The “Golden Hits Of The 70s”
Main MenuConcept Refinement The Author..Wayne JancikGolden Age Of The 50sGolden Age Of The 60s1970s and There After
ARLO GUTHRIE
“THE CITY OF NEW ORLEANS”
(Steve Goodman)
Reprise 11 03
No. 18 October 28, 1972
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“I was going to be a forest ranger,” said folk legend Woody Guthrie’s son Arlo, to DISCoveries’ Jeff
Tamarkin. “I had absolutely no intention of being a professional musician. I am not a social animal. I do
not enjoy the company of large amounts of people most of the time. I’m much better off with trees .. .”
For a brief period in the late ’60s, Arlo was America’s favorite folkie. Many fondly recall the classic lines–
“You can get anything you want/At Alice’s Rest au-rant”–from “Alice’s Restaurant,” the rambling 18
minute saga about his arrest for littering in Stock bridge, Massachusetts, on Thanksgiving Day in I965.
Not only did that offense allegedly render Arlo ineligible for the draft, but it also launched his career.
“Alice’s Restaurant” became the core of his same-titled 1967 debut LP and served two years later as the
flaky foundation for Arthur Penn’s film of the same name.
Arlo (b. July IO, I947, Coney Island, NY) was born the eldest son of Woody and his wife, Marjorie. People
like Bob Dylan, Ramblin’ Jack Elliott, Cisco Houston, and Pete Seeger were always dropping by and
playing music together. When he was three, Arlo danced and blew his harmonica for Leadbelly. A few
years later, his mother, a former Martha Graham dancer, taught him the workings of the guitar. He
attended private schools and, for a while, a college in Billings, Montana.
In mid-’65, Arlo started working the East Coast coffeehouse circuit. He toured Japan with Judy Collins,
and on his return in 1967, he presented the initial work-up on “Alice’s Restaurant Massacre” at the WNYC
Folk Song Festival. Warner Brothers representatives noted the ode and wanted the song, and bad. Was
Arlo surprised? “Nobody in their right mind would ever think that an 18-minute monologue would, first of
all be on a record,” Tamarkin was told, “let alone be played on the radio in an era when a song over two-
and-a-half minutes didn’t stand a chance of being played.
“Frankly, I don’t even feel that it has anything to do with me anymore–it became bigger than me.” After
his first album, a number of highly-praised LPs followed: Arlo (1968), Running Down the Road (1969),
Washington County (1970), and Hobo’s Lullabye (1972). Some of Guthrie’s most popular numbers
included “Coming Into Los Angeles,” a song about dope-smuggling that Guthrie performed at Woodstock;
the deliciously vicious anti-Nixon number, “Presidential Rag”; an Arab-Israeli political commentary,
“Children of Abraham”… and that Steve Goodman train tune, “The City of New Orleans.”
Arlo remains active on the music scene. During the ’70s, he toured and recorded with Pete Seeger. He
frequently performs for causes like the anti-nuclear and ecological movements. But Guthrie rarely sings
of Alice and the restaurant these days. As he told an interview er in the late ’70s: ‘”Alice,’ it’s just too long.
I forgot it about four or five years ago. I’m trying to learn it again, but… I got the first part down, the
garbage down. I’m just workin’ on the trash part now.”
In 1997, on the eve of the 30th anniversary of “Alice’s Restaurant,” Arlo re-recorded the tale for Kock
Records. Guthrie continues to run his label Rising Son Records, with his son keyboardist/producer Abe,
and to publish a newsletter Rolling Blunder Review. [Arlo Guthrie can be reached at his official Web site,
ArloNet (http://www.clark. net/pub/ ar lonet/ ar lonet main.shtml).]