‘Bungle in the Jungle’ is a song by British progressive rock band Jethro Tull. It was released on their album War Child in 1974. A remnant from the band's abandoned ‘Chateau D'Isaster Tapes’, ‘Bungle in the Jungle’ features lyrics based on analogies between animals and humans. The song was later released as a single, becoming a top 20 hit in the United States and top 5 in Canada. The single was one of Jethro Tull's most successful US single releases ever, reaching number 12 on the Billboard charts. The single spent 16 weeks on the American charts was the band's second and final top 40 hit in the United States, after 1969's ‘Living in the Past’. ‘Bungle in the Jungle’ also reached number four in Canada. It was the 51st biggest Canadian hit of 1975.
This is perhaps the best-known song from Jethro Tull's War Child album. War Child was originally written to be the soundtrack for a film which never got made. The outline of the movie, posted on the official Jethro Tull website, goes into details of the film: A black comedy about a dead teenage girl visiting Heaven and her various misadventures in the afterlife. May we humbly recommend Terry Gilliam to direct?
‘Bungle in the Jungle’ actually came from an earlier project. Ian Anderson said in a Songfacts interview: "It was actually late '72 or early '73 when I was in Paris recording an album that never got released, although one or two of the tracks made it out in 1974, but that was at a time when I was writing an album that was exploring people, the human condition, through analogies with the animal kingdom. And that particular song was perhaps the more obvious and the more catchy of the tunes. Eventually it was finished and saved in time for the War Child album, sometime later."
The War Child album peaked at #2 on the Billboard Albums chart. Despite the song's American success, Anderson saw the song as too commercial and a minor song in the band's catalogue outside of North America. Cash Box said that "Ian Anderson's vocal is powerful and his flute playing enhances the arrangement as always" and "the lyric is in the haunting metaphorical imagist mood that Tull has always typified so well."
Label – Chrysalis
Songwriter – Ian Anderson
Producer – Ian Anderson
SONG LYRICS
{Intro}[Verse 1]
Walking through forests of palm tree apartments
Scoff at the monkeys who live in their dark tents
Down by the waterhole, drunk every Friday
Eating their nuts, saving their raisins for Sunday
Lions and tigers who wait in the shadows
They're fast but they're lazy, and sleep in green meadows
[Chorus]
Well, let's bungle in the jungle
Well, that's all right by me, yeah
Well, I'm a tiger when I want love
But I'm a snake if we disagree
[Verse 2]
Just say a word and the boys will be right there
With claws at your back to send a chill through the night air
Is it so frightening to have me at your shoulder?
Thunder and lightning couldn't be bolder
I'll write on your tombstone, and thank you for dinner
This game that we animals play is a winner
[Chorus]
Well, let's bungle in the jungle
Well, that's all right by me, yes
I'm a tiger when I want love
I'm a snake if we disagree, yes
{Bridge}
[Verse 3]
The rivers are full of crocodile nasties
And he who made kittens put snakes in the grass
He's a lover of life but a player of pawns
Yes, the King on His sunset lies waiting for dawn
To light up His Jungle as play is resumed
The monkeys seem willing to strike up the tune
[Chorus]
Well, let's bungle in the jungle
Well, that's all right by me, yes
I'm a tiger when I want love
And I'm a snake when we disagree, yes
[Outro]
Let's bungle in the jungle
Well, that's all right by me, yes
Well, I'm a tiger when I want love
And I'm a snake when we disagree