Free Round Roulette
One of the most exciting games in all of Kansas City, if not the world, is Jukebox Roulette at my favorite little dive, Dave’s Stagecoach Inn. On Thursday nights at 9, 10, and 11 p.m., bartender and jukebox overlord John Yuelkenbeck posts cryptic clues that point to a certain song on his 100-album-heavy jukebox. Play the song, and the entire house, no matter how full, gets a free round. It is a game wherein the victory of one benefits the many. But though all are rewarded equally in the material sense, the true champion gets his name, along with the winning song, logged in the bar’s Roulette records, which have been going at least since 1999. For those in search of personal glory among music geeks, there is no better — or more harrowing — test of mettle.
At 10:15 last Thursday night, the joint was hoppin’. There was only one open seat in the house, next to some old guy at the bar who blabbed on about the hotel business to anyone who made the mistake of sitting next to him. Two of the clues had already been posted:
9:00 Cited often by Bowie
10:00 Where 3301 came from
The first clue was anyone’s guess. The second referred to a track on the jukebox, “I Don’t Wanna Grow Up” by Tom Waits, which was there on a compilation album, leading one to believe the answer to Clue 2 was something to do with Bone Machine, the original Waits album on which it appeared. But whom or what does/did David Bowie often cite?
I began focusing on the Bone part, thinking also about Bowie’s contemporaries — Iggy Pop, Lou Reed, T. Rex. That was it! T-Bone! There was a T-Bone Burnett song on the very same CD in the juke as the Waits song. It seemed unlike John Y. to pick a winning song on the same disc as one of the clue songs, so I held back buying the song until I got to read the 11 o’clock clue.
Other people were making different associations. In fact, I’d never been to a Roulette night where so many people were involved. At one table, a girl suggested that the origin of “I Don’t Wanna Grow Up” was Peter Pan. Then, the girl across from her made the “first star to the right and straight on ’til morning” connection, which pointed to space, stars, starmen, etc. as things Bowie often cites.
Then, Buchmann arrived. David Buchmann is the Jukebox Roulette king. He’s also a local trivia hound. He was sporting a custom shirt designed by a member of his usual Trivia Clash team. The design was an artsy picture of overlapping candy hearts with the words “Bitter Sweet” on them. Because Buchmann is a thorough gentlemen, and the shirt actually looked cool, I refrained from giving him shit. Also, he was going to win us all a free drink.
Buchmann gained an immediate entourage, which followed him to the jukebox, brainstorming ideas and flipping through the selections in search of inspiration. This left a table open, so I sat down, but was quickly up and down again, back and forth from the jukebox, to check the progress of Buchmann and associates.
At 11, John posted the final clue:
11:00 I’m a big teaser, I took you half the way there, now
I had no idea what it was, but Buchmann immediately identified it as a lyric from “Day Tripper” by the Beatles. That’s when I put forth my T-Bone theory because the name of the T-Bone Burnett song on the juke was “Nothing In Return.” So, I had the T. Rex citation by Bowie, which led to T-Bone because of Bone Machine, and then, you get nothing in return from a big teaser, right?
Wrong.
I played the song, and all I got from John Yuelkenbeck was, “You know T-Bone Burnett’s coming out with a new album, right?” Once the game begins, people always start looking to John after the beginning of every song, waiting for some signal that it’s The One. But most of the time, you catch him just singing along (because he knows every song on the machine), enjoying the music. He gets feisty, too, when those huddled around the jukebox aren’t making selections and are too focused on the game.
I sat down. Songs were played that I didn’t recognize, one after the other, mixed with a rare familiar tune. I overheard some guy at another table ask, “What does ‘Que sera sera’ mean?” Nice one, dude.
Returning to the Bowie/Space/Bone theme, Buchmann’s group actually managed to find a song buried on the ‘box titled “Bone” by some obscure band called the Spaceheads. A jolting, mechanical tune came through the speakers, and the group looked eagerly at John, who was rolling his eyes at their far-out selection.
At 11:45, only 15 minutes before John would divulge the answer and end the game, Buchmann’s group thought of the song “Bone Machine” by the Pixies, which, as it turned out, was on the jukebox on disc number 50. For some reason, though, they didn’t select it but went on frantically searching for something else. At the stroke of midnight, John told them that the winning song was indeed “Bone Machine” by the Pixies. Foreheads were slapped, teeth were gnashed, and an explanation was demanded. John said that in interviews, David Bowie often cited the Pixies as a fave; the second clue was obvious; and as for the third, at number 50, the disc was “halfway there.”
But at least we didn’t get nothing in return — there was the fellowship of minds bent to a common goal, the conversations about music that spun off from the challenge, and the pleasure wrought from the bar’s high-efficiency, low-cost drinks.
Next week, though, we’re tearing that shit up.
