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Chris Granner has been working for Bally and Williams. He is currently working for STERN Pinball.
Discography: Road
Kings, Pin-bot, F-14 Tomcat, Big Guns, Cyclone, Taxi, Jokerz!, Earthshaker, Police Force, Elvira and the Party Monsters, Whirlwind, Diner, Dr. Dude, Funhouse, Terminator 2: Judgement Day, The Addams Family, Fish
Tales, White Water, Twillight Zone, Indiane Jones, Red & Ted’s Roadshow, The Addams Family Gold, Indianapolis 500 (All Williams / Bally), Monopoly, Rollercoaster Tycoon, The Simpsons, Terminator 3. (All Stern)
Chris can without a doubt be considered one of the best sound designers. He has composed the music for all-time classics such as Twillight Zone and The Addams Family. The alliance Pat Lawlor & Chris
Granner is still active at Stern nowadays.
PinballSounds.com had the opportunity to interview Chris Granner:
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First game you've ever played?
Gottlieb's "Abra Ca Dabra"
Do you own pinball machines? If so, which?
I used to have more, but I've hung on to my Taxi, Fish Tales & Addams Family.
Which gameplay designer do you most like working with?
My
favorite was Mark Ritchie for a long time (I think Fish Tales is my all-time favorite pin), but he's no longer designing games; I work currently with both Pat Lawlor & Steve Ritchie, so I won't commit
professional suicide by picking between them!
How/why did you start to create pinball music?
I got into it by accident. I studied electronic/computer music in school (I have an MM in music composition from the University of Illinois
in Urbana, which is fairly famous for its pioneering work in computer music), and stumbled into the game world after I graduated & moved to Chicago, working as a programmer.
A guy who studied at Northwestern University worked at Williams at the time, and he announced an opening for a composer/sound designer/sound programmer; I had the right credentials, and my timing was really good -- they were just about to release the 1st game with a yamaha synth chip on board, so pinball sound was suddenly less of a programming problem & more of a musical problem. Fortunately I'm a much better composer than I am a programmer!
First game you've designed the music for?
Road Kings, 1986
Favorite pinball music YOU have composed/arranged?
A toss-up between Taxi & Fish Tales, although many people have said that Addams is the best overall package --
I can't really argue but it's pretty subjective. Favorite single track is the Taxi main play tune.
Favorite pinball music ANOTHER composer has created?
I like mine the best! Although I think Star Trek: Next Generation is spectacular, as is Attack from Mars.
Apart from the aspect of music, which is your favorite table?
Fish Tales. Just great rules, great shots, ... unbelievably beautiful art ... "stretch truth when lit" -- my favorite pinball rule description! and
of course great sounds!
What projects did you do other than pinball music?
I've been involved in coin-op games since that time -- did a number of Midway videos in the early '90s, moved to Capcom Coin-op in '95 and ran their sound
dept., moved to Incredible Technologies in '97 and did sound for the 1st Golden Tee Golf Fore! game...did sounds for several slot machines in the late '90s & early '00s, on the side, and then IT decided maybe
THEY should be a side project for me too...so I've been independent since mid '01, mostly back to doing pinball work for Stern.
Is there any game you would have loved to do the music for but you
couldn't?
I was invited to do music & sound for both NBA Jam & the Cruisin' franchise, but they didn't fit my schedule at the time...most unfortunate. I would
have loved to keep working with Ed Boon too -- Taxi was great...and Mortal Kombat would've been awesome to do, but Forden did a great job. Things always work out.
Are there any themes/topics you prefer?
I'm a country boy at
heart -- that's why I like Taxi & Fish Tales so much. I also have a fondness for most of Pat's themes -- he has that Americana streak going which I think works well for pinball.
Do you prefer arranging the music for a movie/tvshow-based
pinball machine or do you like creating music for an "original" machine?
I prefer original themes, although working with the music of
composers like John Williams is always instructive.
Did you ever personally do the speech for a table?
I'm in a lot! I'm almost any indian accent character you've ever heard; I'm Santa in Taxi, and any of the giant "Jackpot" yells
(including "Banzai" and "Earthshaker") are also me.
Do you like video modes?
I LOVE Indiana Jones Mine Cart...and Water Skiers is pretty cool too. The Stern gang is kind of anti-video modes, so none are being
developed currently...but I don't miss them really.
Did you like Gotlieb/Premier games?
Abby, as we affectionately called it, and Surf Champ from the same time period, were my 1st favorite games. Then I went on "sabbatical" until
'86, and after that only went for Williams/Bally pieces, although Hollywood Heat and Victory were both very enjoyable.
What do you think of Pinball 2000?
I loved Revenge from Mars, have actually not played Star Wars...but I think
it was a really gutsy move to do it, and there's definitely something to it.
Pinball would need a real renaissance before we could afford to spend that much on pinball hardware -- we'd have to sell it for so much more than currently, we'd never get any orders.
Could you tell me a little about the prodcution progress of a pinball
machine? When do you start creating the sound? As soon as you know the basic
gameplay & elements or can you play a prototype machine before you start doing the sound/music?
The sound
development can start as soon as there's a "whitewood" (prototype) playfield, which is when the programmer also usually starts.
The further along the rules are, the more focused the sound development can be, so I like to either help define the rules or encourage the designer to work it out ahead of my involvement. Pat Lawlor is the most organized in this regard; We never really start a project together until he can tell me a plausible version of every rule in the game. Pat's also great with "choreography", or how effects should play out, with timing and gesture pretty clear in his mind right from the start. Other designers leave these details to me & the programmer, and that opens us up for problems relating to being coherent, but it's pretty fun either way.
To what extend does the gameplay designer influence your work? E.g.,
did Pat Lawler tell you "I want a strange voice that says 'Don't touch
the door'"?
Again, with Pat,
that's exactly what happened. Other designers, it all depends. Even with Pat, everyone on the team has a voice in the design.
Have any of your ideas ever been rejected by the game designer and/or
your bosses at WMS or Stern? If so, why?
Sure...too slow (never too fast), too complicated, too long...not quite the right direction...all kinds of things. Check your ego at the door!
Do you sometimes hide "easter eggs" in your music/sound artwork?
If you mean "do I use musical jokes" or quotes, not conciously, no. I've had people catch me unconciously quoting some of my favorite music, but
that's just part of the process of composing; we're all quoting Bach anyway.
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