Pac-Man Fever (album)

Pac-Man Fever
Cover illustration of 1999 re-release
Studio album by
ReleasedJanuary 1982
Recorded1981
GenreRock
Length33:24
LabelColumbia/CBS Records (1982)
RC 37941
Buckner & Garcia Productions (1999)
K-tel Entertainment (2002 version)
ProducerBuckner & Garcia
Buckner & Garcia chronology
Pac-Man Fever
(1982)
Now & Then
(1999)
Professional ratings
Review scores
SourceRating
AllMusic[1]

Pac-Man Fever is a 1982 album recorded by Buckner & Garcia. Each song on the album is about a different arcade game, and uses sound effects from that game. The album was originally released on LP, cassette, and 8-track tape in January 1982, and was later completely re-recorded for re-release on CD in 1999 and 2002.

The title song, "Pac-Man Fever", was released as a single in December 1981 and became a top 10 hit, peaking at #9 in March 1982 on the Billboard Hot 100[2] and earning gold certification by the RIAA for selling over one million copies;[3] the single sold 2.5 million copies in total as of 2008.[4] It had been released independently earlier in the year on the BGO Records label, before being picked up by CBS. The album's second single, "Do the Donkey Kong", peaked at #3 on the Bubbling Under Hot 100 chart.[5] Like the title track, the album went on to receive a gold certification from the RIAA, for over 500,000 records sold;[6] the album had sold 1,200,000 copies in total by the end of 1982. The duo performed both of these singles on American Bandstand on March 20, 1982,[7] and appeared later that day on Solid Gold to perform the title track.[8]

The album was completely rerecorded in 1999 for CD release because the original album is still owned by Columbia, who declined to re-release it. When Buckner & Garcia rerecorded "Mousetrap" for this release, they were unable to find a copy of the arcade game anywhere, so they instead recorded dog and cat sounds at a pet store.[citation needed]

  1. ^ Allmusic review
  2. ^ "Pac-Man Fever". Time Magazine. April 5, 1982. Archived from the original on November 7, 2007. Retrieved October 15, 2009. Columbia/CBS Records' Pac-Man Fever...was No. 9 on the Billboard Hot 100 last week.
  3. ^ "Popular Computing". Vol. 2. McGraw-Hill. 1982. Archived from the original on November 7, 2007. Retrieved August 14, 2010. Pac-Man Fever went gold almost instantly with 1 million records sold.
  4. ^ Turow, Joseph (2008). Media Today: An Introduction to Mass Communication (3rd ed.). Taylor & Francis. p. 554. ISBN 978-0-415-96058-8. Retrieved 29 January 2012.
  5. ^ Joel Whitburn's Bubbling Under the Billboard Hot 100 1959-2004
  6. ^ RIAA Gold & Platinum Searchable Database - Pac-Man Fever Archived 2015-09-04 at the Wayback Machine. RIAA.com. Retrieved 2009-11-01.
  7. ^ "American Bandstand Season 25 Episode Guide". TV.com. March 20, 1982. Retrieved August 14, 2010.
  8. ^ "Solid Gold Season 2 Episode Guide". TV.com. March 20, 1982. Retrieved August 14, 2010.