Transcript
Speaker: Hey, thanks for tuning in to the Loser Kid Pinball Podcast.
Speaker: We are on episode number 39.
Speaker: I know it's been three weeks.
Speaker: I'm sorry, guys.
Speaker: We had some stuff come up.
Speaker: I also want to apologize about the quality of my microphone.
Speaker: It's not top-notch like it usually is.
Speaker: But we have a gentleman on today that we just couldn't say no to, and we're so excited about this.
Speaker: But before we get to him, we're going to go through our friends of the podcast.
Speaker: Scott, do you want to do it?
Speaker: You want me to do it?
Speaker: You know what?
Speaker: I'll give it a shot and then you fill in who we forgot about.
Speaker: First off, flipping out pinball.
Speaker: If you are looking at any sort of pinball machine, hit up Zach and Nicole.
Speaker: They are easy to work with.
Speaker: And the nice thing is they give you personalized service.
Speaker: I have a premium turtles coming in through them.
Speaker: And I also upgraded to the blades and the shaker motor.
Speaker: And Josh, you have a pro coming in through them.
Speaker: So that's always a good option.
Speaker: Uh, next, uh, this week in pinball, please check out this week in pinball for your updated weekly news and pinball.
Speaker: Uh, Jeff's always a great guy to, to keep you abreast of the situation without having to go through a lot of the drama on some of the other forums.
Speaker: So check him out.
Speaker: Another thing, uh, lit frames, please check it out.
Speaker: If you're looking for a way of, uh,
Speaker: spicing up your arcade room.
Speaker: Please consider Brad at LIT Frames and a great way of illuminating those trans lights that are collecting dust under your bed.
Speaker: Also, we have Flyland Designs.
Speaker: Please check him out.
Speaker: I bought the Medieval Madness alternative trans light.
Speaker: I think the original is great too.
Speaker: This just spices it up a little bit and it's been a lot of fun to have it in my machine.
Speaker: Um, and who else am I forgetting, Josh?
Speaker: You've got all spot on.
Speaker: And I, I just want to say thank you to Brad Hunter really quick, man.
Speaker: He got my, my lit frame was to me within like three days from me, like ordering it.
Speaker: And, um, it's, it's fantastic.
Speaker: My kiddos keep playing with the buttons.
Speaker: They love the lights.
Speaker: Um, it's very simple.
Speaker: I'm one of those guys that sometimes doesn't read the instructions.
Speaker: So I was like, uh, how do I get the plastic film off?
Speaker: The frame itself just flips open.
Speaker: I mean, there's no using screwdrivers.
Speaker: There's no using any of that stuff.
Speaker: You just seriously just flip the edges open, pull out your old Translate, put a new one in.
Speaker: You're done in 30 seconds.
Speaker: I mean, it's a wonderful product.
Speaker: I've been very happy with it.
Speaker: I can't complain.
Speaker: Yeah, and you can put on static or dynamic.
Speaker: And it's fun to have.
Speaker: I like the Monster Bash that's on dynamic because it cycles through all of them and it really brings out the different colors.
Speaker: But hey, you know what?
Speaker: Pick your poison.
Speaker: Yep.
Speaker: So, Josh, today, who do we have on the show?
Speaker: So, you know, we talk about the velvet voice, Jeff Teulis, but I figured maybe we should get the silk voice.
Speaker: So this man is the voice of very many different voices.
Speaker: He has done some wonderful work in the new Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles pinball machine.
Speaker: And he's going to have to remind me, because I can't remember, he did an amazing amount of voices in this pinball machine.
Speaker: So we have with us Mark Sticks.
Speaker: Six.
Speaker: Six voices.
Speaker: I always remember Splinter because he's the one that's like telling you what to do.
Speaker: And so he's very, very important.
Speaker: And then I remember Casey Jones because Casey Jones is one of my favorites.
Speaker: Loser kid, you have been chosen.
Speaker: So Mark Silk, welcome to the show, man.
Speaker: Thanks for the invite.
Speaker: Nice to meet you finally.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: I like your podcast.
Speaker: I'm a listener as well.
Speaker: Just for the record, I listen.
Speaker: And you mentioned Brian Allen earlier.
Speaker: I've got the Monster Bash alternate translate.
Speaker: Oh, isn't it great?
Speaker: It's beautiful.
Speaker: Really like it.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: That is a significant upgrade from the original, I will say.
Speaker: I really love it.
Speaker: And the Attack from Mars as well.
Speaker: Mm-hmm.
Speaker: Beautiful piece of hard work.
Speaker: And I think he's coming out.
Speaker: I know that he has talked about other Bally Williams licensed product that he's reimagining.
Speaker: And I think that Whitewater is either next or on the list.
Speaker: And so I'm really excited to see what that one is.
Speaker: Well, I got chatting with Brian at Chicago Expo last year, and I picked that up from him, but I just grabbed a load of sketches from him too.
Speaker: I mean, some of his just other little sketches and just his other art bits of inspiration that he was putting out there.
Speaker: I bought a stack of the stuff.
Speaker: So yeah, that's one for the framers.
Speaker: Hugely recommended.
Speaker: Meanwhile, thanks for having me on the show.
Speaker: No problem.
Speaker: Thanks for coming all the way over from the land of England.
Speaker: It was a hell of a bus ride.
Speaker: Do you remember back in the Google days, in the early days of actually getting directions?
Speaker: Before you'd type up map.
Speaker: I don't know if you had MapQuest over there, but you'd have to type it in and then you would hit print.
Speaker: And so you'd be driving around everywhere with this printed off sheet of directions, you know, when people were trying to graduate from just following a map.
Speaker: Do you remember back in the days when we actually could meet people?
Speaker: Oh, geez.
Speaker: Holy cow.
Speaker: No doubt.
Speaker: We'd have plexiglass in a bag in our head.
Speaker: Oh, geez.
Speaker: I'm currently dressed as a beekeeper in an astronaut outfit.
Speaker: Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker: Well, I'm at home, so I'm dressed in the Borat swimsuit.
Speaker: And so I'm nice.
Speaker: It's just comfortable.
Speaker: Thank you for the video.
Speaker: Like it's beautiful.
Speaker: Yeah, it's beautiful.
Speaker: But you would type in like from Utah and talk about how do I get to Paris or London or something?
Speaker: And it would give you directions all the way to New York and it would take you to the pier.
Speaker: And then it would say jump in the ocean and swim 2000 miles.
Speaker: And why wouldn't you?
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And it's it's healthy, right?
Speaker: If you're trying to find where I am right now, by the way, I'm in a place called Birmingham.
Speaker: Birmingham in Birmingham in the heart of the UK.
Speaker: So if you put a pin in the middle of England, that's where I am, the heart of England.
Speaker: It's very accessible.
Speaker: See, most of my England geography, I guess, is based on the book Good Omens.
Speaker: And so when I listen to Good Omens, I'm like, okay, I think I kind of know where that is.
Speaker: Most of my Chicago geography is based around pinball factories.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Elk Grove is the center of Chicago.
Speaker: And now there's like there's basically four there now.
Speaker: And there's American.
Speaker: You got JJP that moved there.
Speaker: You have Stern and Chicago Gaming Company.
Speaker: And so it really has become a re-emerged as a mecca of pinball.
Speaker: I need to just put a tent up in the middle and just hope that people will just come past and go, do you need some voices for your machine?
Speaker: I'll do them for you.
Speaker: Really, I'm a bargain.
Speaker: I'm a hobbyist, but I love what you do.
Speaker: So that actually brings up an interesting question is that like, um, obviously you've been in voice acting for ever.
Speaker: Um, and we're in the, yeah.
Speaker: And we're in the same age group.
Speaker: And that seems like one, a really interesting, uh,
Speaker: I don't want to say hobby, but an interesting career choice.
Speaker: Like I want a quick summary on how did you even get involved?
Speaker: And I know you talked to with Jeff Teolis about this, but do a quick recap of how you got involved in that.
Speaker: And the second question is, okay, then getting involved in pinball, like how did that transition go?
Speaker: From niche to super niche.
Speaker: My heroes, just as a kid, my heroes were always the people behind the scenes.
Speaker: So I loved the craftsmen and the artistry behind it all.
Speaker: And I always loved the fact that there were these people that were voices of my favorite cartoons, people like Mel Blanc and Dawes Butler and Dom Messick.
Speaker: And people like Jim Henson and Frank Oz.
Speaker: And it was those kind of people in terms of performers that I liked who are more behind the scenes rather than on camera.
Speaker: And then people like Ben Burtt, the sound designer, you know, Mr. Star Wars sound effects, him.
Speaker: So...
Speaker: I was heavily influenced by people that weren't necessarily other people's heroes.
Speaker: And very early on, I worked in radio.
Speaker: I taught myself how to produce things by watching other people who I thought were terrific.
Speaker: I learned from watching other people.
Speaker: And then bit by bit, I needed voices for what I was doing at a local radio station.
Speaker: And it was one of these things where I kind of knew it was always in me, but never had an outlet for it.
Speaker: And so I would sneak into a radio studio very late at night when it wasn't being used.
Speaker: And so try and then bought kit for my mom and dad's dining table, the dining studio, and just learned, honed my craft, really.
Speaker: So bottom line is I, it's self-taught.
Speaker: I worked on radio for a while and then started a production company.
Speaker: and focused on voice performance.
Speaker: It was something that I got good at.
Speaker: And because I was so heavily influenced by these other people, it was just a natural progression.
Speaker: So I went from, I suppose, emulating my heroes to finding my own voice and then creating new characters.
Speaker: So, yeah, I mean, ever since then, I, because I had the, I had the production skills very early on to make other people sound good.
Speaker: So I could make like an audio movie trailer and it sounded like Hollywood.
Speaker: It really sounded great.
Speaker: And that's what you were hearing over here on the radio lot.
Speaker: And then when I decided I wanted to get voice work, I used those skills to sort of showcase my own work.
Speaker: And it was cool.
