‘The Jungle Line’: The Joni Mitchell song that opened the gates for ambient folk
When Simon and Garfunkel split up, while many fans were devastated by the news, Paul Simon was excited about the prospect of writing more experimental music without the limitations that came with being in a duo. We see him at his most creative in one of his albums, Graceland, which continues to divide opinion.
After hearing a South African song called ‘Gumboota’ on the album Accordion Jive Hits No. 2, Simon became obsessed with the rhythm of South African music and wanted to try incorporating it into his next album. The result was Graceland, and even though he ended up not being a fan of the cover he performed of ‘Gumboota’ on the album (confusingly called ‘Gumboots’), the album marked a drastic change for Simon and folk music.
“If it wasn’t that ‘Gumboots’ led me into the whole project, I would have dropped ‘Gumboots’ from the album,” he said, “Because I think it’s the weakest of the South African cuts.”
While this may have seemed like a big moment for folk music, as such a traditional sound was suddenly being made with influence from other countries and cultures, Simon was actually quite late to the party. Almost a decade earlier, Joni Mitchell wrote the song ‘The Jungle Line’, which also took a great deal of influence from African music and set the foundation for much more ambient folk.
When people talk of Joni Mitchell’s music, two main things come to mind: her exceptional and emotive lyricism and her ability to play the guitar like it’s an entire band. These two qualities, which sound simple on the face of it, create some of the most complex singer-songwriter music of all time.
“When I play guitar, I hear it as an orchestra,” said Mitchell, “The top three strings being horn section, the bottom three being cello, viola, and bass – the bass being indicated but not noted.”
Given her mastery over her guitar, it was always her instrument of choice; however, that isn’t to say that there haven’t been songs she’s written that didn’t push the boundaries of music and make her sound more experimental than just vocals and guitar. ‘The Jungle Line’ is an excellent example of this. At the time, it merely seemed like an experimental track for Mitchell, but with the power of hindsight, we recognise the song as being one of the starting points for more ambient folk and singer-songwriter music.
One of the most prominent factors in the song was the African drumming. The rhythm section of a lot of folk music can be hard to keep time with, given it often involves singers jumping in and out of rhythm depending on what they’re saying. This strange rhythm emphasises words, which is why so much folk music is played acoustically. African rhythm signatures can be much more scattered than what you hear in pop and rock music, so incorporating the two was a difficult task, but it worked incredibly well.
Mitchell’s experimental approach to the song is a real testament to her as a songwriter. It showed how good she was at the fundamentals and her ability to expand the boundaries of sound.
