We Transcribed the Lyrics to The Root’s Mario Rap on Late Night So You Don’t Have To

It’s Game Week over at Late Night With Jimmy Fallon, and since Fallon has basically the best back-up band ever in The Roots, he used their unique talents to answer an audience request for lyrics to the Super Mario Brothers theme song. As you can see, it was a great success — Tariq had some surprisingly poetical things to say about the Mushroom Kingdom.

Here are the transcribed lyrics for your perusal:

Shigeru Miyamoto — hero — you can call me those,
From where my inspiration comes, nobody knows,
But I kept my pockets double-stuffed like Oreos
Since creating the digital kingdom of the Marios.
It all began on Donkey Kong:
He was just a Jumpman getting his monkey on
And trying to save Daisy was makin him crazy
(He’s come a long way since those 8-bit ’80s) —
But who knew in the future he’d be killing Goombas
And scooping Princess Peach from King of the Koopas?
We threw a cape on his back and he became super —
These are the life and times of a Mushroom Troopa.
His brother’s a coward —
Could be divine intervention from a higher power
But Mario defends Luigi, spitting fire flowers,
And it’s been weird that it’s been all these years
Since he originally appeared, but Mario’s still here —
Classic.

On a related note, how does one decide what kind of punctuation to use when transcribing rap lyrics? I feel like this ended up looking like an Emily Dickinson poem. Not that I’m complaining or anything. Emily Dickinson is my freakin’ jam.

Oh and yes, we know that it was Pauline that Mario was saving in Donkey Kong, not Daisy. Are you really going to tell Tariq he’s wrong about one little detail after he just pulled that wonderment off before your eyes? I know you’re the Internet and that’s what you do, but come on — this is so much better than the last Mario-related rap we all had to listen to:

(via Uproxx)

Meanwhile in related links

• I might need some therapy after that theme song — and so does Mario
• After all, his actual life is a lot grittier than we’d been led to believe
• This interview with Miyamoto clears up a lot of misconceptions