by Robert Wilkinson
We begin our Sunday with a show celebrating the 77th birthday of the son of Woody Guthrie and a singularly remarkable talent in his own right, one of my all-time favorites, the legendary Arlo Guthrie. I saw him 8 years ago and it was a memorable performance!
Arlo Guthrie (July 10, 1947) is best known for his 18 minute "talkin' blues" folk song, "Alice's Restaurant Massacree," a protest against policemen busting freaks for dumping garbage ("littering") on Thanksgiving. In fact, from what I've heard on the radio, I believe it's become an "official" Thanksgiving song, where he sings of being sent to "the Group W Bench" and in-spected, see-lected, in-jected, and ree-jected by the draft board for the crime of littering. The punch line to the draft board is his statement that "I'm sittin' here on the Group W bench 'cause you want to know if I'm moral enough to join the army, burn women, kids, houses and villages after bein' a litterbug." Some kind of antiwar statement....
From Wikipedia,
The song lampoons the Vietnam War draft. However, Guthrie stated ...that Alice's Restaurant is more an "anti-stupidity" song than an anti-war song, adding that it is based on a true incident. In the song, Guthrie is called up for a draft examination, and rejected as unfit for military service as a result of a criminal record — consisting in its entirety of a single arrest, court appearance, fine and clean-up order for littering and creating a public nuisance on Thanksgiving Day in 1965, when Arlo was 18 years old.
Lest you think he was a one hit wonder, he also wrote a great anti-FBI protest song called "The Pause of Mister Claus," (video below!) where he makes the argument that Santa is a dope fiend, communist, and pacifist while suggesting to the FBI in the audience following him that they probably will need to be "sent back to the factory" if anyone finds out who they are, which "is a drag for you and an expense for the government." And I also found videos of him doing the Steve Goodman hit lamenting the "disappearing railroad blues" of the train called the "City of New Orleans," the ever-great "Motorcycle Song," and his classic, "Coming into Los Angeleeez, bringing in a couple of keys, don't check my bags if you please Mister Customs man...." at Woodstock.
I had the distinct pleasure of seeing him for my birthday in April 2015. The show was exquisite. Warm, intimate, classy, loose, he told stories that made us laugh and sang songs and told more stories about his life and his view of many things and sang more songs that brought us all together and made us feel like we were one in that music. That’s the power of folk music.
So for your enjoyment, here's Arlo!
In its entire genius, at the Guthrie Center, here's Arlo in 2005 performing "Alice's Restaurant."
Here's the original 1967 studio record. Here's the entire 18+ minute masterpiece of "Alice's Restaurant"
From Atlanta in 1978, "City of New Orleans"
We now present my favorite performer on that first day! In the spirit of Arlo’s head space, here’s his opening number, an iconic ode to green power! Here’s his live 1969 Woodstock performance (as performed on the original movie soundtrack) of the iconic ”Coming Into Los Angeles" Lotta freaks getting herbed up, with the end of the song Arlo’s live footage.
Here’s his performance of the Bob Dylan tune “Walkin’ Down the Line” (This year’s clip includes Arlo’s stoned rap about the event closing the NY State Turnpike along with “Lotta freaks.”)
Here’s the audio to his entire 45 minute set! Arlo Guthrie at Woodstock 1969 – entire set
Since the song was exquisitely performed in the studio, here's the studio version featuring some of the best session players in history, here's "Coming Into Los Angeles" (Some of the players included James Burton, Clarence White, Ry Cooder, Jim Gordon, Chris Etheridge, and Gene Parsons!)
Last year I had a great 1984 clip with Arlo talking about his Woodstock experience, champagne, and his performance there, followed by a live performance of “Coming Into Los Angeles” but it’s gone this year.
And yet again, this clip is hilarious! For your enjoyment, 10 minutes of Arlo telling a great story and performing “Coming Into Los Angeles”
From 1975, Arlo performing "Motorcycle Song"
A great audio-only performance from 1975 of Pete Seeger and Arlo in a rousing version of “Walkin’ Down the Line.”
Arlo doing a great version of the bright atmosphere of "The Garden Song"
From the late 70s, Arlo gives us "City of New Orleans," and then Pete Seeger comes out to join Arlo and the audience in a great performance of "Amazing Grace"
Arlo and Pete Seeger teamed up in a live performance filmed by PBS at the Wolftrap in 1993 for this amazing hour and 10 video! Arlo Guthrie and Pete Seeger Together in Concert – Live at the Wolftrap 1993
From that great Wolftrap show, we have several single tune clips. We begin with "If I Had A Hammer," which they followed with "When A Soldier Makes It Home." They then went into 8 minutes of storytelling followed by "Can’t Help Falling In Love."
Later in the set they did the ever-popular "City of New Orleans," and closed with a tune which should be our national anthem, "This Land Is Your Land"
Here's Arlo in a May 2007 performance of his father Woody's iconic ballad of a better America, "This Land Is Your Land"
On a related note, here's Arlo doing Woody's "Pastures of Plenty" From 1944, here's Woody's original version of "Pastures of Plenty"
From 2018, Arlo doing the full version of "Mr. Tambourine Man"
Last year I had several great performances by Arlo and Keith Lockhart leading the Boston Pops but this year all but one has been locked up. So we don’t get "This Land is Your Land," “Week on the Rag" and “Last Train to Glory," while we do have "City of New Orleans."
We'll close this Arlo/Boston Pops performance with a fantastic version of "Coming into Los Angeles" complete with the Pink Panther theme, the Get Smart theme, the I Spy theme, and the James Bond theme worked into the song!
We have a few great performances of this classic! This 1978 Atlanta performance finds Arlo and Shenandoah are in great form! "City of New Orleans."
We now go to Arlo, Willie, John and the rest of the pickers at the classic first Farm Aid 1985 doing a rousing version of "City of New Orleans"
And yet again, this time from Farm Aid 2008, "City of New Orleans"
Here's Arlo and St. Willie doing a live performance in 2005 of "Will The Circle Be Unbroken."
From Farm Aid III in 1987, Arlo, Willie, Neil, Kris, and a cast of dozens closing the show with Woody’s American classic, “This Land Is Your Land”
Here’s a one hour performance from 1974 on Soundstage which is great! Arlo and Friends – Arlo Guthrie, Steve Goodman, and Hoyt Axton.
A 10 minute talk on stage where Arlo thanks the narcs that made his career.
To complete this birthday celebration, here's a treat! This is an amazingly funny performance! For the 8 minute studio version with the long intro from his live album, here's his classic "The Pause of Mr. Claus." For the shorter song only, here's "The Pause of Mr. Claus."
For our encore, I found a very strange 25 minute variation of THE tune, complete with a tale of multi colored roaches weaponized by Russia and China. The Alice's Restaurant Multi-Colored Rainbow Roach Affair
Thanks for everything over the decades, Arlo. You really do keep the flame alive! May you have many, many more years of enjoyment, entertaining us with your poignant ballads and gentle, playful sense of humor.
© Copyright 2024 Robert Wilkinson
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