Overflowing Quarters

Lyrics

September, 1972.
Andy Capp's Tavern.
They rolled you in, you strange wooden box.
Smelled like sawdust and solder.
A black and white secret between the jukebox and the smoke.

Just a training exercise, that's what Nolan Bushnell said.
Just a little project for Allan Alcorn to get his head straight.
A simple circuit, two white lines, one little dot.
They put you next to the pinball machine, in the forgotten spot.
No one knew what you were.
Just another box to hold a beer.

But then the first quarter dropped.
A clink in your aluminum gut.
Then another.
And the sound began. Beep. Boop.
A metronome for a new religion.
The silver kept coming, the line kept growing.
And you just got thirsty, you just kept showing them
The game. Until you choked on the prize.
Overflowing quarters, a beautiful surprise.

The phone rang two days later. Allan, it’s broken.
The boys at the bar, their hearts are broken.
Alcorn drove down to Sunnyvale, screwdriver in his pocket.
Expecting a loose wire, a blown-out socket.
He saw the crowd around you, quiet and waiting.
The bartender just pointed, tired of explaining.

He heard the silence where the quarter should drop.
The dead slot where the silver should stop.
And he heard the sound that had ended. Beep. Boop.
The dead metronome of a hungry new loop.
The silver had stopped, the line was just waiting.
And you were just sitting there, full and suffocating.
Choked on the prize.
Overflowing quarters, right before his eyes.

He opened the lock on the coin box door.
He wasn't ready for what he saw.
Not a jam, not a wire, not a technical glitch.
Just a mountain of silver, a money-filled ditch.
Quarters spilling onto the sticky floor.
Three hundred dollars, and they wanted more.
The machine wasn't broken.
It was just full.

It was just full.
Full of the future.
Andy Capp's Tavern.
September, 1972.
You were never empty again.