Though not a hit single in the traditional sense (most top 40 songs don't last five or six minutes let alone eighteen), Arlo Guthrie (son of folk legend Woody Guthrie) has nonetheless pretty much built a career out of "Alice's Restaurant Massacree" (though he did have one top 40 hit in his career with "City of New Orleans"). Since its release in 1967, Guthrie has released another 29 albums (with nary another hit in the bunch) and toured consistently, though he chooses to perform "Alice's Restaurant" now at only ten year intervals.
The first song on his aptly titled Alice's Restaurant LP (and it takes up the entire first side), "Alice's Restaurant Massacree" is one part satire, one part stand-up routine, and one part war protest song (though Guthrie claims it's more of an anti-stupidity song than an anti-war song, I disagree and since it's my blog, he loses). Loosely based on actual events in Guthrie's life, it's a humorous monologue with some spiffy acoustic guitar that tells the story of how Guthrie got arrested for littering and how the draft board later deemed him unfit to serve in the military for being a litterbug. Though Guthrie himself has taken a rightward turn politically and become a libertarian (and I'm sure his father is vomiting in his grave at his embrace of unfettered capitalism), the song is a potent reminder of a time when the left fought back and won, and in oh so many ways changed our country for the better.
Lyric sheet: "And can you, can you imagine fifty people a day, I said fifty people a day walking in singin' a bar of Alice's Restaurant and walking out. And friends they may think it's a movement..."
Enjoy:
Fuck Donald Trump,
emaycee
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