Jungleland

Jungleland

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Track 8 of Born To Run, 1975.

Born To Run (1975)
- Bruce Springsteen: vocals, guitar
- Roy Bittan: piano, organ
- Clarence Clemons: tenor saxophone
- Garry Tallent: bass
- Max Weinberg: drums

JUNGLELAND - V1		uncirculating
JUNGLELAND - V2		uncirculating
JUNGLELAND - V3	1:33	BIS / WAR / ET / BTRS
JUNGLELAND - V4	9:43	BTRS
JUNGLELAND - V5	9:44	ESR / BTRO
JUNGLELAND - V6	9:37	DDITV / BTRS / BTRCS / UBTROC / WAR / URT1 / ROOI
JUNGLELAND - V7	9:14	ROOI / UBTROC
JUNGLELAND - V8	9:32	BTR / ESSENTIAL: 2003 / BTR: 30

Note: In his book Bruce, Peter Ames Carlin claims that from January 8, 1974 Springsteen and the band spent "a couple of days fiddling with rudimentary versions of both "Born To Run" and "Jungleland"" at 914 Studios. The accuracy of this statement is unverified, but we've included it here for reference. V1 above represents those sessions. The first circulating live performance of "Jungleland" is from the July 12, 1974 show at the Bottom Line in New York City, over seven months later. V2 is a complete take in the studio, cut August 1, 1974 and known from a Record Plant log sheet. It's likely that this is the January 8, 1974 recording referred to by Ames Carlin, with the day/month reversed in the European format on the worksheet (right) by Louis Lahav. V2 was recorded before David Sancious and Ernest Carter left the band, and took inspiration from "Zero And Blind Terry". Through 1974 and early 1975, Bruce continued to play and develop "Jungleland" on stage, and worked on it the studio; V3 is a segment of Bruce and Suki Lahav recording vocals for dubbing, and the recording captures her talking to Bruce and singing the song coda with heavy echo. Suki recorded the violin intro at some point at 914 Sound Studios, later overdubbed to the final master at Record Plant studios in 1975. During the second half of 1974 and the first half of 1975, lyrics included "there’s a crazy kind of light tonight, brighter than the one that sparkles for prophets" which were changed in July 1975 to "the midnight gang's assembled and picked a rendezvous for the night." Similarly, the 1974/early-1975 lyrics "the street's alive with tough-kid Jets in Nova-light machines, boys flash guitars like bayonets and rip holes in their jeans" later became "the street's alive as secret debts are paid, contacts made, they vanished unseen, kids flash guitars just like switchblades hustling for the record machine."

Jon Landau relocated the Born To Run sessions to the Record Plant on April 18, 1975, the studio from which all other circulating versions emanate. These sessions did not include Suki Lahav, who had returned to Israel in late March 1975, but her violin overdub survived. Much of the first day was devoted to "Jungleland", and in the first week there were more sessions on April 23 and 25. It's likely that V4 was recorded during this period, with the band laying down base tracks. V5 has the same opening as V4, but after that uses a guide vocal by Bruce, strings and no sax, which are also present in V6. According to the incomplete logs, Springsteen didn't give any more attention to "Jungleland" until July 14, with new vocal overdubs, but still lacking a lead guitar track (V7). Work was finally completed over two days from July 19, and it all came down to the last minute on July 20, according to Bruce: "Clarence and I finishing the "Jungleland" sax solo, phrase by phrase, in one (room), while we mixed "Thunder Road" in another, singing "Backstreets" in a third as the band rehearsed [for the tour that was to begin that evening] in a spare room upstairs."

^{Studio Sessions: Born To Run}

The rangers had a homecoming in Harlem late last night
And the Magic Rat drove his sleek machine over the Jersey state line
Barefoot girl sitting on the hood of a Dodge drinking warm beer in the soft summer rain
The Rat pulls into town rolls up his pants, together they take a stab at romance and disappear down Flamingo Lane

Well the Maximum Lawman run down Flamingo chasing the Rat and the barefoot girl
And the kids 'round here look just like shadows, always quiet, holding hands
From the churches to the jails tonight all is silence in the world
As we take our stand down in Jungleland

The midnight gang's assembled and picked a rendezvous for the night
They'll meet 'neath that giant Exxon sign that brings this fair city light
Man, there's an opera out on the Turnpike, there's a ballet being fought out in the alley
Until the local cops, Cherry Tops, rips this holy night

The street's alive as secret debts are paid, contacts made, they vanished unseen
Kids flash guitars just like switch-blades hustling for the record machine
The hungry and the hunted explode into rock and roll bands
They faced off against each other out in the street down in Jungleland

In the parking lot the visionaries dress in the latest rage
Inside the backstreet girls are dancing to the records that the deejay plays
Lonely-hearted lovers struggle in dark corners desperate as the night moves on
Just one look and a whisper, they're gone

Beneath the city two hearts beat, soul engines running through a night so tender
In a bedroom locked, in whispers of soft refusal and then surrender
In the tunnels uptown, the Rat's own dream guns him down as shots echo down them hallways in the night
No one watches when the ambulance pulls away or as the girl shuts out the bedroom light

Outside the street's on fire in a real death waltz between what's flesh and what's fantasy
And the poets down here don't write nothing at all, they just stand back and let it all be
And in the quick of the night they reach for their moment and try to make an honest stand
But they wind up wounded, not even dead, tonight in Jungleland

^{Visit SpringsteenLyrics.com for other versions of this song.}

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