Lost Performances

[Kyle]

I tried to google the lyrics to Barry Sobel's rap from 1980s Eddie Murphy HBO Uptown Comedy Express Special (which I think also had the first time I'd seen a young Chris "Bitch, paint my house!" Rock on it). You know the "I'd like to know your zodiac sign" rap, with "Now other comics, they just tell jokes. They get on the stage say 'Ever notice folks?' Then they talk about socks missing from some dryer. But I'd like to take you this much higher!"

There are zero results.

You can't find the lyrics online.

And here's the thing. Here I am 30+ years later and I still remember almost the entire rap. But the lyrics aren't somewhere online? I'm sure I can find a video of the performance, but I was 1000% confident that I could google the phrases "socks missing from some dryer" and "take you this much higher" and I'd find twenty links to the complete lyrics.

Nothing.

[Kyle]

Here's a terrible recording of the special cued up to when the rap starts:

[Mike]

I'm shocked. Shocked. I knew all but two lines.

My imitation of bad customer service is still, "What? You want I should pick up the airport and shake it until your bags fling out? What, am I fuckin Kreskin over here?"

[Kyle]

Whenever someone says they’ll “do anything” for a favor, I still say “Paint my house.”

[Mike]

Whenever someone says they’ll “do anything” for a favor, I still say “Paint my house.”

Every single time. My kids say it, and they barely know why.

[poorpete]

This little section of Al TV News is so important to me, that I figured that if I wrote "John Cougar Mellencamp Finkelstein Billy Bob Joe Agnes Moorehead" in google, the video or an appreciation of it would come up, but it doesn't / didn't.

Eventually found it...