playing a rock ‘n roll pinball game (the mechanical/arcade variety—not some modern-day home console video game like Rock Band.) Have you ever played one of these rock ‘n roll pinball games? Are there others out there you have seen?
What artist would you most like to see honored by a pinball machine?
You thought, perhaps, he was actually saying “Watchung” as a shout-out to New Jersey?
This is quite nice http://www.ipdb.org/machine.cgi?gid=1981
Plus, I just like the idea that there’s an Internet Pinball Machine Database.
But I think we should all pitch in and buy this one for 200man! http://www.goldminemag.com/wp-content/uploads/Rolling-Stones-game.jpg
Sorry, 2000man! I was off by a factor of 10.
BTW, Pete came around, eventually. http://www.sun-sentinel.com/wtxx-a-journey-through-the-history-of-rock-rol-006,0,1409914.photo
My dedication to a misspent youth included a serious pinball addiction. For a while I would have considered myself a semi-pro (beer money only). There have been many rocknroll tables & I will offer this one dedicated to the Nuge.
http://rockbrat.files.wordpress.com/2011/08/nuge_pinball1.jpg
As the boys from Yello sang “I know for you this doesn’t look a lot. For me this is the only thing I got”
.http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MIxUczH0QDo
I honestly thought it was some attempted blooz inflection on “1-2!” – as if he was counting in the song.
I could swear I’ve seen an Aerosmith pinball machine at Jilly’s Arcade in Ocean City but I couldn’t find a picture of one after a brief google search.
YUCK! A Broadway Tommy pinball machine?!?!
Arc/Weld-era Neil Young, with a pinball machine that just plays punishing, howling feedback during the entire game.
Wow, that pinball game gives Nugent’s entire career a purpose.
I find this Aerosmith geegaw most appropriate as it is plastic and made for children.
http://i445.photobucket.com/albums/qq176/MORETHANTAZOS/JULIO%2026/DSC08377.jpg
Since my pinball career peaked in the late 70s, early 80s, I think Joan Jett would be a good subject for a pinball machine.
Carlene Carter was featured in a Williams pinball maching called Roadshow in the 90s.
http://www.careyscatering.com/ProductCart/pc/catalog/roadshowpinballflyerfront_1998_detail.jpg
The CBGBs pinball machine attracted the stars!
http://redredwineonasunday.blogspot.com/2010_09_01_archive.html
I’m pretty sure I’ve played that Carlene Carter pinball game at Dirty Franks, a Philly dive bar of some renown that I used to frequent.
Carlene Carter?!?! Who’d a-thunk it?
Carlene Carter! First album released in 1978. I’m too lazy to look but I don’t think she was mentioned in the second generation thread the other day.
I loved pinball. But to answer Mod’s original question, yes, “Watch It!” is the opening of Jumpin’ Jack Flash right after the cool intro cuts into the main riff.
My favorite game was Target Alpha, but I was lethal on most any machine back then (I suck ass now, though). We spoke up at a city council meeting when they forbade us to play pinball. I used to cut school and hang out at A&J’s Tobacco and play pinball all day. Target Alpha was the kind of game I could put a quarter in and play as long as I felt like it. I could max out the replays. I could bet people I’d drain the first four balls and beat everyone else there (it was a four player) even when they played all five. I got lot’s of free beers and stuff that way.
Once I went to Sea World with close friends of the family. The daughter was my age, so we hung out at those kinds of functions, but didn’t do much outside of those. We went in and I played a game called OXO and she tallied my score because I bet some kid I could score a million on it. I walked away at over 1.5 million. I really thought I was cool, and I loved it. Video games generally bore me to death, though.
That Stern Rolling Stones game looks real cheesy, but it may be nice in person. The original Bally is a lot of money these days, and I’d find a place to put one of those for sure. I’d even like to just own a backglass of that one.
Taking kids to the seaside was always an opportunity to find some of the remaining available tables. It was a sad day when I just quit looking because I knew that the arcades had no use for them anymore. We knew the only place in London with some machines but, as in many things the new tables are not as good as the old ones (Baywatch theme – NO !).
My thoughts on a noble game (& a couple of tunes) can be found here…
http://loosehandlebars.wordpress.com/2012/12/06/i-thought-i-was-the-bally-table-king-pinball/
Metal Pinball Machine Music
aloha
LD
For a brief time the great state of Illin’ noise responded to the carnage of Vietnam by lowering the drinking age from 21 to 18, – basically in response to the argument – ‘they can die in a ambush in Na Trang but they can’t buy a beer at home’. Of course at that time I was hanging out nowheres near the DMZ masquerading as the bartender in the short-lived bar that was put in at the DePaul University student union.
