24 Hours at the Electric Bat
Two kinds of people take pics for Nudge, those who “know” photography and those who don’t. In case there’s any doubt — I place myself firmly in the second camp. I’d also put Cale from Electric Bat in that category — but there’s just something about an amateur. There’s freedom in not being tied to technique. Right? Like you’re still excited about stuff.
Or maybe it’s just better to hire us amateurs because we’re too dumb to know better. Either way, what’s good about Cale’s photography is also what’s dope about his arcade that he co-runs with partner, Rachel Bess. It’s genuine, it’s exciting, and god damn it — it’s about a good time.
The Electric Bat is a Good Ass Arcade
Cale and Rachel are one of those annoying couples that genuinely like each other and can hang out, like, all the time. It’s wild. Their relationship story has been told a bazillion times, so let’s not waste time with that here — needless to say these folks met through pinball, and by god, if pinball isn’t the foundation to damn near EVERYTHING these crazy kids do. That goes triple for the Electric Bat (which was originally founded by Bess through connections forged from her involvement in Zapcon — ok no more backstory.)
The Electric Bat (and its associated outposts) has quickly become THE spot in Arizona to play pinball. That’s not by accident. Cale and Rachel both used to work at Marco Specialties. Rachel is especially gifted at fixing machines, and evidently so is Cale, though I’ve yet to see anything he’s actually fixed. Mostly it’s just various pinball tables being taken apart in our text threads. Could they be being fixed? Sure. Could they also be sitting there while Cale creates another dank-ass meme for the Electric Bat Insta? Likely.
24 hours at the Electric Bat
Since Covid, the weekly league night at Electric Bat has frickin’ exploded. Averaging around 75 players a night, it’s part punk show, part pinball tournament, and part, uh, some lady showing people the penis cards she drew. Anyway, I asked Cale to take pics of one of his league nights, then had Him and Rachel on a zoom call to break down what the hell we’re actually looking at. Without further ado, here’s some crazy shit at a weekly Pinball tournament in Arizona.
Cale: We’re open 365 days a year. 6am to 2am. Believe it or not, there are people waiting at 6 am for the bar to open. You know, like shift workers and people still partying. So it’s up to either one of our bartenders, Genell or Chantelle, to get to the bar at 5 AM. We have a league night 52 weeks a year. These are some of our regulars. The guy on the right is Brandon. He got engaged last night. He went to Mexico for Valentine’s day.
Rachel: We like his girlfriend. She’s a reader.
Cale: This is Tyler. He’s an absolute pleasure. He rides his bike every week to the arcade.
Nudge: He kinda looks like if Ska was a person.
Cale: He didn’t know he looked like Dom Deluise
Rachel: When Cale told him, he didn’t know what he looked like. When he saw a picture he ran to the bathroom and yelled, “Oh my God, you’re right! I’ll be goddamned, I DO look like Dom Deluise.”
Cale: this is our security guard Dane. He’s really into ska stuff, scooter riding.
Nudge: Is ska really big in Arizona?
Cale: Yup. Always has been. He’s our handyman and security guard.
Rachel: And he plays a mean saxophone!
Cale: The girl in the stripes is an arborist and draws a lot of penis drawings. One time we came here in the morning and found a bag. Inside the bag were these nice car keys and sketchbooks slap full of dicks. And they were nice dicks. All types. All styles. And we were like who is this? and anyway, we took it to the bar, and it was her stuff. She shows up on her lunch break, grabs her stuff, and then heads back up a palm tree.
Nudge: Do the dicks have anything to do with the pinball? Are they choosing the dick card in this picture?
Cale: No, man (looks at me like I’m crazy for asking)
Cale: Rachel plays in our league and is TD.
Nudge: Are you good?
Rachel: I sometimes win events that I’m not running — but if I’m running an event I won’t usually. I’ve gotten second or fourth.
Cale: She’s a top ten player in our league, for sure.
Nudge: Whose neon Steve Ritchie sign is that?
Rachel: Our friend Greg Davis.
Cale: But see all the cards with the different kinds of dicks?
Nudge: Yes.
Cale: This is Ty Bull. He’s sort of our mascot. He’s here right now. He’s always here. Always playing pinball. Now he’s dating one of the bartenders.
Nudge: * I go off on some weird unrelated tangent for five minutes *
Cale: Ty is also a tattoo artist.
Cale: This is nick, one of our bartenders. He has a sacred heart, D-20 tattooed on his chest. He goes by, uh, * trails off for a while * …Danger sometimes. Every year we have punk rock karaoke, so you sing Fugazi or The Misfits or whatever, and that’s his name. Danger. He’s the reigning king of punk rock karaoke.
Nudge: A lot of people wearing those hats, I noticed.
Cale: Yeah, there are a few. Do you think I should try one of those?
Nudge: No.
Cale: I appreciate that man, you’re always honest with me.
Cale: This is Roland, he won. He’s got a t-shirt from a brewery, he won a Heavy Metal magazine, and a handful of tokens. Roland is an incredible player. He goes to INDISC every year. We’ve seen him play, he can hold it with the best in the world and he’s a super cool guy and runs an online dungeons and dragons thing — some nights.
Nudge: He’s a really good looking guy. Beautiful hairline.
Cale: Yucca Tap Room is a dive bar that’s been here for 50 years. It’s a big complex here. In the middle of the complex is the venue, which has punk shows and stuff, another part is the Bat, another part is the Lounge. This is in the lounge. They go to these distilleries and pick small batch stuff to bring back and put it in special bottles. This Too $hort bottle is Whistle Pig.
Cale: We have three mannequins in Electric Bat gear. One of these is the one a contracted handyman - since let go - had sex with (EB caught him on security camera)
Nudge: OK, he was intimate with it. I wouldn’t say he had sex with it.
Rachel: I dunno, I saw the tape. I’d say sex.
Nudge: I saw the tape too. Which mannequin was it? Can I guess?
Cale: It was the one on the left.
Nudge: Yeah, that’s the one I was gonna guess.
Nudge: How much time do you spend fixing machines?
Rachel: I’d say fifty percent. It’s just what it takes. A lot of what we’re doing is upkeep. Today it was Cale with Bond Premium fixing a weird parts problem. Something esoteric that a lot of people couldn’t figure out. In this picture what I’m doing is figuring out why one of the fuses kept blowing out. Right about here I figured out it was one of the pop bumpers, The actuator going into the spoon part was going into the edge…
Nudge: * we keep nodding as Rachel explains the fix *
Nudge: What’s going on here?
Rachel: Fuck if I know, I’m drinking a liquid death and playing Iron Man.
THE END
And that’s it. Do I have an ending? Not really. Why? Because the party doesn’t end here. For real. You know that what these guys have at The Electric Bat is special. They’ve cultivated a culture. Their tournaments feel like parties because they ARE parties. Their games play buttery because Cale and Rachel love playing pinball. That’s dope. And in a world where arcades are a rarity, it’s pretty dope that this insanity can happen on a regular basis. Rock on, weirdos.
