Wednesday cover: "Pac-Man Fever" by the Countdown Singers

 ...and Graham Blvd. and Countdown Chartbusters and Comedy Craze and Rock Patrol. In other words, this is a "band" of session musicians that they'll put whatever name they want to. Who's "they"? Well, that varies too. Mostly it's Suite 102, but sometimes the publisher is CHV Music Factory or Lift Me Up Records.

Assuming it's the correct band, Discogs says, "The Countdown Singers is a name given to Madacy Entertainment's revolving group of studio musicians, used since 1994. They perform sound-alike cover versions of well-known songs."

The easiest way to quickly identify this version of "Pac-Man Fever" is if it's length is about 4:03. It's been released on multiple digital albums, but no physical releases as far as I know. It's also available on Spotify and other digital music vendors.

Here's the list of "albums" with artist and publisher that I've seen this cover song on. The most recent one I just found when writing this entry.

• Chartbusters 1982 by Graham Blvd (Suite 102, 2008)
• Music for Nerds by Countdown Singers (Suite 102, 2010)
• 50 Best of Novelty Songs by Comedy Craze (CHV Music Factory, 2011)
• 100 One-Hit Wonders 1980s by Graham Blvd (Suite 102, 2011)
• Essential One-Hit Wonders of the 80s, Vol. 1 by Countdown Singers (Suite 102, 2012)
• Soundtrack to the 20th Century: The 1980s, Volume 2 by Countdown Chartbusters (Suite 102, 2014)
• 80's Hits Car Ride Playlist compilation ("Pac-Man Fever" by Rock Patrol, Lift Me Up Records, 2019)

Off-topic Tuesday: The Pac-Man Album

If someone calls Pac-Man Fever the "Pac-Man Album", tell them that's a different thing. The Pac-Man Album is a record from Kid Stuff. I'll let you judge it for yourself, as it's on YouTube. (Scans from Discogs.com.)

On the charts March 27, 1982

 40 years ago today, "Pac-Man Fever" peaked at #9 (up 1) on the Billboard Hot 100 and peaked #7 (up 1) on Cash Box Top 100 Singles. And in Canada, it was #22 (up 9) on RPM's 50 Singles.

Meanwhile the album was #87 (up 42!) on Cash Box Top 200 Albums and #80 (up 13) on Billboard Top LPs & Tape.

Record World was not published this week in 1982.

Week 24: Puc-Man Fever album

Japan wasn't the only place to get the Puc-Man version. Puc-Man Fever was the name the album was released under in Hong Kong, too. (All photos courtesy eBay.com, IIRC.)

And not just the album title. The track list also includes "Puc-Man Fever". However, the credits for the album are almost identical to the American version. Including the "Puc-Man Fever" background singers, which should be different from the American version, but isn't!

Other than changing the "Pac" to "Puc", the album is much the same as the American version, including having the Pac-Man patterns on the sleeve.

Song, album, and video game name style conventions

 In case you haven't figured it out, here are the style conventions of the blog.

• "Pac-Man Fever" (in quotation marks) refers to the song or single.
• Pac-Man Fever in italics refers to the album.
• Video game titles are also given in italics (e.g. Ms. Pac-Man) unless they're within a song title. For example, it's "Pac-Man Fever" and not "Pac-Man Fever". This is to help reduce confusion.

These conventions apply to all album and song titles mentioned in the blog. The error you're most likely to see is my forgetting to italicize a video game title. Feel free to let me know if you see that or find an instance where the meaning isn't clear.

Wednesday cover: "Pac-Man Fever" by Astrosmash

 An Intellivision-based band called Astrosmash released their cover of "Pac-Man Fever" on a digital EP in 2008. All the sound effects were taken from the Intellivision version of Pac-Man.

Off-topic Tuesday: "DiG DuG" (parody of "TiK ToK" by Ke$ha) by Insane Ian

Insane Ian has done many songs about video games, but this is a better known one. (And is also about a game of Pac-Man's vintage.) The video that goes with it is excellent, too!

Single certified gold on March 22, 1982

40 years ago today (1982), the RIAA certified the "Pac-Man Fever" single as gold, indicating it had shipped over 1 million copies!

On the charts March 20, 1982

40 years ago today, "Pac-Man Fever" was #10 (up 2) on the Billboard Hot 100, #8 (up 1) on Cash Box Top 100 Singles, and #4 (down 1) on Record World Singles. The single was also #31 (up 7) on RPM's 50 Singles chart in Canada.

