How Two Jingle Writers Turned a Sudden Video Game Obsession Into a Hit Novelty Song in 1981

Who doesn’t love a good novelty song? OK, maybe some folks don’t. But we do. And no decade catered to those songs like the 80s. It seemed like any topic you might imagine could be fodder for one of these songs. All it took was one enterprising individual to make a catchy song about it.

In 1981, it was actually a pair of enterprising individuals who turned the hottest video game craze of that era into a hit song. And then came an album. That’s when things got a little weird.

“Fever” Pitch

Pac-Man came along at the perfect time. The deceptively simple yet ridiculously addictive game arrived when video games, with their chirping soundtracks and colorful action, were starting to leave behind pinball machines as the weapon of choice for quarter-wielding children of all ages.

The success of a good novelty song depends on timing. And Gary Garcia and Jerry Buckner couldn’t have timed their ode to Pac-Man any better. One day, the two musicians, who were focused at the time on writing commercial jingles, went to a restaurant in their home state of Georgia. While there, they saw patrons causing quite a commotion while lined up in front of a machine.

They were, of course, playing Pac-Man. After the line died down, Buckner & Garcia, as they’d be known when they became unlikely hitmakers, played the game themselves. Hours later and dozens of quarters poorer, the two men came up with the idea to write a song about the game. They titled it “Pac-Man Fever.”

Primitive Sound Effects

The two men managed to squeeze in references to the video game’s storyline. That included the names of the inimical ghosts that chased Pac-Man and the fruit that added big points to tallies. In a stroke of genius, they decided that they needed the sound effects from the game.

This was well before the sampling era, so the two men simply held up a recorder to the machine while someone played it. Although Buckner & Garcia struggled to get record companies interested, radio stations began playing “Pac-Man Fever” anyway, creating a truly organic hit.

Released late in 1981, “Pac-Man Fever” caught fire in 1982 at roughly the same time that the game really swept the nation. (There’s that timing thing we mentioned.) The two men were then commissioned to do an entire album devoted to video games, which led to songs about Donkey Kong, Defender, and several other of the hottest games of the era. (“Do The Centipede”, anyone?)

Behind the Lyrics of “Pac-Man Fever”

The narrator of “Pac-Man Fever” has taken his obsession with the game to the extreme. “I’ve got a callus on my finger and my shoulder’s hurting too,” he confesses. The suspense of the game works its way into the lyrics: “I’ve got speedy on my tail, and I know it’s either him or me.”

By the final verse, our hero has the high score in sight. But it’s not enough to quench his thirst for the game: “I’m really cookin’ now, eating everything in sight/All my money’s gone, so I’ll be back tomorrow night.”

Weird Al Yankovic released his own parody song devoted to the game in 1981, but The Beatles’ lawyers put a stop to it when they heard its resemblance to “Taxman”. Buckner & Garcia, meanwhile, sailed right along to novelty song history.

(Photo by Yvonne Hemsey/Getty Images)