Start a new (old) Thanksgiving Day tradition: 'Alice's Restaurant' on the FM radio

This song is called "Alice's Restaurant." It's about Alice, and the restaurant. And it's a huge Thanksgiving tradition you probably didn't realize has been happening right under your nose for decades.

Kid, it's time you joined the movement.

NOW, kid!

It all started 51 Thanksgivings ago -- that's 51 years ago on Thanksgiving -- when folk singer-songwriter Arlo Guthrie was busted for littering in Great Barrington, Mass. The incident spiraled spectacularly out of control, and Guthrie turned the real-life debacle into his greatest opus.

The 18-plus minute-long "Alice's Restaurant Massacree," with more than 2,500 words of lyrics, was the title track of Guthrie's 1967 debut album Alice's Restaurant. It was a big counterculture hit back in the '60s, and FM rock stations are still faithfully playing it every Thanksgiving Day -- usually at noon.

The irresistibly catchy journey from that fateful 1965 littering arrest to anti-war anthem is just the kind of thing your whole family -- kids, grandparents, uncles, father-stabbers -- can gather around the radio and enjoy together, year after year.

Sure, these days it's available on streaming, CD, vinyl, cassette, reel-to-reel and on YouTube (above). But kid ... there's just something about the shared experience of live, FM radio that "Alice's Restaurant Massacree" requires.

Most major markets have a classic rock station that will play it on Thanksgiving Day. You may have to just turn on your radio just before noon Thursday and start dialing around -- and how throwbacky is that?

To be sure, the blog Radio Survivor put together a list of known FM stations in the U.S. -- click over to the site to see if yours is one.

But if you must, hook up the speakers, gather the family around and give "Alice's Restaurant Massacree" a listen with the full orchestration and five-part harmony and stuff like that.

And don't forget to sing loud.