IF YOU WANT TO END RACISM AND STUFF YOU GOT TO SING LOUD

And that’s what it is, the Alice’s Restaurant Anti-Massacree Movement, and all you got to do to join is sing it the next time it comes around on the guitar

With feeling. So we’ll wait for it to come around on the guitar, and sing it when it does. Here it comes

♫♫ You can get anything you want, at Alice’s Restaurant
♫♫ You can get anything you want, at Alice’s Restaurant
♫♫ Walk right in it’s around the back, just a half a mile from the railroad track
♫♫ You can get anything you want, at Alice’s Restaurant

That was horrible. If you want to end war and stuff you got to sing loud. I’ve been singing this song now for twenty five minutes. I could sing it for another twenty five minutes. I’m not proud… or tired

So we’ll wait till it comes around again, and this time with four part harmony and feeling

We’re just waitin’ for it to come around is what we’re doing

All right now

♫♫ You can get anything you want, at Alice’s Restaurant (Excepting Alice)
♫♫ You can get anything you want, at Alice’s Restaurant
♫♫ (I said) Walk right in it’s around the back, just a half a mile from the railroad track
♫♫ You can get anything you want, at Alice’s Restaurant

Arlo Guthrie, 1967

I used to play “Alice’s Restaurant’ every Thanksgiving. Yes, on a turntable. My kids thought I was crazy.

Some of you remember “Alice’s Restaurant.” Some of you heard it when your parents played it on Thanksgiving. For the rest of you, a little background may help.

The country was in turmoil unlike anything we’d seen in decades or since. Cities were burning, literally, and the President, first Johnson, then Nixon, was subject to as much abuse as is heaped on Donald Trump. The country was in the midst of a deadly war (ultimately over 50,000 Americans died), students were marching in the streets, and popular music reflected the times.

Along came “Alice’s Restaurant,” an 18-minute satirical talking blues protest song from a young unknown folk singer. Well, not completely unknown. His father was Woody Guthrie, America’s greatest protest song writer and singer (“This Land Is Your Land”). So Arlo wasn’t a newcomer to the protest song biz.

Still, Arlo took the music world by surprise in 1967 when he showed up at the Newport Folk Festival performing “Alice’s Restaurant.” The song was ideal for the times: funny, ironic, at times poignant and finally, calling people to action. It’s the end of the song I’ve quoted above. The refrain, “You can get anything you want …” has already been sung several times, so the audience is familiar with it. The tune is catchy. As he comes to the end, Arlo asks his audience to join in. They do, predictably in half-hearted fashion.

Arlo chides the audience, still playing his guitar and half singing, half talking: “That was horrible. If you want to end war and stuff you got to sing loud. I’ve been singing this song now for twenty five minutes. I could sing it for another twenty five minutes. I’m not proud… or tired.”

The crowd laughs, and the next time around they sing louder. The song ends with everyone laughing and cheering.

What’s the point? Only this: If you think I’m running out of essays about racism and about fixing our antiquated governance system, you’re wrong. I have plenty more to come. I’m not proud … or tired.

If you want to end racism, if you want to integrate greater Hartford, you got to sing loud. All you have to do is sing it the next time it comes around. With four part harmony and feeling.

Here it comes.

♫♫ You can get anything you want …

We can have the city we want for all people, white and Black, if we sing loud and together.

Have a Happy Thanksgiving.