Speaker: And my very first voice showreel, it was just me really just emulating my heroes with a few extra characters that I'd kind of created myself.
Speaker: And you heard this really big kind of like Warner Brothers, Looney Tunes, familiar sounding music.
Speaker: And then you heard, hi, I'm Mark Silk.
Speaker: I do cartoon voices.
Speaker: And then like a mallet to the skull, about 20 voices in 20 seconds.
Speaker: And...
Speaker: And then that was the start of it.
Speaker: I sent this showreel off to a bunch of people and it got a great response.
Speaker: And I started working on movies and games and I was very fortunate that it seemed to hit a nerve right at the start of my career with some big projects.
Speaker: And yeah, does that answer in a kind of wibbly-wobbly lots of words way?
Speaker: Well, no, absolutely.
Speaker: I want the 10 minute answer for the 30 second question.
Speaker: It works really well.
Speaker: In all seriousness, I will say that it's a talent that people don't appreciate how difficult it is.
Speaker: I think of back in the 80s, and I wish I knew what this guy's name was, but he did all of the movie trailers.
Speaker: Don LaFontaine.
Speaker: Yes, that guy.
Speaker: And he basically he was known because he was that guy was like back in the era of, you know, like I think he did all of them.
Speaker: And so he would just show up and he'd read them.
Speaker: And he had that amazing voice.
Speaker: And the reason why they kept hiring him is because he had a talent that other people did not have.
Speaker: And I think people don't recognize that being a voice actor is it is a talent unto itself.
Speaker: And there are all these people who do the voice acting, but there are people who really stick out and say, that's an amazing talent.
Speaker: And for you to be able to take what you do and to break out into a
Speaker: it's a faceless medium.
Speaker: Like, you're successful as a voice actor if you're able to be a chameleon and be able to do so many different options that people are like, oh, well, that's Mark Silk, too?
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Well, you mentioned Donald Fontaine.
Speaker: The thing that was great with him is he also was a brilliant performer.
Speaker: He had a great voice, but it's more than just having a good voice.
Speaker: I think most people can do a party piece and go, in a world.
Speaker: I mean, Donald Fontaine was actually the guy that wrote that line.
Speaker: He actually started off writing copy for promos and trailers.
Speaker: He was a brilliant performer.
Speaker: But yeah, there's now, for what I do, I...
Speaker: Variety is a big part of what I do.
Speaker: There's a great show that I grew up with called Danger Mouse and it was rebooted a few years ago.
Speaker: They were nice enough to bring me in on that show.
Speaker: I'm the voice of 31 characters on the first season of Danger Mouse.
Speaker: And then on the second season, it's an additional 12.
Speaker: Usually you're kind of doubling up or doing at least a handful of characters for bits and pieces.
Speaker: But it's everything from Star Wars.
Speaker: I worked with George Lucas on episode one of that performing character.
Speaker: In the UK, I get brought in to be every now and then Scooby-Doo and Shaggy.
Speaker: Like, man, it's really creepy, Scoob.
Speaker: Right, Scoob?
Speaker: Yeah, creepy.
Speaker: And there's stacks of stuff for Lego and... Oh, did... Okay, Bob the Builder.
Speaker: I was working on a show called Pingu over here, this animation show, stop-motion animation.
Speaker: And the people came in the booth and around the studio and they said, if you were to be the voice of a builder named Bob in the States, for the States, how would that sound?
Speaker: And I said, well, you could go...
Speaker: Come on, guys, let's hustle.
Speaker: We've got to build this wall.
Speaker: I'm not made of cash.
Speaker: Union rules.
Speaker: Let's go.
Speaker: And they said, maybe a little friendlier.
Speaker: I said, okay, how about, hi, I'm going to build a house.
Speaker: Somewhere in the middle.
Speaker: And I kind of tried, hi, I'm Bob the Builder.
Speaker: How you doing?
Speaker: Can we fix it?
Speaker: Yes, we can.
Speaker: Come on, Wendy, let's go.
Speaker: Scoop, mug, dizzy.
Speaker: Let's listen to Loser Kid.
Speaker: And, um...
Speaker: I got it.
Speaker: And I was the voice of Bob the Builder in the States for about a decade.
Speaker: America and Canada.
Speaker: If you grew up with Bob the Builder, you probably heard me.
Speaker: Mm-hmm.
Speaker: Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker: What amazes me is that this always surprised me when Star Wars was rebooted for the prequels, how they went to Frank Oz and they said, and he had forgotten how to create the Yoda voice, which is funny because everybody makes, I don't want to say makes fun of, but they emulate it.
Speaker: It's such a stereotype, right?
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And so when you have voiced how
Speaker: hundreds of actors, how do you say, oh, that's how I make the sounds to sound like that?
Speaker: Because you're really trying to say, okay, I'm going to say this line in this character, this line in that character.
Speaker: And it's the same thing as audio books, like really talented audio book narrators.
Speaker: They're able to go through and do
Speaker: the different character voices.
Speaker: And I believe like Harry Potter, the last book had like over 150 characters.
Speaker: And so that guy was- It's an art form.
Speaker: What you said is so true.
Speaker: And when we're doing animation, we tend to, if we're in a, my favorite shows that we work on, there's a great one called Go Jetters, which is on Universal Kids in the States and on the BBC over here.
Speaker: And I'm the voice of Grandmaster Glitch, the naughty person, the bad guy.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Him.
Speaker: And we do it lined up in the studio like you'd perform a radio show.
Speaker: You know, it's a full cast.
Speaker: And in that, we each perform one character each.
Speaker: But in lots of other shows, we perform multiple characters.
Speaker: And so we're kind of, you know, sometimes we'll have a scene performing to ourselves, doing it that way.
Speaker: But it really is a huge... You said about Frank Oz.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: That's a really interesting name to bring up because Frank Oz totally gets it.
Speaker: I've got such respect for Frank Oz and I learned so much from watching the work of him and Jim Henson.
Speaker: They were just brilliant character performers.
Speaker: The thing that you can hear a lot of people say in interviews when they're talking about his performances are, he's the voice of Miss Piggy or he's the voice of Yoda.
Speaker: It's more than that.
Speaker: He's the performer of Yoda.
Speaker: He's the puppeteer and the voice.
Speaker: It's all in one.
Speaker: It's not just the voice.
Speaker: And he's very particular on that.
Speaker: And most people, I would imagine, can do a decent little party piece of Miss Piggy or Yoda, but it's the acting ability, the ability to just bring that character to life.
Speaker: And the people who I adore watching their work are people really who you forget that it's them doing it because you totally believe in that character.
Speaker: You lose yourself in just enjoying...
Speaker: enjoying the story that they get out of the way and they let that character live.
Speaker: And that's what's terrific about what Jim Henson did and what Frank Oz does and the best people you can be in the room in.
Speaker: I love being in, it's a privilege sometimes just to be in the room with these people.
Speaker: There's a show I work on called Thunderbirds, not the paintball machine.
Speaker: Oh God.
Speaker: The International Rescue.
Speaker: International, put it in a skip.
Speaker: The 5, 4, 3, 12, 1.
Speaker: That one.
Speaker: So I grew up as a, I'm a massive fan of the original Thunderbirds show.
Speaker: The one from the 60s.
Speaker: I watched it on repeats, by the way, for the record in the 80s.
Speaker: Thank you.
Speaker: And when you watch those shows back now, it was big in the UK, huge in, I think, Japan as well.
Speaker: And it went to America, but it wasn't as big as in the UK.
Speaker: It's a really big, iconic show in the UK still.
Speaker: And when you look at the restored, they remastered everything a few years ago in HD from the original 35 mil negatives.
Speaker: And the quality of some of the special effects and everything, it still looks really cool now.
Speaker: Massive, massive orchestral scores, special effects done by a guy called Derek Meddings, who went on to do the work on Bond, and brilliant voice acting.
Speaker: Well, I got brought into...
Speaker: work on the reboot of Thunderbirds called Thunderbirds Are Go.
Speaker: And again, just the production standards of what they do.
Speaker: You've got Weta Studios, Peter Jackson Studio, doing all the massive models for this thing.
Speaker: And then the CGI characters on top of that.
Speaker: And then I work with Rosamund Pike and a guy called David Graham, who's a brilliant voice actor.
Speaker: And the voice of Jeff Tracy in this new series is Lee Majors.
Speaker: Wow.
Speaker: This is a great Christmas party.
Speaker: But yeah, it's a real thrill to be part of that.
Speaker: Okay, it is funny.
Speaker: You did bring up the Muppets.
Speaker: And ironically, my wife was playing this yesterday.
Speaker: It's the Hamilton soundtrack that's sung by the Muppets.
Speaker: Last Genius.
Speaker: It's one of the funniest things, especially there was one song that was just a chicken singing.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And the great thing is, like, I knew the song.
Speaker: And so it was just hilarious.
Speaker: It took about five minutes to get into it.
Speaker: And you're like, I don't know if I can deal with this.
Speaker: After 30 minutes, you're like, this is brilliant.
Speaker: This is hilarious.
Speaker: The first film I ever worked on, I got it because of an audition I did as a chicken.
Speaker: Back when they did the first chicken run, this is right at the very beginning of my career in voice acting.
Speaker: Aardman Animation, who I loved their work, they needed extra chickens.
Speaker: They did the Wallace and Gromit thing, right?
Speaker: Exactly.
Speaker: Yes.
Speaker: So in fact, I have an actual Wallace puppet here in the studio.
Speaker: So they needed extra chickens to just flesh out the soundtrack because they needed just extra layering for additional dialogue recording.
Speaker: So I got a phone call saying, look, I'm going to do this film called Chicken Run.
Speaker: They need extra chickens.
Speaker: Can you just send in some recordings of you being a chicken, please?
Speaker: So I thought, well, I'm going to do something good.
Speaker: So I put this thing together showing that I understood the acting side of what they'd need.
Speaker: So I did Chicken Waking Up.
Speaker: Chicken walking down the street.
