Alice's Restaurant

In the psychedelic '60s, Arlo Guthrie, son of folk titan Woody Guthrie, emerged as a puckish counterculture icon, largely on the merit of this album and its far-flung title track. Clocking in at 18-plus minutes and eating up the first side of the original vinyl LP, Alice's Restaurant became a staple of freeform radio in the '60s and '70s, a side-splittingly funny, shaggy-dog story that rambled over the Vietnam War, military draft, police harassment, and longhairs running afoul of the legal system. Guthrie's superb comedic timing—complete with spaced-out lapses—remains every bit as funny now as it was in 1967. The remaining half-dozen tracks show an ambitious sweep of musical styles, ranging from ragtime-tinged jug band tunes and delicate folk to acid rock.