40 years ago today, the Pac-Man Fever album was #75 (down 51!) on Billboard Top LPs & Tape and #57 (down 12) on Cash Box Top 200 Albums.
Meanwhile we continue marking Donkey Kong Month by noting that "Do the Donkey Kong" was #105 (down 2) on Billboard Bubbling Under the Hot 100.
This is a set of 10 uncut jukebox title strips for "Do the Donkey Kong" by the Star Title Strip Company. They showed up on eBay within the past couple years, but I don't remember seeing any "Do the Donkey Kong" strips prior to that. Given the song wasn't a hit, it's not too surprising some survived in this condition.
Around 1999/2000, B&G took the music from their new version of "Pac-Man Fever" and turned it into this. Unable to obtain a license, it wasn't released. Until Pokémon Go hit in 2016. With Pokémon Go's amazing popularity, Buckner released a couple videos of the song. However, after some months, he removed it, telling me after I asked that he was never satisfied with it. But once something's on the Internet, it's rarely gone for good. So you can still find a version on YouTube.
Our first Off-Topic Tuesday song for Donkey Kong Month is "Human Video Game" by DJ Jazzy Jeff & The Fresh Prince (1988). This is a link to the longer version from the original vinyl and cassette release of He's the DJ, I'm the Rapper. The CD version was shorter.
40 years ago today, the Pac-Man Fever album was #45 (down 13) on Cash Box Top 200 Albums but maintained its peak position of #24 for a second week on Billboard Top LPs & Tape.
Meanwhile "Do the Donkey Kong" peaked at #103 (up 6) on Billboard Bubbling Under the Hot 100.
Columbia chose this as the album's second single. Of the album's games, Donkey Kong was certainly the biggest hit after Pac-Man at the time. But it just didn't make the impact "Pac-Man Fever" did. Buckner estimated it sold 200k-300k. A far cry from the 1 million of "Pac-Man Fever."
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| "Do the Donkey Kong" 45 picture sleeve, side 1 |
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| "Do the Donkey Kong" 45 picture sleeve, side 2 |
Only sold as a 45, it came in an attractive picture sleeve featuring the Donkey Kong logo and screenshot. Notably, the 45 has a ™ after the game name and a Nintendo trademark notice at the bottom. The "Pac-Man Fever" single had neither. (For Midway, in that case.)
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| "Do the Donkey Kong" side 1 |
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| "Do the Donkey Kong (Instrumental)" side 2 |
Side 1 is an abbreviated version (3:16) of the album track (4:32). The song only consists of two verses and choruses, a keyboard solo, and then repeated adlibs on the chorus, so it's simply a matter of fading early. The album version of the song features a false ending fade out inspired by "Do You Love Me" by the Contours. But side 1 of the 45 fades even before that point. You can find it on YouTube.
Side 2 features an exclusive instrumental version of "Do the Donkey Kong". Today it'd be called a karaoke version. And THIS version fades out where the false ending is on the album version. This version was not currently on YouTube, so I believe my upload is a 52 Weeks of Pac-Man Fever exclusive.
I'm not aware of any "Do the Donkey Kong" covers for DtDK Month, so we'll do this. In 2018 Tyrone "The Kahn Man" Kahn took the Buckner & Garcia song and tweaked the cadence to make a swing version. It's only been played on Kahn Man's Comedy Corner, his comedy music show. You can listen by creating an account at MadMusic.com.