Speaker: Nervous chicken because the farmer's come out of the farmhouse.
Speaker: And then chicken being picked up by the farmer.
Speaker: Yeah, that kind of thing.
Speaker: And so to be honest, anyone that does kind of good chicken performances should be able to do that.
Speaker: So I thought I want them to see that I get kind of their comedy sensibility as well.
Speaker: So I got a hold of an instrumental version of Frank Sinatra's New York, New York and did five part harmonies of going...
Speaker: And I got it.
Speaker: And anytime they wanted me to step up to the mic to do a character for Chicken Run, they would just shout, can I have a Sinatra chicken in place?
Speaker: And it got me the gig.
Speaker: As a kid, were you that guy who was hanging out with your buddies and trying to make everybody laugh by making different voices?
Speaker: No, I wasn't.
Speaker: I think I was the quiet one taking it all in.
Speaker: I was the studious one.
Speaker: I was kind of the teenager that was kind of just taking it all in, watching the others, letting other people be noisy, but then...
Speaker: go and learn how to play the piano by myself or learn how to edit by myself or perform or do that.
Speaker: That wasn't me, no.
Speaker: So I started quiet and got louder.
Speaker: You know, I think that's a very common theme with people is that it really seems that the people that I've met that I consider exceptional at their trade, they tend to be...
Speaker: I guess not your stereotypical teenager.
Speaker: They tend to be a little more introverted, a little more observing teenage life as opposed to experiencing it.
Speaker: Now, I don't know if that's the best way of describing it, but I think it captures it that they're thinking differently than other kids.
Speaker: Mother always said it was special.
Speaker: Oh, I know.
Speaker: It's so good.
Speaker: But I just figure it translates a little bit to approaching their career a different way than what would be considered a stereotype.
Speaker: It is interesting that you tend to find that in a whole bunch of people, that usually the people who are, well, I really love their work or just being around them as friends.
Speaker: They're people who you can be in a room and you can just own that space in what you're performing.
Speaker: But also sometimes you need to have a conversation too.
Speaker: If you always turn up to 11, it gets a bit tedious after a while.
Speaker: It's exhausting.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: There's a point where you go, okay, can we just bring it down a little now?
Speaker: But no, there's a good balance to be had.
Speaker: But I look at so many heroes and it's interesting as well how over time you find your voice.
Speaker: There's a big, I think there's a massive connection between if you're, do you play a musical instrument?
Speaker: Are you musical?
Speaker: So I actually, I started college as a music major in voice performance.
Speaker: And so I did.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: I did.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Oh, well.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: Now that being said, I was competent enough.
Speaker: I was never, I realized very quickly that I was good, but I was never going to be great.
Speaker: And then I, uh, so, uh, you know, I, I served a mission for my church and that was two, that took two years out.
Speaker: So I went to college for a year and I was always in performing like joke, you know, uh, show choir and that kind of stuff.
Speaker: And, uh, then I did college for a year and then I, uh,
Speaker: Went on a mission for two years teaching people.
Speaker: And I started thinking about, okay, so I enjoy it enough, but I'm never going to be exceptional at it.
Speaker: So what should I start looking at?
Speaker: And that's when I came home and I was always good at math.
Speaker: And so I actually decided to be an engineer, which is a completely linear transition.
Speaker: So I started over and I took a lot of classes that I needed to for engineering.
Speaker: And then I decided to...
Speaker: go to medical school.
Speaker: So I basically didn't have a straightforward loop on anything.
Speaker: Okay, that's interesting you say that.
Speaker: I nearly didn't do a media class at school.
Speaker: I did one, but the reason that I nearly didn't do a media class at school was I was kind of shy-ish because
Speaker: You're at that point as a teenager where you don't want to make a dope of yourself in front of your friends.
Speaker: And to go out there and go, look, aren't I wonderful?
Speaker: People might go, no, no, you're not.
Speaker: And so there was this media course that involved production and being on the mixing desk and being a camera guy and editing.
Speaker: And that really appealed to me.
Speaker: But part of it too, part of this course I went on also involved a performance side.
Speaker: And at that point I thought, no, it's not me.
Speaker: No, no, no, it's not me.
Speaker: Even though I think I kind of knew I could do it, I didn't feel comfortable doing that.
Speaker: Anyway, I chose to do it and it changed my life genuinely because it's like that thing where you're pushed in the pool and you realize you can swim really well.
Speaker: And this media course I did, I found out it was everything I love.
Speaker: It was music, technology, music.
Speaker: storytelling, characters, production, all of that all in one.
Speaker: And it genuinely, it was one of those moments in your life where you go, oh, hang on.
Speaker: Yeah, that's what I'm about.
Speaker: This is what I should be doing.
Speaker: And then I'd always been musical as well.
Speaker: I played the piano ever since I was seven.
Speaker: And I've recorded production music libraries for broadcast and games and commercials and all that kind of thing.
Speaker: And then bit by bit, you find your voice.
Speaker: And that sounds a little bit arty, but kind of any performer, eventually you start off when you're learning how to play an instrument, like basically copying your heroes.
Speaker: You know, I was a massive Billy Joel fan.
Speaker: I still am.
Speaker: And when I started playing the piano, you just kind of, I just want to play all these Billy Joel tracks.
Speaker: And then eventually after a while, you start creating your own tunes and you become your own thing.
Speaker: You go from being the cover band to the band, but you can still do a few covers every now and then.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And it took me, I'd say it took me about 10 years to find my voice as like a, just like, just talking like myself on a, on, as a performer for TV commercials or movie trailers, or even just like this, just talking like me.
Speaker: Cause it takes a while to figure out who you are as a, you know, a voice in this kind of thing.
Speaker: As a, as an angry, as an angry guy from the, from New York, I could do that fine.
Speaker: I knew what he sounded like, but I didn't know what I sounded like.
Speaker: And so, yeah, and then it kind of, it all kind of, it kind of all distills down into you, really.
Speaker: Do you, is it nice because you get to do voices and stuff like that and there's still some, like, I look at, like, Johnny Depp and them, like, you know who Johnny Depp is because you see his face.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: But you kind of get the luxury of, like, you get to do some of the famous parts, but you still get to live somewhat a private life, correct?
Speaker: Listen to my famous parts.
Speaker: No, that's a really astute thing to say, genuinely, Josh, because I had someone ask me recently, you know, it must be awful people not knowing who you are, you know, in terms of like, you know, you walk down the street and no one would know that you might be the voice of their favorite TV character or game character.
Speaker: I said, no, it's fantastic because what you said is so true.
Speaker: You get the best of both worlds.
Speaker: You get to work with some of the most talented people in that field of their industry, and yet you can walk down the street and not get bothered.
Speaker: You can still have a regular life.
Speaker: Then the other side to that is I'll get asked to do Comic Cons and things where you're doing these big signing sessions.
Speaker: And so you get to meet people who do enjoy your work.
Speaker: And also it's lovely for me to just meet other people that we all love the same stuff.
Speaker: So yeah, it's a really nice, it's a really lovely balance.
Speaker: And then...
Speaker: And then, you know, like the pinball side of stuff.
Speaker: I love this as a hobby.
Speaker: You know, what brought us together is basically I have a love of pinball.
Speaker: The fact that I now work, the fact that I'm now in my voice is in a pinball machine now is just a lovely bonus.
Speaker: But yeah, I mean, it's driven by just something that I happen to love.
Speaker: Now you brought that up.
Speaker: So we, that was our intention when we got you on was to actually talk about that.
Speaker: But we were talking about a lot of interesting stuff in your life.
Speaker: You can cut the other stuff out.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Where did that transition start?
Speaker: Like, did you approach any of the companies or did they say, hey, there's this guy who really likes pinball and he has a great voice acting talent.
Speaker: Maybe we can get him in.
Speaker: How did that turn from a niche to a niche niche?
Speaker: It was kind of accidental on purpose sort of thing.
Speaker: I've always loved pinball.
Speaker: As a kid, I had a little Tomy Atomic pinball machine.
Speaker: On the Commodore Amiga computer, I played Pinball Fantasies, this game, which was stunning.
Speaker: I'd go to arcades here in the UK and love playing pinball.
Speaker: And then it all went away.
Speaker: And then I kind of got back into it a couple of years ago with the rise of barcades here in the UK and in the States.
Speaker: And I found out about Expo in Chicago.
Speaker: And in 2018, I went out to Expo just as a fan.
Speaker: And I just, I loved it.
Speaker: I brought the guy that works for me over there as well.
Speaker: And it was just, it was great to just go and watch people whose work I love talk about how they do it.
Speaker: And bit by bit, I didn't go around kind of going, do you know who I think I am?
Speaker: I'm marvelous.
Speaker: I, you know, I bumped into a bunch of people and we just kind of kept in touch, but I didn't really push for any work or anything.
Speaker: I was just happy to enjoy what they do.
Speaker: And then over time,
Speaker: I was in, you know, I chatted, I did stuff for Ken Cromwell on his podcast.
Speaker: And I, you know, I really respected what Jason Fowler was doing and a bunch of others.
Speaker: And they were very nice and sort of spread the word about what I do.
Speaker: And this one day, Greg Bone put a video out of him blowing up the Star Wars machine that he had.
Speaker: Yeah, huge Star Wars fan.
Speaker: And I just sent him a note saying, nice job, beautiful work, sir.
Speaker: And he got back in touch with me saying something along the lines of, hang on, were you in Star Wars?
Speaker: I went, yeah.
Speaker: And the conversation went something like, you never said.
Speaker: And I said, well, you never asked.
Speaker: And it kind of then grew that there was someone that loved pinball, which just as a hobby, which is me, who happened to do this kind of work on a bigger scale.
Speaker: And then down the line, I was listening to Ken's show.
Speaker: Special when lit.
Speaker: I had the t-shirt.
Speaker: And I think he was talking to Dwight.
Speaker: I think he was talking to Dwight Sullivan.
Speaker: And they happened to be just talking about creativity and projects from the future.
