Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Theme Song

This is for the original animated series, what else?

There has been a long-time, ongoing mystery behind this theme, and the question remains unanswered: Who were the performers? Besides the chants from the turtles, of course. In fact, there is an ongoing open thread at IMDb regarding this one. (Damn, I lost the link.)

Composers are no mystery though, Dennis C. Brown and Chuck Lorre. Yes, Chuck Lorre, as in the creator of Dharma & Greg, Two and a Half Men, and The Big Bang Theory. On the other hand, Dennis C. Brown or D.C. Brown, is a known composer who also composed for the former two.

Below is the theme with the original and unedited intro.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_rr7aIqCE74

Yeah, sorry for the “Hero” (Teenage Mutant Hero Turtles), it’s the Brit version. There’s a high-def version here, but uploader chose not to embed.

And the lyrics.

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles theme song lyrics

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles
Heroes in a half-shell
Turtle power!

They’re the world’s most fearsome fighting team (We’re really hip!)
They’re heroes in a half-shell and they’re green (Hey – get a grip!)
When the evil Shredder attacks
These Turtle boys don’t cut him no slack!

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles

Splinter taught them to be ninja teens (He’s a radical rat!)
Leonardo leads, Donatello does machines (That’s a fact, Jack!)
Raphael is cool but crude (Gimme a break!)
Michaelangelo is a party dude (Party!)

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles
Heroes in a half shell
Turtle power!

Research tells me that there was no commercial release of this song. (Even though there were a bunch of soundtracks for the not-so-useful movies.)

That’s it. Hey, did you know that there was a TMNT concert tour back in 1990? The in-costume turtles played:

• Donatello: keyboards
• Leonardo: bass guitar
• Raphael: drums & sax
• Michelangelo: guitar

It was also sponsored by Pizza Hut and was very commercial-y.