Meanwhile the album debuted at #129 on Cash Box Top 200 Albums and was #93 (up 30) on Billboard Top LPs & Tape. I couldn't find its Record World Albums position for this date.

Prior to the album's debut on the Cash Box chart, they published this a couple weeks before. (Click to enlarge.)

Week 23: "Puc-Man Fever" by Buckner & Garcia

You might have noticed I left this international picture sleeve off last week. It gets special consideration for a couple reasons. First off, it's technically Buckner & Garcia covering their own song.

I seem to have misplaced the e-mail that told the story, but my memory is that Columbia wanted to release the song in Japan, where Pac-Man had originated. Except there, it was Puck Man. You can see Wikipedia for the oft-repeated story of why it was changed. (Flyer from The Arcade Flyer Archive.)

Puck Man flyer from Japan

I'm not sure how the jump was made from "Puck Man" to "Puc-Man". Most likely it was simply a miscommunication or a lack of research. But regardless, it at least sounds the same regardless of the spelling.

 

As you can imagine, neither Buckner nor Garcia spoke Japanese, so they couldn't re-record the entire song. But they could redo all the parts where the game was named. In fact, Garcia only had to redo the choruses! Did you ever notice "Pac-Man" is only said in the chorus?

So -- again, going from memory -- they flew out to California and Garcia redid the choruses. They also had to have a different set of backup singers redo the backup vocals. Drop all those new vocals in place of the old ones and voila: "Puc-Man Fever"!

I believe they did go to the trouble of also having the new backup singers redo the, "To the right", just before the guitar solo, just so it all sounded consistent. Judge for yourself, but then come back, because we're not done!

Another technicality is that this isn't really a picture sleeve. The actual sleeve containing the 45 is fairly plain. But there's a two-sided insert with the graphic on the front. From my understanding, this wasn't uncommon for Japanese 45s.

Finally, let's talk about the B-side. You might have noticed it said "Mousetrap" on the insert's front. It also says that on the insert's back and on the record! But it lies. (Well, maybe.) The second song is actually the instrumental version of "Do the Donkey Kong"!!!

Now perhaps not all the "Puc-Man Fever" 45s are like this. Some may actually have "Mousetrap" on the B-side. But my copy doesn't. Discogs does list both a regular version and a mispress with "Do the Donkey Kong", but I don't know how much research has been done.

So, there you go. More than you ever wanted to know about "Puc-Man Fever".

What's that? You want to hear the "Do the Donkey Kong" instrumental? Sorry, I'm saving that for DtDK month in June!

Wednesday cover: "Pacman Fever" by Robertt Youngg

The most notable thing about this 2010 cover is that it is the only one that contains an F-bomb. ("I'm gonna eat the [f-ers] up....") It's on Apple Music, Spotify, & elsewhere.

Off-topic Tuesday: Get Victimized by R. Cade and the Video Victims

Okay, time to tackle the biggie. This is not a song, but an entire album of video game songs. Yes, Pac-Man Fever wasn't the only one in the U.S.! (These two scans courtesy Discogs.com.)

Get Victimized was released in 1982, almost surely AFTER Pac-Man Fever's release. The songs were written by "D.J. Michaels" and John Lombardo. The actual performers are unknown. We only have this one comment on Discogs that reveals a bit more:

Get Victimized does not use as many sound effects from the original games as Pac-Man Fever does, but they're there. Also unlike Pac-Man Fever, not all the songs are about individual games. Some are just about the arcade: "Victim of the Video", "Video Magic", "In the Arcade", "We Fell in Love at the Video Arcade", and "Change Attendant". It seems Michaels and Lombardo were *really* convinced half the songs needed to be love songs, even if it was about being in love with a game machine, as is the premise of "Video Magic".

As for game songs, two retread games Pac-Man Fever covered ("Donkey Kong" and "Defender Contender"), two cover sequels to Pac-Man Fever games ("Ms. Pac-Man" and "Frenzy") and one covers a not-quite-so-new-at-the-time game ("Scramble").

The album pretty much acknowledges that the Pac-Man Fever album in the first line of "Ms. Pac-Man":

"Pac-Man fever got me started
And I play every day
I never thought another game
Could make me feel this way"

"Ms. Pac-Man" also reveals that the writers may have done less research on the games than Buckner & Garcia:

"I still play ol' Pac-Man
I'll be loyal to the end
But ever since I met his sister
I know I found a friend"

Anyone who's seen the Ms. Pac-Man intermissions knows she's NOT his sister. And Ms. Pac-Man was released early in 1982. Although, admittedly, we don't have the release date of Get Victimized, odds are it wasn't *that* early in the year.