Speaker: And I was walking my little dog in the city center.
Speaker: And they started talking about me.
Speaker: And that was that.
Speaker: I just started my tracks.
Speaker: What?
Speaker: Because I was happy to hear Dwight Sullivan talk about how talented he was and projects that he adored and people he wanted to work with.
Speaker: They mentioned my name.
Speaker: And he got, yeah, I'm up for that.
Speaker: Yes, please.
Speaker: And then over time, they were nice enough to invite me to work on this project.
Speaker: And I went out back to Expo again in 2019 and just had a really good chat with everyone.
Speaker: And bit by bit, I've been working on Turtles since the end of last year.
Speaker: And Matt, I'm so proud of the work we've done.
Speaker: And it was a thrill for me as well, because you hear people from the fan side talk about what they think is going on and how they think it works.
Speaker: And inevitably, it is noise that way.
Speaker: And what you realize is the people that are...
Speaker: the creative minds behind this, they genuinely care like hell and just want to make the best possible game they can.
Speaker: And it was lovely for me to get to work with them too, because, you know, I enjoy their work.
Speaker: I'm a fan too, you know.
Speaker: I want to get the games as much as you do.
Speaker: So my question was, when you record for a pinball machine, the code is evolving.
Speaker: They have probably some parameters of what they're trying to do to tell the story.
Speaker: Sure.
Speaker: So they'll give you, I don't know, how many lines they would actually give you to record.
Speaker: And then they, I'm sure, slice and dice and try to integrate them into the code and the story.
Speaker: So how much recording is there?
Speaker: that you do versus how much ends up in the game.
Speaker: And maybe this is, you may not even know at this point, but I believe the code is almost complete or at least code complete now that it's shipping.
Speaker: Well, we recorded, there's a lot of dialogue in this machine.
Speaker: There's a stack of characters, but also there's a lot of dialogue.
Speaker: So I'm looking forward to hearing me.
Speaker: I'm looking forward to playing with myself.
Speaker: It's going to be quite a thrill.
Speaker: But really, it's the same as any computer game that I would work on.
Speaker: I've worked on computer games for years now.
Speaker: And with this, we got a very clear... We've got pages and pages and pages of dialogue.
Speaker: So you've got obvious things in terms of, you know, there's a beginning, middle and an end.
Speaker: So right at the beginning of Turtles, you'll hear, you know, choose your turtle, you know, Leonardo, you have been chosen, you know, this kind of thing.
Speaker: And even down to there's a whole stack of stuff that you have to bear in mind when you're performing any character for anything, whether it's a game or a movie or a pimple machine.
Speaker: and one of them is sustaining that character.
Speaker: It might sound like a really obvious thing, but you've got to make sure that character sounds the same throughout the entire game.
Speaker: Because if you go off character, it'll just sound weird.
Speaker: And you've heard that in TV shows.
Speaker: And also, you've got to make sure it sounds like the character.
Speaker: Sometimes you'll watch a show and you can hear the guy reading it.
Speaker: You want to make it sound like the actual character.
Speaker: And one of the things with... I'm the voice of Splinter in The Turtles Machine.
Speaker: And, um,
Speaker: By the way, the animation in this thing is amazing.
Speaker: I've been so blown away with what a great job they've done.
Speaker: It looks better than the original series.
Speaker: But with Splinter, we made a conscious choice of sort of almost doing a mix of... It was very clearly grounded in the original series of Turtles, but also the voice of Splinter changed pretty much season to season.
Speaker: So we kind of kept that nice kind of mystical side of him.
Speaker: So it still sounds like splinter.
Speaker: But the other thing as well, as the character is leading you around the game,
Speaker: the temptation is to shout, you know, multi-ball, you know, or go nuts.
Speaker: And of course, if you do that, that no longer sounds like Splinter.
Speaker: So you have to find a way of expressing the thought, but still staying in character for a really exciting moment.
Speaker: And there's a stack of them in the Turtles game, but it was, they've been really clever how they've used each of the characters to help tell the story and still keep it exciting as you're going around the play field.
Speaker: So which characters, I know you voiced, you said six of them, which six characters do you voice?
Speaker: Yeah, I'm Splinter, Bebop, Rocksteady, Baxter, Baxter Fly, and Casey Jones.
Speaker: And Casey Jones, I think, is kind of dovetailed into a wizard mode.
Speaker: Is that correct?
Speaker: Oh, I haven't played it yet.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: I don't want to spoil the surprise.
Speaker: I think that would make a great deal of sense.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: Well, yeah.
Speaker: Dwight actually talked about this, and he talked about the challenge of doing the storyboard of the story and saying that he had so much Casey Jones, but eventually there's only so much you can put in the game, so they had to narrow it down.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah, yeah.
Speaker: I remember him saying how he would have liked more.
Speaker: Yeah, I think the way they've used each of the characters was pretty clever.
Speaker: And it's kind of... I like the fact that they were true to the original show by using Splinter to be your guide throughout the whole thing.
Speaker: Because it could have been tempting to use the turtles, but to have the turtles...
Speaker: be the action-packed voices and characters for these key moments and to lead you into certain spaces, I think is great.
Speaker: But to have Splinter as the narrator and the guide that's just a bit more grounded works really well.
Speaker: It takes you through it and you're not going to get tired of that.
Speaker: It's something that you're happy to just sit along and take you for that journey.
Speaker: It's a nice start.
Speaker: And I'm over the moon to just... I've been watching all the feeds like you have.
Speaker: I just want to get that multi-ball.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: No, it's great.
Speaker: So when are they going to be able to get one to you?
Speaker: When are you going to have one in your recording studio?
Speaker: I've got an Ellie on its way and it should be here by the end of this month.
Speaker: Fingers crossed.
Speaker: Nice.
Speaker: So you will jump on a boat and you can come and have a go.
Speaker: You have to wear a mask and gloves, but you're in.
Speaker: Yeah, well, I have a premium coming.
Speaker: So when that comes, however, I had to buy the Artblade separate and the shaker motor, but you get those stocks.
Speaker: One of the reasons I wanted it was for the upgraded audio.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Obviously.
Speaker: When's yours due?
Speaker: You know what?
Speaker: They don't know.
Speaker: I was talking with Josh about this earlier because he's getting a pro and I'm getting a premium.
Speaker: Yes.
Speaker: And we're trying to figure out that in the past, they have done the LEs, then the pros, and then they've done the premiums last.
Speaker: But it sounds like they're planning on mixing this up a little bit.
Speaker: And so they're alternating pros and premiums.
Speaker: So depending on where we are in the pecking order, I actually may get my premium before him.
Speaker: Oh, boy.
Speaker: I must ask somebody at Stern if there's any way of me getting a Translite, just a separate Translite, because I am blown away with the artwork that Jeremy Packer's done for this thing.
Speaker: It's absolutely gorgeous.
Speaker: Even on every machine, totally shines.
Speaker: The artwork on the Pro is terrific on the back glass, on the Translite.
Speaker: And every single cabinet, you'd be happy with any one of them.
Speaker: And Zombie Yeti talked about that, and he said the Pro was the first one he did, and that's the one that he tends to like the most just because of the centralization of the Turtles.
Speaker: I really love the Pro artwork, seriously.
Speaker: I was about to say the word simple, but that's almost not complimentary enough for it.
Speaker: But what he's done with that, there's a great focal point on that Pro artwork.
Speaker: on the Translate for the Pro.
Speaker: Same with the play field too.
Speaker: And the same with the cabinets.
Speaker: It just kind of, it does what it says in the tin.
Speaker: It's everything that you'd want as a fan of the show.
Speaker: And if you collected the toys, the LE artwork, it's full on.
Speaker: So I'm looking forward to that.
Speaker: But you know, I was very tempted by the Pro artwork.
Speaker: And I thought, well, if I'm in the game, I've got to get the LE.
Speaker: But if I had a Pro, I'd be happy.
Speaker: Well, and I think it looks great.
Speaker: And the good thing is, really, Translites aren't that expensive.
Speaker: They're $100 or something.
Speaker: So you can buy them and swap them out.
Speaker: Maybe I should get a Pro Translate for my LE.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Well, you could swap it.
Speaker: Have it on rotation.
Speaker: They're not hard to swap out.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: The only challenge is yours, since it's a back glass, you'd have to get an extra glass, and so you could put the Translight behind that.
Speaker: That's true.
Speaker: Yeah, but absolutely.
Speaker: You guys have distributors there.
Speaker: You can totally get one.
Speaker: Yeah, yeah.
Speaker: Oh, we got a really good one here, yeah.
Speaker: He's taking good care of us.
Speaker: So which character was the most fun to voice?
Speaker: Oh.
Speaker: Let's say, I like Bebop and Rocksteady.
Speaker: I mean, they're great fun.
Speaker: When you start going, when you start,
Speaker: talking like this the whole time.
Speaker: It just goes nuts.
Speaker: But frankly, the calm nature of Splinter was a nice change because a lot of the time I'm going nuts doing game voices and animation voices.
Speaker: So to have the calmness of Splinter, which is more like a kind of mystical version of my own voice, was really quite calming.
Speaker: So I'm going to go with Splinter.
Speaker: I think I'm going to go with Splinter.
Speaker: I think I need to stay.
Speaker: If you need any birthday messages or voicemails, we can do them as Splinter.
Speaker: There you go.
Speaker: Yeah, he will take you there.
Speaker: He'd be a good GPS voice.
Speaker: Yeah, he would be.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Well, back in the day when you buy the Garmin was big here, you could buy the alternative voices and you could get one of those Yoda.
Speaker: Like, turn here, you will.
Speaker: I did a lot of those.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Take the left turn.
Speaker: Now go straight ahead.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And I wish you could do that easily on, uh, cause everybody's basically defaulted their phone for GPS.
Speaker: And so it'd be easy if you could, you know, pay a few bucks and get an alternate voice on there.