At that time future NBA-er Dave Corzine and pal Joe Ponsetto would come in nearly every evening, invest a quarter and play pins all night every night: Bally’s Captain Fantastic and the Brown Dirt Cowboy. Occasionally I would get to play with them and would usually get to play off the credits they had accumulated.
CFATBDC is a killer game – you can capture the ball on either the top left or lower right flipper and fire it back up to the top gates almost at will, and with the high right flipper can get a fabulous crossfire on the drop targets going. Corzine made it to the pros balling, but if there was a pro pins league he’d of been HoF material…
Always sounded like one two to me as well. Never cared enough to really investigate.
Nice find, Tele. I thought there was an Elton Pinball Wizard machine from the Tommy film, but this Capt Fantastic machine is the one I remember.
I think there should be a Prince pinball machine that makes little orgasmic moans whenever a bumper is tapped. Kind of like the old Bride of Pinbot machine https://encrypted-tbn1.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcRdZcJiHXvEWhaSO_fyX-jJRnZk7JWCs4FLZ_J2KQZXf8aFtzebiQ
You could really lean into that one.
I had a blast playing a Captain Fantastic machine at the Silver Ball Museum in Asbury Park a couple years ago. I imagine it would still be there.
loosehandlebars, this is fantastic – as is your blog! Good to have a new time-killer/alternate universe to check in on while waiting for large documents to downloads, teleconferences to actually get started, planes to board. I am adding your blog to our Links, on the left column. I encourage other Townspeople to check it out!
I’ll high-five any Dave Corzine reference
aloha
LD
Keith’s beyond-the-grave response:
http://youtu.be/0-6lfuNrP3g
Can we please get a super-closeup of Keef’s hair from the backglass of this machine? Thank you.
http://flyers.arcade-museum.com/flyers_pinball/sternpin/44003901.jpg
See if this does the trick:
Excellent. There is much to ponder in that image.
Yes, we may have to dedicate a day ponder to its implications. Perhaps even a live event…
Are you maybe thinking of Revolution X, the Aerosmith-themed arcade shooter (one of those stand-up arcade cabinets where the controller is shaped like a gun) set in a dystopic future where you have to help Aerosmith overthrow and murder an evil totalitarian government that has banned rock ‘n roll?
If you weren’t, let me ask you: are you now thinking about Revolution X, the Aerosmith-themed arcade shooter (one of those stand-up arcade cabinets where the controller is shaped like a gun) set in a dystopic future where you have to help Aerosmith overthrow and murder an evil totalitarian government that has banned rock ‘n roll?
In seeking out some tracks and an entire album by Jefferson Airplane last night, I came across an album by another SF band I’d always heard about but never heard, Sons of Champlin. The album I stumbled across is called Follow Your Heart. After checking it out last night, I’m tempted to say that I’ve finally found a SF band I can sink my teeth into: really soulful singing, nice ensemble playing, little of the melodrama that has always bogged me down with Jefferson Airplane. Along with the title track, I was impressed by “Children Know,” “Before You Right Now,” “Hey Children,” and “Child Continued.”
Interesting. Never heard of ’em. I am listening right now to their album Fat City. A compilation, I take it? So far, not bad at all. A decent, if inferior version of the Beau Brummels’ “Don’t Talk to Strangers.” In fact, they sound rather Beau Brummely. BTW, what’s wrong with the BBs, Mod? Modest in their achievements, but, still, some good stuff and from SF.
I sampled a few songs from what I gather are later Sons of Champlin records (Loving Is Why and A Circle Full of Love) that seem, unfortunately, something less than listenable. Like, is it even the same band? From the 70s based on the sound. Stupid Spotify doesn’t give release dates.
Oof, a bad version of “Shades of Grey,” a bad song best known from the Monkees recording. Unfortunate. But the rest of Fat City is a surprising pleasure, so far. Thanks for the heads up.
I love that piece about pinball! We’d have had fun if you’d have hung out at the local Roll and Bowl when I was there. These days, the new digital machines with only three balls always seem to tilt on me. I’m probably just too fat.
Hmm…He looks kinda Savior-ish to me. He just needs a white shirt.