1960 · Gottlieb
Melody Lane
Bright sky-blue field with faint white musical staff lines and scattered black music notes, green grassy hill and red ground band along the bottom edge and cream filigree and scalloped ornament framing the two score windows.
- Year
- 1960
- Maker
- Gottlieb
- Type
- Electro-mechanical
- Display
- Score reels
- Players
- 2
Made by
- Design
- Wayne Neyens
- Art
- Roy Parker
Vision analysis
On the backglass
Written by a machine from the photos, so details may be off.
Backglass
- blue
- red
- cream
- yellow
Fingerprint: MELODY LANE on sky-blue ground crossed by musical staves and black notes, treble clef vertically through center, girl in blue cap blowing brass trumpet left, red-haired woman in orange polka-dot halter top dancing center-right kicking leg and holding cup, red electric guitar with white pickguard leaning diagonal lower left, four grinning men in period dress right of women
The two women in the centre — a tiptoeing girl in shorts and cap blowing a trumpet, and a red-haired dancer in an orange polka-dot top and blue shorts kicking one leg up with a cup in her raised hand — flank a towering navy treble clef. Below them a cherry-red electric guitar leans across a cream '1 or 2 Can Play AT THE SAME TIME' card. On the right, four laughing men in period jackets and caps cluster around a hand-lettered sign insisting 'It’s More Fun to Compete!'. The top is dominated by two mirrored red-and-cream filigree score windows labelled 1 and 2, with gold 'PLAYERS 12' between them.
Setting
- Bright sky-blue field with faint white musical staff lines and scattered black music notes
- Green grassy hill and red ground band along the bottom edge
- Cream filigree and scalloped ornament framing the two score windows
Symbols
- Navy blue treble clef
- Musical staves and black note heads
- Brass trumpet
- Red electric guitar with white pickguard
- Two red scalloped score windows with cream filigree
- Right-pointing arrow beside the ball-in-play text
Lettering
- Hand-lettered 1950s display: red mixed-case script for the maker line, heavy red slab capitals with cream and yellow keyline for the title, gold-and-brown condensed capitals for players 12, and casual red brush script on the cream cards
Themes
- Music
- Musical instruments
- Jazz
- Singing and dancing
- Two-player contest
- Amusement arcade
Title on it
- Gottlieb’s melody lane
Text on it
- Gottlieb’s
- MELODY LANE
- 1
- 1st PLAYER
- 2
- 2nd PLAYER
- PLAYERS
- 12
- A Gottlieb
- SUPER
- SKILL GAME
- 1 or 2
- Can Play
- AT THE SAME TIME
- It’s More Fun to Compete!
- A GAME OF SKILL
- BALL in PLAY
| Kind | Description |
|---|---|
| Child | Girl in blue cap, red-and-white top, navy shorts, white socks and black shoes, standing on tiptoe blowing a brass trumpet, left of centre |
| Woman | Red-haired woman centre-right in orange polka-dot halter top and blue shorts, one arm raised holding a small cup, one leg kicked up in a dance pose, blue high-heeled shoes |
| Man | Man in blue-and-white striped blazer with red bow tie, holding a small book or record under his arm, front of the right-hand group |
| Man | Dark-haired man in a tan suit jacket behind the striped blazer man, mouth open laughing |
| Man | Man in a yellow-green jacket, blue tie and grey flat cap, looking left toward the women |
| Man | Balding man at far right in a red checkered vest over a shirt, grinning, partly cut by the right edge |
Painted pinball backglass on a bright sky-blue ground crossed by faint white musical staves with black notes. Two matching ornate score panels, red scalloped surrounds with cream filigree, sit across the top: the left headed by a big red '1' over five white rectangular windows with '1st PLAYER' beneath, the right headed by a red '2' over five windows with '2nd PLAYER' beneath. Between them gold text reads 'PLAYERS' above a large '12', and a big navy-blue treble clef runs vertically through the centre. Top right is a small yellow box reading 'A Gottlieb' in script, 'SUPER' inside a black-and-white oval, and 'SKILL GAME'. On the left a white cloud cartouche carries 'Gottlieb’s' in red script above 'MELODY LANE' in big red capitals with cream and yellow outline. Centre-left a girl in a blue cap, red-and-white top, navy shorts, white socks and black shoes stands on tiptoe blowing a brass trumpet. Centre a red-haired woman in an orange polka-dot halter top and blue shorts dances, one arm raised holding a small cup, legs crossed. Lower left a red electric guitar with white pickguard leans diagonally beside a cream card reading '1 or 2 Can Play AT THE SAME TIME'. Right, four grinning men in 1950s dress crowd round a white sign reading 'It’s More Fun to Compete! A GAME OF SKILL'. Bottom left white script reads 'BALL in PLAY' with a right-pointing arrow over a red band and green hill.