Speaker: But the, you know, I, I just don't think it's worth their headache and dealing with licensing for that and,
Speaker: No, you're not going to need it.
Speaker: This thing is so packed.
Speaker: Also, with what Jerry Thompson has done for the sound on this game, it is so true to the original.
Speaker: It is full on 80s, all those big stings and hits and whooshes and bangs and all the iconic synth sounds that you love from your favorite 80s band.
Speaker: They are all in this machine.
Speaker: Jerry's a master.
Speaker: See, you're making me regret not getting the LE now.
Speaker: Maybe I'll need to upgrade my sound package so I can actually hear everything better.
Speaker: I had a major sound upgrade on a machine of mine a couple of weeks ago.
Speaker: And oh my God, it is shaking the floor now.
Speaker: It sounds absolutely stunning.
Speaker: And it's one, I listened to your podcast about this.
Speaker: And it's the game that I don't think has got the love that it really deserves.
Speaker: And if you had to guess, which one would you guess it would be?
Speaker: Um, okay.
Speaker: Is it, uh, I'm going to narrow it down.
Speaker: I'm going to play five questions.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: So is it in the last 10 years?
Speaker: Yep.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: And, uh, is it Stern?
Speaker: Yes.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: And hasn't got the love that it deserves.
Speaker: So, you know, I would say I would narrow it down to two choices and I'm just going to, so I'm going to guess final answer.
Speaker: It's either monsters or stranger things.
Speaker: Oh, man.
Speaker: Really?
Speaker: Star Wars Home.
Speaker: Oh, you know what?
Speaker: Actually, that... Okay.
Speaker: The challenge is I've never actually played one of those because there just haven't been any here.
Speaker: However, I mean...
Speaker: uh, Gomez, he designed it.
Speaker: And really from everything I've heard about it, they're like, you know, it's actually a pretty fun game.
Speaker: I think, uh, people in the industry, people in the hobby feel kind of snobbish about it.
Speaker: It's like, Oh, it's not, it's not a real pro game.
Speaker: And I'm just like, actually it looks pretty good to me.
Speaker: Well, I, um,
Speaker: I absolutely, I've been blown away by it.
Speaker: And there's the way that a whole bunch of fans were talking quite negatively about it last year.
Speaker: And I kind of kept a very open mind and played it at Expo.
Speaker: By the way, I'm probably in an unusual situation, whereas I love Star Wars, I love pinball, and I was in Star Wars.
Speaker: So there's a few niche things to tick on the list.
Speaker: I played it at Expo.
Speaker: It was so much fun.
Speaker: And I had an open mind and I was ready to go, no, the fanboys were right.
Speaker: Seriously, no.
Speaker: It's a stack of fun.
Speaker: It's instant gratification.
Speaker: This is not a deep rule set or anything like that, but there's still enough to do.
Speaker: It was right next to a Beatles machine, which I also have and love.
Speaker: But this is, it sounds terrific.
Speaker: The sound design in it is great.
Speaker: They have, they've used the same palette of audio and video that are in the, you know, in the other game, which is the Pro Premium and LE from the other game from a few years ago.
Speaker: But this is a different game.
Speaker: And the one thing that I thought was interesting was hearing people that own, say, the Pearl of the Premium say they are seeing media on the home game that they never saw in their own game.
Speaker: And what's great is it is quick and easy.
Speaker: And if you're not a huge pinball player, or even if you are, it is a step up, 10 minutes, have a go, blast the thing out the roof, and you'll just be smiling the whole time.
Speaker: By default...
Speaker: It comes with one speaker, which as a sound guy, I want the biggest speaker system you can get.
Speaker: So a few days ago, or a couple of weeks ago, I had it upgraded to stereo speakers, a new amp, and there's even a hole cut in the bottom for the subwoofer.
Speaker: And oh my God,
Speaker: With that sound system now, it is incredible.
Speaker: So I had a musician friend who's not a big pinhead, but he likes pinball.
Speaker: And he's played on my machines in the past.
Speaker: And he came over a couple of weeks ago.
Speaker: And he played Beatles, Monster Bash, Attack from Mars, Batman 66, and Star Wars Home.
Speaker: His two favorite games were, in second place, Monster Bash.
Speaker: In first place, Star Wars.
Speaker: Seriously.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Because he stepped up to it, plunged the thing, and straight away you've got the John Williams score, C-3PO, R2 Deto, all the sound effects that you know and love, and within like 30 seconds he's got a multiball, and he feels like he's just blown the thing up and was just in absolute hysterics.
Speaker: And seriously, it is such an underrated game.
Speaker: And it's a full-size play field.
Speaker: And I was expecting it to maybe not feel quite as good as a regular machine.
Speaker: Do you know what?
Speaker: It feels fine.
Speaker: It really feels good.
Speaker: So yeah, for Pinball Santa, I highly recommend it.
Speaker: Seriously.
Speaker: After you've got your turtles.
Speaker: Absolutely.
Speaker: Absolutely.
Speaker: Okay, actually, I do want to get a little bit more into the sound.
Speaker: And really, I listened to Scott Denisi, and he talked about this, that how sound is such a necessary part of the experience.
Speaker: And he pointed out that that's one of the things that took TNA to the, I guess, the recognition that it had is because the Whitewood he had had this premium quality sound system.
Speaker: And it's a great soundtrack.
Speaker: And so it really brought him in.
Speaker: And I have always argued that the most important part of Star Wars for its success was actually the John Williams soundtrack.
Speaker: I totally agree.
Speaker: Yep.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And if you've, if you've heard, uh, if you've seen the video of them walking in the very end of star Wars, where they're going to get their medallions and everything.
Speaker: And, uh, you know, when they jipped Chewbacca out of getting a medallion, cause he's a dog for some reason.
Speaker: Um, but you can watch the video without any sound and it looks ridiculous.
Speaker: But it's the same thing as when you have Darth Vader and you have the actor who's doing it.
Speaker: And he has a very high voice.
Speaker: And when you swap it out for – oh, I'm blanking on his name.
Speaker: James Earl Jones.
Speaker: Yes.
Speaker: Yes.
Speaker: And when you swap it out, it makes it different.
Speaker: And it's a complete different experience when you have the right voice with the actor.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Well, what you mentioned is Star Wars the movie.
Speaker: Imagine that movie without that soundtrack.
Speaker: Imagine Star Wars.
Speaker: Imagine C-3PO and it didn't sound like C-3PO or R2-D2 without those sound effects.
Speaker: And that's a testament to Ben Burtt's amazing sound design.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Sound is 50% of the experience, and anyone that doesn't hear a game with the full sound blasting through the speakers, they are missing out on a huge part of the experience.
Speaker: Of course, the shots have got to be good.
Speaker: Of course, the rules have got to be good.
Speaker: But when you hear that with that soundtrack...
Speaker: The difference between me playing the Star Wars home game with just the one speaker to the upgrade that it was given, it's astonishing.
Speaker: Do you know what?
Speaker: Actually, to be fair to it...
Speaker: It sounded way better than I ever expected it to be with the one speaker.
Speaker: It still sounded good, but with a stunning audio system.
Speaker: Oh my God, it sends it through the roof.
Speaker: I mean, what we're going to get on Turtle's LE is going to sound great as well.
Speaker: But seriously, the sound design in any machine for the music, the call outs, just all of the effects, every pop bumper, every slingshot, every hit, every drop target,
Speaker: That's what creates these key moments.
Speaker: You know, you look at something like Adam's Family, just before the multiball happens, it stops and there is a moment.
Speaker: It's theater.
Speaker: It's a roller coaster.
Speaker: And that's the stuff that's exciting.
Speaker: You know, it's light and shade.
Speaker: If you look at your favorite films, how music and sound effects and voices are used, it's creating...
Speaker: It's creating anticipation or absolute rollercoaster thrills or the sense of tension.
Speaker: Get ready, something massive is about to happen.
Speaker: And then when you do something incredible, when you get a high score, to have that fanfare that you feel like you've really achieved something.
Speaker: This is so much a part of the audio and the light show too.
Speaker: You mentioned TNA with what he did on that.
Speaker: The sound on that thing, when that would play in our local barcade, it was blowing away all the other machines there because it just sounded so good.
Speaker: I come from a sound background, so I love it as a fan, but I appreciate it as someone that works in it too.
Speaker: Here's a question.
Speaker: Do you have a pinball machine that you absolutely adore?
Speaker: that you would love to hear completely restored audio, where at the moment the audio isn't great in terms of, say, call-outs, but you'd love to hear a fully restored version from the original recording tape?
Speaker: You know, my oldest machine is Black Rose.
Speaker: Oh, and it sounds very late 80s, early 90s.
Speaker: It does not have any modern sort of sounding.
Speaker: I'm surprised, Scott, you didn't go with X-Men because X-Men.
Speaker: Well, that whole sound package just needs to be replaced.
Speaker: I'm sorry.
Speaker: I wish I loved the game more than I, because I have a beautiful X-Men, but it's right next to Tron, and I just, for the life of me, have a hard time enjoying X-Men.
Speaker: And I think the sound has always been detracting, and I'm not the only one who thinks that on that game.
Speaker: I'll tell you what mine is.
Speaker: I've never owned an Addams Family, and it's one of those where I feel I should have it.
Speaker: But a beautiful, restored, you know, completely beautiful restoration of the game.
Speaker: But what I would love is, I would love it if Chris Granner, the sound designer of Adam's Family, has the original recording sessions in high quality on a reel-to-reel or a dat tape somewhere that he did back in, what would it be, 92?
Speaker: Because the only version of those call-outs we've ever heard is really low bitrate, crunchy.
Speaker: It's what we're used to.
Speaker: And you get people that play around with things like Pinsound that will do an alternate version of those call-outs and the music.
Speaker: But the thing that makes Adam's Family, Adam's Family, is that sounding soundtrack and those performance of those call-outs.
Speaker: But...
Speaker: I would love it if somewhere in a drawer, he's got that original recording session and they did a remake of Adam's Family, but with beautiful, brand new, sounds like they were recorded today, call outs from Raoul Julia.