There was one single released off the album, "Victim of the Video" (with "We Fell in Love at the Video Arcade" on the B-side). It came in a picture sleeve featuring the same art as the front of the album on both sides.

Surprisingly, the album — which was only released on vinyl and cassette, not CD — has not disappeared in the digital age. It's available on Spotify, YouTube, & Apple Music.

On the charts March 13, 1982

 40 years ago today, "Pac-Man Fever" was #12 (up 2) on the Billboard Hot 100, #9 (up 2) on Cash Box Top 100 Singles, and still peaking at #3 on Record World Singles. It was also #38 (up 9) on RPM's 50 Singles chart in Canada.

Meanwhile the album debuted at #143 on Record World Albums and debuted at #123 on Billboard Top LPs & Tape.

Week 22: International picture sleeve 45s

While the standard American 45 (see week 2) came in an unassuming sleeve, that wasn't so for several foreign markets. We're only going to cover the Buckner & Garcia versions of the song this week, starting with Australia... (Scans from eBay.)

Then Italy. You'll notice this one has "Froggy's Lament" on the B-side instead of the instrumental version of "Pac-Man Fever". (Scan from eBay.)

Then Netherlands. (Photos by me.)

Then Brazil. (Scan from Discogs.)

And finally South Africa. (Scans from Discogs.)

Wednesday cover: "Pac-Man Fever Redux" by Jace Hall

Hall actually worked with Buckner & Garcia on this "epic reinvention" of the song. Sadly, Garcia died in the middle of production, but Buckner encouraged Hall to finish it. (We'll see Hall again.)

Charts Special: Ranking the '80s

Kevin Eldridge of The Flopcast was kind enough to provide the rankings for Buckner & Garcia and "Pac-Man Fever" (both album and song) taken from Ranking the '80s by Bill Carroll,

• "Pac-Man Fever" is ranked at 786 out of 4168 singles.
• The Pac-Man Fever album is ranked 1331 out of 4892 albums.
• Buckner & Garcia is ranked 465 out of 1400 singles acts
• Buckner & Garcia is ranked 773 out of 1927 acts with albums

More information about the ranking system can be found at https://ranking.rocks/methodology.

On Dr. Demento March 7, 1982

40 years ago today, "Pac-Man Fever" was #3 on the nationally syndicated Dr. Demento Show's weekly Funny Five. Thanks to Jeff Morris and his site for the information!

On the charts March 6, 1982 and notes on international charts

40 years ago today, "Pac-Man Fever" was #14 (up 4) on the Billboard Hot 100, #11 (up 5) on Cash Box Top 100 Singles, and peaked at #3 (up 2) on Record World Singles.

I've done some digging into non-American charts and found that "Pac-Man Fever" appears to have not charted in Australia or the United Kingdom.

Finding information for non-English-speaking countries has proven extremely difficult for me. I found one site that claimed "Pac-Man Fever" peaked on the French chart at #2. It also said the song was #64 on the 1982 year-end chart in Brazil. I couldn't confirm either.

I did, however, find information on the performance of "Pac-Man Fever" on the RPM 50 Singles Chart in Canada. The song debuted there on March 6, 1982 at #47. It appears Pac-Man Fever did NOT place on RPM's album chart for Canada at all.

There was also a CBC singles chart for Canada in 1982, but I've been unable to find any archive of it, so I'll only be posting the RPM info.

Week 21: Two-part vocal sheet music

I thought I'd seen all the vintage Pac-Man Fever things, but no! This popped up on eBay this week. It weighs in at 10 pages and was arranged by Dave Riley and Dana Wilson. Unfortunately, the seller only included the first page where the singers are told to open by ad libbing "computer-like sounds". It'd be interesting if there were any old videos of this being performed, but I didn't find any.

Wednesday cover: "Pac-Man Fever" by Knuckle Sandwich

The group recorded a punk rock cover of the song for The King of Arcades documentary, which has Jerry Buckner in it. As best I know, this cover was never released on physical music media.

There is also a mini documentary about recording the cover, which also features Jerry Buckner talking about the original songs. 

Off-topic Tuesday: "I Had Sex with Pac-Man" by Barnes & Barnes

This song was only released by Barnes & Barnes (of "Fish Heads" fame) on a low circulation E.P. It didn't have the staying power of either "Pac-Man Fever" or Weird Al's "Pac-Man" and came a bit after those two songs.