How Is Labyrinth the First Pinball Machine with David Bowie In It?

The second half of the ‘70s saw a number of pins based on musicians flood into bars and arcades. Legit superstars like Elton John, Dolly Parton, and the Rolling Stones all had their own machines, and Bally’s KISS game from 1979 remains an all-time favorite. There was even a Ted Nugent machine, and at least two different machines based on country legend and Hee Haw cohost Roy Clark—one of which, a cabinet by Fascination, has been our coffee table for about a decade now. (Sadly it doesn’t play and is unfixable.) The rock ‘n’ pinball connection was in full force, and it’s clear what kind of artists appealed most to pinball manufacturers: iconic superstars with a strongly defined visual element (Parton, John, the Stones), currently chart-topping hard rock bands (KISS, Nugent), and celebrities with mainstream recognition (Clark was a regular presence on TV every week for decades). 

Bowie, of course, checks all three boxes—kind of. Nobody can argue Bowie’s visual presence; he’d already gone through a number of instantly recognizable, defining personas by the late ‘70s. He had always been artier than most American rock bands, and was in a dancier and more experimental place by 1976, but the glam rock songs he made his name with earlier in the decade were already rock radio staples. And although Bowie was in a bit of a commercial lull in the US when this wave of music-based pins was cresting—none of the singles he released between 1976 and 1980 charted higher than 64 over here, and only the first of the four albums he released during that time hit the Top 10 in the States—other metrics proved he was still a major artist. His 1978 Isolar II tour packed arenas and stadiums throughout the country, and he was at a creative peak with the Berlin Trilogy albums he made with Brian Eno and Tony Visconti between 1977 and 1979. And he never stopped being a dominant chart force throughout Europe, and anyway, immediately before this era began he had his biggest hit yet in America, with “Fame” reaching Number 1 on two nonconsecutive weeks in late 1975. 

A Bowie pin should’ve been a no-brainer in 1978, right alongside Elton and Dolly. It didn’t happen, though. Even after he hit new commercial highs in the US with his 1980s pop material, nobody came through with a Bowie machine. It’s very possible that Bowie himself wasn’t interested; he was a serious artist, after all, and even though it’s pretty much the coolest thing ever, pinball isn’t exactly a mark of class or distinction. And maybe he’s just too arty for the current wave of music machines that Stern pumps out; they tend to stick to fairly meat and potatoes hard rock and heavy metal legacy acts—Metallica, AC/DC, Iron Maiden—and not weirder, artier musicians. (It’s telling that Stern’s Beatles machine focuses exclusively on their Mop Top era, before they started getting experimental.) Meanwhile Jersey Jack’s two music pins are both new games based on artists with classic pinball machines in their past, Elton John and Guns N’ Roses (who were the stars of one of the rare music pins from the ‘90s), appealing not just to general fans of those artists but also fans of those two older pinball machines in particular.

It’s probably safe to assume that there’s never been a Bowie pinball machine for a combination of two reasons: Bowie just didn’t really care about pinball, and pinball companies didn’t want to pay what Bowie or his management were asking for. So his official pinball debut comes not in the kind of Bowie-focused machine that makes so much sense, but in one based on a movie he starred in, where Barrels of Fun wouldn’t have to license any of his other music. And as good as the Labyrinth machine is, it mostly left me wanting that Bowie machine—as well as a pin based on Henson’s most beloved creation, the Muppets. But that’s a topic for another day.

Editor-in-chief Garrett Martin writes about videogames, theme parks, pinball, travel, and more. You can also find him on Blue Sky.