Speaker: I think that Lord of the Rings falls into that category, too, where everyone, you know, they love the game, but the sound is it's still not quite what they would want.
Speaker: And the art package is well, if there were a high res version of it, it would be so much better.
Speaker: But the gameplay is still so much more fun.
Speaker: But that that is one of the reasons.
Speaker: The evolution slash revolution of pinball over the last 10 years is the upgrading of the sound packages where before they were just kind of junk.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And then there's a fine line too, because as somebody that loves the game for what it is, one of the reasons why we do love it is because of that 8-bit quality sometimes.
Speaker: You look at Pac-Man.
Speaker: And well, yes, of course you could do it now with much higher res graphics, but it wouldn't be Pac-Man.
Speaker: You know, the same with synthesizer and the sound you hear in Turtles, the certain drum noises and synth sounds that make it, um, that make it authentic to that period in time.
Speaker: And same with Adam.
Speaker: So you'd, you'd still want to hear that music kind of sound like that, but it's just with the call outs for me.
Speaker: If I, if we could get those call outs in a remake or, uh,
Speaker: We need to find a friend of Chris Granner and start digging through his studio drawers.
Speaker: Yeah, that's always the challenge of restoration, right?
Speaker: You want it to be updated, but retro at the same time.
Speaker: You're trying to capture the spirit of the moment because it wouldn't be the same.
Speaker: Yeah, yeah.
Speaker: Have you ever played around with Pinsound?
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: You know, I haven't because I am not that technical when it comes to computers.
Speaker: I have.
Speaker: I bought a Flintstones machine last year.
Speaker: Really?
Speaker: Yeah, just because I wanted an animation theme.
Speaker: And it was a really nice restoration with brand new decals.
Speaker: And, you know, it was the animation overlay.
Speaker: So it didn't look like the movie version.
Speaker: It looked like an old school cartoon version of the game.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: And it was the classy version of the Translite as well.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: I know the alternate, yeah.
Speaker: Yeah, it's the code.
Speaker: So it was that.
Speaker: And you know what?
Speaker: For just a... It's actually quite a fun game for what it is.
Speaker: And I don't have it anymore, but I really enjoy... I got a pin sound and just hearing the same audio, but in a better ramp, it sounded good to begin with.
Speaker: But then...
Speaker: If you like tinkering around as well, it allowed you to go and change call-outs.
Speaker: And I didn't really want to do much with it because it kind of worked.
Speaker: It sounded pretty good.
Speaker: And also a good game.
Speaker: Really, a good game.
Speaker: You shouldn't want to go and change it.
Speaker: It's like you listen to Turtles.
Speaker: You don't want to change it.
Speaker: Sounds good.
Speaker: But you listen to Flintstones.
Speaker: When I worked with Cartoon Network, I get brought in every now and then to be the voice of Barney Robble.
Speaker: And so I had a friend and her kids coming over to just visit around the time just after I bought this machine.
Speaker: So I recorded some custom call outs for the kids as Marty Ruppel.
Speaker: And it was like, you know, oh, come on, Tim, it's your turn.
Speaker: I don't feel afraid.
Speaker: It was always, you've got a multi-ball, and slammed a load of those in.
Speaker: And the look on their face as they're playing this game, and it's saying their name.
Speaker: Oh, man.
Speaker: It's custom call-outs as part of downloads.
Speaker: That's the future.
Speaker: There you go.
Speaker: That's the DLC.
Speaker: Yes.
Speaker: I would do that.
Speaker: So, Mark, I've got to ask, though.
Speaker: So, what...
Speaker: Like with Ninja Turtles and stuff like that, when you come up upon a project that you're doing voices for and whatnot, how do you research?
Speaker: Is there a certain approach you have to it?
Speaker: How do you get inspiration for that?
Speaker: Oh, yeah.
Speaker: It depends on what it is.
Speaker: If it's a brand new thing, if it's a brand new show or say like with Star Wars, they showed us, they told us about the characters and they talked about the kind of sound and characteristics of that.
Speaker: And we'll come up with...
Speaker: voices that we think will represent that well.
Speaker: With Turtles, this is something that's already there.
Speaker: And, you know, the actors, if you bring original actors back in, they don't always sound the same.
Speaker: Well, they've aged.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: So their voice timbre is going to be different.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And, you know, same with singers.
Speaker: You'll have singers that they'll bring the key down when they perform it live now, 20 years on, because they can't do the high notes.
Speaker: So, but with titles, I watched everything.
Speaker: I bought all the episodes and just watched them all again.
Speaker: I went through everything from season one again.
Speaker: And looked at the bigger picture of turtles as well.
Speaker: And if I'm a fan, you know, I watched these back then and loved them.
Speaker: And my brother was a massive turtles fan.
Speaker: But I wanted to make sure that what I thought it sounded like in my head was what it actually sounded like.
Speaker: And it's funny, even going back to the original animation of turtles from the late 80s.
Speaker: This is one of those shows that they've never restored it.
Speaker: They've never gone back to the original film and made it look pretty.
Speaker: And some of it, just because of the nature of the beast, it was a little rough around the edges, some of the animation.
Speaker: You know, we were talking about the animation earlier and what they've done within the game.
Speaker: I actually think it's the best representation it's had in animation.
Speaker: And especially for this, just the graphic artwork that Jeremy's done from the play field.
Speaker: Honestly, I collect animation art going right back to the 40s for Pinocchio and stuff.
Speaker: And the work that he's done representing these characters, it is so good.
Speaker: It is so true to the time.
Speaker: And you feel that you're playing with the turtles that you grew up in and loved.
Speaker: But going back to what you said, I watched every single episode of
Speaker: and made sure that what I was doing was true to the intention that they were doing.
Speaker: So you kind of, yes, you have to, to a point, you're emulating the sound of what they sounded like.
Speaker: You have to, to a point.
Speaker: But also to create a new performance, you have to understand the intention of why they were doing it that way.
Speaker: Otherwise, you're just copying someone else all the time, you know, and we're looking to take it to a whole new level, something new and something fresh for this game.
Speaker: So, yeah, I did a stack of research.
Speaker: I spent a lot of time...
Speaker: watching it.
Speaker: And then of course, you've never heard Splinter guide a player around a play field.
Speaker: So it's interpreting how do you take that character and how do you make it work and sound authentic and a stack of fun as well for when you play in the game.
Speaker: But yeah, it took a good while, but I think you're going to be happy.
Speaker: Okay, so Mark, how long have you been collecting games?
Speaker: What was your first game and what is in your collection right now?
Speaker: My first game was Tomy Atomic Pinball when I was about eight years old.
Speaker: And then when I got back into pinball through local barcades here in the UK, my first game was meant to be Attack from Mars because I fell in love with that.
Speaker: And in the end, I found an Aerosmith game, actually.
Speaker: Aerosmith was my first game.
Speaker: I love John Borg's work and obviously he's Mr. Turtles as well.
Speaker: But I played this Aerosmith game and it was just a load of fun.
Speaker: And I got a hold of this Aerosmith game.
Speaker: And again, it's a great shooter.
Speaker: And that toy, the toy box,
Speaker: as a piece of theater in that thing.
Speaker: You know, the scoop shoots it into this toy box and then there's a massive multi-ball.
Speaker: Is it five or six balls you get in there?
Speaker: I think it's five.
Speaker: But you can delay it.
Speaker: You can actually say, no, I'm going to wait and stack it up.
Speaker: Exactly, yeah.
Speaker: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker: It's a gamble.
Speaker: Yeah, so my first game was Aerosmith.
Speaker: And when I went to Chicago Expo, I brought back with me the Aerosmith Topper.
Speaker: by Stern.
Speaker: Oh, yeah.
Speaker: Oh, my God.
Speaker: Have you seen it in the flesh?
Speaker: It's pretty.
Speaker: No, it's a good job.
Speaker: It is really good.
Speaker: And where they were clever, the Aerosmith logo, whether or not you like the band, the Aerosmith logo, they'd isolated each of the areas of the logo so that each little part of that could separately light up depending on what was going on musically.
Speaker: So the logo would basically move in time with the song that was playing.
Speaker: And it was a hell of a light show.
Speaker: It was more than just reproducing what you're seeing in the game.
Speaker: It's a really good topper.
Speaker: But that thing, I had to buy separate luggage to get it back to the UK.
Speaker: It cost me an extra $100 just in shipping to get it on the plane.
Speaker: So my first game was Aerosmith.
Speaker: The next one was Attack from Mars Ellie, which is terrific.
Speaker: And it's a great showpiece.
Speaker: And then what was after that?
Speaker: Oh, a friend, my pinball tweaker friend had a family guy and I wanted to Pat Lawler game, plus also an animation based game.
Speaker: So that sat around for a while.
Speaker: Then Flintstones arrived.
Speaker: Then I got, what else do we do?
Speaker: Oh yeah.
Speaker: Then there was Monster Bash Ellie from Chicago Gaming, which I saw at Expo and I was just blown away with what a great job they did of that.
Speaker: And then after that, Beatles, which, you know, again, what they what they did with that, the soundtrack on that game is, have you played Beatles?
Speaker: You know, it's actually on my list.
Speaker: So right after Turtles, I am planning on buying a Beatles.
Speaker: And so I ordered the topper.
Speaker: And so the topper is coming here.
Speaker: And so I'm just going to have it on retainer until I get the game.
Speaker: Hang on, didn't you get the Jurassic Park Topper too?
Speaker: Yes, I did.
Speaker: Yeah, I heard that you did that.
Speaker: I heard that you got the Jurassic Park Topper, but you got the Beatles one just in case you bought the Beatles.
Speaker: Well, no, I'm planning on getting a Beatles.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And I also said I want the Black Knight topper because at some point I want- Well, I get that too.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: That's a great topper.
Speaker: No, I'm just a topper guy, so- Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker: Well, the Attack from Mars topper's a lot of fun.
Speaker: And the topper of the sculpture that Chris Franchi did for-
Speaker: For Monster Bash Ellie as well, that's really nice.
Speaker: But honestly, what Jerry Thompson has done with the sound design on Beatles, it's just terrific.
Speaker: First of all, in terms of the quality of it, it sounds great.
Speaker: The sound is used for all the pop bumpers and the hits and all that kind of stuff is also inspired.
Speaker: But for him to use Cousin Brucey, Bruce Morrow, the radio DJ that introduced the Beatles in the mid-60s,
Speaker: in New York at Shea Stadium is, it's such a clever move because it makes it sound so authentic.
Speaker: You know, it's moments like that.
Speaker: If you're a fan of that particular theme that really resonate and you really make it more immersive to play, but Beatles is, it's a really fun game.
Speaker: But yeah, so...
Speaker: The current lineup is Beatles, Attack from Mars, Monster Bash Elite, Batman 66, and Star Wars, home version.
Speaker: Even after I played that Star Wars game in Chicago, that's the sound of my pup, by the way, shaking her ears.
Speaker: Good girl.
Speaker: She had a bath earlier.
Speaker: She smells beautiful.
Speaker: Oh, great.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Even after I played that Star Wars game in Chicago, just because of all the kind of word around it, I still waited a little bit until I got it, even though I knew it was a good game.
Speaker: A friend in Paris bought it.
Speaker: I just absolutely fell in love with it.
Speaker: And he's actually said recently, he has friends that go over to his place in Paris and he's got Twilight Zone and he has Attack from Mars.
Speaker: What else does he have?
Speaker: But he's got the Star Wars home game and friends that go over there, their favorite game of the lot is the Star Wars home game.
Speaker: Isn't that interesting?
Speaker: Yeah, that doesn't surprise me, actually, because it was intentionally made for an easy accessibility.
Speaker: And you can have a tournament on it because it's still a good game.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: But people just don't see it that way.
Speaker: But really, it's a fun game.
Speaker: Oh, it's just like a fun game.
Speaker: And Josh and I were talking about this.
Speaker: I was saying that this is actually a brilliant game because if you have grandpa who's trying to get his fun cave downstairs where he has billiards or he gets all that kind of stuff and then he's like, well, I want a pinball machine.
Speaker: How much are they?
Speaker: Well, they're $6,000 to $10,000.
Speaker: Really?
Speaker: You got anything cheaper?
Speaker: You kidding me?
Speaker: Yeah, yeah, exactly.
Speaker: I'm not doing that for my kids.
Speaker: And then it's like, oh, well, there's the Star Wars.
Speaker: Wait, Star Wars?
Speaker: I can get that for four something?
Speaker: Sure, give me that.
Speaker: And it's perfect.
Speaker: Do you know what?
Speaker: Well, here's his admission.
Speaker: I, for whatever reason, this one, I just find more fun than the other one.
Speaker: You know, these things are so individual.
Speaker: Yeah, that's actually a common, that's a common feel.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And one thing, you know, with all respect to everyone that was involved in the other machine, they're just, you know, different games for different people.
Speaker: But I was offered a pro of the other game for the same price as the new in-box home version.
Speaker: And I wanted the new in-box home version.
Speaker: I think the other one's more ambitious in that the code is crazy deep.
Speaker: It's a harder game.
Speaker: And so it's more difficult to do all that on that game.
Speaker: So the Home Edition, you know, it's... So my wife has a Mini.
Speaker: And it's a convertible Mini.
Speaker: And there are cars out there that are faster and stronger.
Speaker: But, you know, it's just a fun car to drive.
Speaker: You hop in, you put the top down, and it's like a go-kart with steroids.
Speaker: And I kind of...
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And I feel that that's how this, yeah, this home machine, you know, it's just a fun game.
Speaker: And yeah, are there deeper games?
Speaker: Absolutely.
Speaker: But that's not what you're looking for.
Speaker: And what's great with this, with the Star Wars home game, there are moments when you don't have a multiball.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah, exactly.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: But even some little things where you go, hang on, that's a really nice idea.
Speaker: The way the shooter rod is attached to the play field.
Speaker: So when you lift it up, the whole thing comes together.
Speaker: That's a really innovative idea.
Speaker: The R2-D2 ball log too.
Speaker: That's really nice.
Speaker: So the way you can steal that away from somebody else if you wanted to.
Speaker: And even the Orbit, it's such a cool, smooth shooter.
Speaker: It's really good.
Speaker: Well, it's a Gomez design, so it makes... It's not like it's a... He should go professional.
Speaker: Yeah, he's really good.
Speaker: This kid's going to do something in video games and pinball.
Speaker: George, well...
Speaker: I sent George Gomez a note straight after I played it in Chicago because after a few people had been not as positive as I think it probably deserved to be reviewed, I just got in touch with him and just said, congratulations.
Speaker: I really love the look of this.
Speaker: I played it and it just seems terrific.
Speaker: And he sent me back a whole bunch of information that hadn't been released publicly about this.
Speaker: And I said, can I share this?
Speaker: He said, sure.
Speaker: I got in touch with my friend Ken and he had him on a special when lit, you know, within like 24 hours revealing this information on the podcast.
Speaker: And it was, they, they, they were talking about having, he described it as a kick-ass sound upgrade.
Speaker: And the, I think art blades, potentially there's a shooter rod.
Speaker: There was a millennium, millennium Falcon toy.
Speaker: Um, yeah,
Speaker: But he gets it.
Speaker: The thing that I'm really drawn to as well with George Gomez games is just the sense of fun.
Speaker: The understanding of you walk up to the thing and you just have a stack of fun.
Speaker: Because you look at what he did in terms of his version of the play field for Beatles.
Speaker: You know, this isn't just a copy of the other game's play field.
Speaker: This is, he moved stuff.
Speaker: He added things.
Speaker: This is, it's a terrific game.
Speaker: Then you look at what he did with Monster Bash.
Speaker: And again, it's theater and sheer fun.
Speaker: You could use it in a tournament, but it's still fun.
Speaker: And also, what a lovely moment for him that he was celebrating the launch of Deadpool, another great game, at the same time as Monster Bash LE was being released.
Speaker: plus Batman as well, the tweaks he did on that to make it what it was.
Speaker: And, you know, I'm very drawn to his stuff.
Speaker: But, I mean, John Borg as well.
Speaker: I mean, the Shots and Aerosmith are great fun, but I really want to get my hands on these turtles.
Speaker: Well, the one thing I really appreciate about Gomez, too, is I feel like some of his codes reward you for completing a mode.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Where some games, it's just like, you played the mode, here you go.
Speaker: But it's like with Gomez, it's like,
Speaker: here's a basic wizard mode, but if you're able to complete the modes and do what you're supposed to do, we'll give you an extra special wizard mode on top of that.
Speaker: Yeah, exactly.
Speaker: And I like the fact that you feel like, I'm just really saying what you were saying, Josh, but the idea, though, that he understands the importance of feeling rewarded or these key pinball moments, you know, it's real theater.
Speaker: It's a rollercoaster.
Speaker: And if you play some games where it's all about speed and it's all turned up to 11, but you kind of go,
Speaker: You've got to have a break every now and then.
Speaker: You think of just great storytelling in any movie or TV show or game, any other game, and it's those key moments that stay with you.
Speaker: With Aerosmith, the first game I got, the light show on that, when you get the multiball,
Speaker: It is so good.
Speaker: And then when you get elevator multiball again, it's this beautiful, exciting buildup where it stops and there's a great light show.
Speaker: The sound goes nuts.
Speaker: And then, you know, you get a gajillion balls coming down the play field that year.
Speaker: But that's the stuff that you look forward to rather than just it happens and it just carries on.
Speaker: You know, it's a proper show.
Speaker: That's what I really enjoy.
Speaker: Totally agree.
Speaker: By the way, would you, okay, I've had an offer of swapping my Batman 66 premium for a fully, beautifully restored, high-end Addams Family.
Speaker: Would you do that?
Speaker: I'm not the guy to ask him.
Speaker: Actually, I would say no, because I don't have that nostalgic connection to Adam's family.
Speaker: I know everybody loves it.
Speaker: I actually bought Adam's family and I had it a little bit and I just I never had that connection that I liked it more than other games.
Speaker: I actually sold my Adam's family to Josh and Josh kept it for a couple of months and he sold it on, too.
Speaker: And it just, it just feels like now my friend, that is his, uh, that is his favorite game.
Speaker: He actually wants a, a fully restored.
Speaker: He sold his gold version and he wants to get a fully restored one.
Speaker: And I just look at that.
Speaker: I was like, I, it's not, you know, it, it doesn't charge my batteries like other people's, uh, you know, other people really have that nostalgic feel for it.
Speaker: It just, it's not me.
Speaker: And so I would keep Batman 66.
Speaker: Well, I'm kind of right there with Scott.
Speaker: I don't know.
Speaker: I had Adam's family for six months, and it felt too repetitious.
Speaker: I could easily get to tour the mansion, get through tour of the mansion.
Speaker: And I just, I don't know, there's so much more depth to Batman 66.
Speaker: I would probably hold on to Batman 66, just because, like Scott said, I'm not the one with the nostalgia.
Speaker: It doesn't appeal to that part of me.
Speaker: And so Adam's family is just
Speaker: another game.
Speaker: I guess also it's worth us remembering the point in time that it came from.
Speaker: These were created in an arcade.
Speaker: They were created for on location.
Speaker: You put your money in and they wanted to give you three minutes of play.
Speaker: So you put your money in again and have another three minutes of play.
Speaker: I guess the intention originally wasn't to make them particularly deep necessarily because they're there to take money.
Speaker: Whereas now if you're a home buyer, you're looking for something much deeper more than likely.
Speaker: Yeah, and so exactly.
Speaker: And before the home market just was non-existent.
Speaker: So it didn't matter, right?
Speaker: You had to have something that was very accessible within 10 minutes.
Speaker: And now you get like Monster Bash where it's a fun game.
Speaker: It's in that same category of, hey, this is just a fun ride.
Speaker: A tournament player will be able to boss it around.
Speaker: But you know what?
Speaker: I still have fun because I stink that much.
Speaker: Well, I look at some of my favorite arcade games.
Speaker: I look at Ghosts and Goblins.
Speaker: It's impossible.
Speaker: Oh, jeez.
Speaker: Yeah, Paperboy.
Speaker: It's great fun, but again, not the most controllable game.
Speaker: You look at, say, oh, I love Space Harrier still.
Speaker: That's a great game from Sega.
Speaker: But then you look at, say, something that was beautiful and revolutionary in the arcade at the time, Dragon's Lair and Space Ace.
Speaker: Well, these aren't really games.
Speaker: Five Minutes.
Speaker: Yeah, yeah, exactly.
Speaker: If you're good, you can beat it.
Speaker: If you played for five minutes, you were better than me.
Speaker: But again, that was, again, pure theater.
Speaker: You're playing a video disc.
Speaker: But again, it's down to these were built for a very specific experience in an arcade on location.
Speaker: And when I go, I've got a bunch of games here.
Speaker: And you go back in and you see they're coded for a different reason.
Speaker: And it's funny, you know, I...
Speaker: I was a big gamer at school and then as I started to work in games, I've done the voice for a stack of games.
Speaker: There was a big game called Black and White from EA years ago and I was the voice of good and evil in black and white.
Speaker: And there's a game called Overlord on Xbox and PlayStation.
Speaker: There's a big game from Sega right now called Two Point Hospital.
Speaker: I'm the voice of the radio station.
Speaker: There's a guy called Ricky Hawthorne, your hospital radio voice guy, who sits and talks along with you as you're playing the thing.
Speaker: The whole thing's marvelous.
Speaker: There's a whole bunch of these characters in this guy.
Speaker: But the...
Speaker: The point being games now to play at home, they are by the nature of you playing them at home, they're movies.
Speaker: You know, you can play them for months and maybe not get to the end of them.
Speaker: But I don't have that time now.
Speaker: And I'm really enjoying, not even necessarily for the nostalgia thing of it, although that's probably part of it.
Speaker: I really enjoy just being able to step up with a coffee and play a game for 10 minutes.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And that's what's so, I don't know, enjoyable for me about pinball.
Speaker: It's not about a tournament for me.
Speaker: It's about, it's the theater, it's the show of it.
Speaker: I love it.
Speaker: The artwork, the creative, you know, the bigger creative picture of it, but to better just step up, play for 10 minutes and go, that was a stack of fun and share that with friends.
Speaker: That's to me, that's what I get out of it.
Speaker: I agree with you.
Speaker: I think that you have to have a special balance.
Speaker: It's just not about the gameplay.
Speaker: It's just not about the code and,
Speaker: and the layout that you've, you've, the, the games that are coveted as some of the best games are theater, like you said.
Speaker: And, and I think that some, sometimes people lose sight of that, especially when, when certain companies are making pinball machines, you know, I guess we can go with Thunderbird since, since that's the easiest one to pick on.
Speaker: Please make it.
Speaker: I love that show.
Speaker: I'm in the new show.
Speaker: It's the only – it is so rare that I ever want to say anything negative about any pinball machine.
Speaker: It's very rare that you find a pinball machine where the best mod available is a hammer.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: That's true.
Speaker: Or lighter fluid, you know.
Speaker: I so wanted to love that machine, but you know.
Speaker: You know, the funny thing is Thunderbirds was never, I had never even heard of Thunderbirds until the game came out.
Speaker: And I'm like, what are you guys talking about?
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: So, and I'm in, I'm in your age though.
Speaker: I like, it just wasn't a big thing here.
Speaker: Yeah, well, for me, it was a dream theme.
Speaker: You know, you just think of your favorite, you know, show as a kid.
Speaker: That was one of those.
Speaker: And, you know, I work with some of the people that worked on the original series in the reboot of it over here in the UK.
Speaker: And yeah, you know, you win some, you lose some.
Speaker: But the rebooted show is cool, at least.
Speaker: At least we have turtles.
Speaker: It's okay, Josh.
Speaker: It'll be fine.
Speaker: So do you think if they re-theme Thunderbirds to the American version Team America, do you think he'll sell more?
Speaker: Oh my gosh.
Speaker: I think you need to speak to Matt and Trey about that one.
Speaker: That's a whole different game.
Speaker: Okay, but instead of spelling International Rescue, you'd have to spell Team America F-yeah.
Speaker: That's a family pinball machine if you need one.
Speaker: Yeah, exactly.
Speaker: Absolutely.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Okay, we're wrapping up a little over an hour, but I do have to point out that someone did, I listened to a comedian about 20 years ago and he was talking about Scooby-Doo and since you're involved in Scooby-Doo, he pointed this out and I didn't know if you had a take on it.
Speaker: He said, one, that Shaggy is a total druggie because he eats all the time and never gains weight.
Speaker: He also talks to a dog and he understands the dog coming back.
Speaker: And also Fred is the genius of the group because he says, Hey, uh, Thelma, Shaggy and Scooby, why don't you go search for clues and Daphne and I are going to hang out over here.
Speaker: I think he's overanalyzing his life.
Speaker: He needs to, he needs to go restored Adam's family and get on with it.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: But Shaggy does anything for a dog treat.
Speaker: Like I'll do anything for a treat, Scoob.
Speaker: Right, Scoob?
Speaker: Oh, my God.
Speaker: Well, I got at a Comic-Con.
Speaker: I got asked about being the voice of Bob the Builder in America.
Speaker: And this guy came up to me and said, don't you think it's weird that the American voice of Bob the Builder is performed by a guy in England who's not American, even though what he's performing is for America?
Speaker: And I said, that's a really interesting point.
Speaker: Did you know that the voice of Scooby-Doo isn't actually performed by a dog?
Speaker: Well, it's just like that point of the producers of the people that made House MD were like, we need a really American voice.
Speaker: We're a real, just solid American person.
Speaker: And the gentleman that walked in, you know, did his spill and they're like, that's it.
Speaker: And then he started talking in his British accent and they're like, wait,
Speaker: You're not American?
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: But it just goes to show is that all of this, it's acting.
Speaker: It's acting.
Speaker: And it goes back to whether it's just another kind of artist, whether it's Jeremy Packer, whether it's me as a voice performer, whether you're a musician, this is all about just people creating this...
Speaker: thing you know just it's all about creativity and and creative performance you know that that's what this is about and uh it doesn't matter where you're from or what your background is if you're if you're if you can perform the character that's needed then that it should go to the best performer hopefully yeah
Speaker: Yep.
Speaker: Totally agree.
Speaker: Well, just like, did you know that BoJack Horseman, Will Arnett, is actually not a horseman?
Speaker: You're ruining these.
Speaker: Man.
Speaker: Another one canceled.
Speaker: They should also get Batman to voice Batman.
Speaker: And it seems kind of...
Speaker: Well, I'm just glad that James L. Jones is still Darth Vader, because in terms of a voice now, that's what you want to generate your life.
Speaker: Although, if you want me to... When the pandemic is over and we're out of the apocalypse bunker, I will happily just walk around.
Speaker: I'll just follow Scott and... Well, follow you both, actually, and we can...
Speaker: with your dribble and just narrate your day going, he's walking on the left ramp.
Speaker: Now take a lift by a cappuccino.
Speaker: Now have a donut.
Speaker: That would be so fantastic.
Speaker: Either that, or you can just walk behind me doing the breathing of Darth Vader.
Speaker: The just sound like someone needs an inhaler.
Speaker: Yeah, I would have, if you followed me around, I'd want it more like, like a golf announcer or like a soccer announcer.
Speaker: You know what I'm saying?
Speaker: Like,
Speaker: Really quiet.
Speaker: Oh, and he's going for the hole.
Speaker: He's stepping up to the air conditioner right now.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: There's a game show now.
Speaker: Ladies and gentlemen, you know him.
Speaker: You love him.
Speaker: You can't live without him.
Speaker: Here he is, Captain Dribblee.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Come on, Josh.
Speaker: Dribble some more.
Speaker: You know it.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: All right, Mark.
Speaker: Well, we really appreciate you coming on.
Speaker: We appreciate you staying up and hanging out in your apocalypse thumper in England.
Speaker: And I hope you really enjoy that fish pie.
Speaker: It sounds interesting.
Speaker: I think my mom might be at the door right now.
Speaker: This is the best way to wrap up any podcast I've ever been a part of.
Speaker: Thanks so much for chatting.
Speaker: I really enjoyed the podcast and I hope you enjoy Turtles.
Speaker: Thank you.
Speaker: Thanks, Mark.
Speaker: I hope you enjoy turtlings as much as I enjoy my fish pie.
Speaker: Mmm.
Speaker: I was going to say, I guess we need to do our typical wrap-up, right, Scott?
Speaker: Yeah, you can go ahead and do it.
Speaker: It's time for a typical wrap-up.
Speaker: And now, the wrap-up.
Speaker: If you want to get a hold of us, we are LoserKidPinballPodcast at gmail.com.
Speaker: I have shortened the name now, so if you're looking for us on Facebook, you just have to go at LoserKidPinball.
Speaker: And, not only are we on Instagram, we started up a Twitter a week or two ago, because...
Speaker: We figured if the poor man's pinball podcast was cool enough to have a Twitter, we better be as cool as them and get one for ourselves.
Speaker: So if you want to contact us, those are the ways to get a hold of us.
Speaker: Gmail or Facebook is probably the best way.
Speaker: Send us off, Scott.
Speaker: You know what?
Speaker: Also, check us out on any of your favorite podcaster catchers.
Speaker: And if you're on iTunes, please give us a review.
Speaker: It actually helps our searchability rating.
Speaker: So be excellent to each other and party on, dudes.
Speaker: Party on.
Speaker: Shut up and sit down.
