| The Great Filling Station Holdup | |
| Type: | single |
| Artist: | Jimmy Buffett |
| Album: | A White Sport Coat and a Pink Crustacean |
| A-Side: | The Great Filling Station Holdup |
| B-Side: | Why Don't We Get Drunk |
| Released: | 1973 |
| Recorded: | 1973 |
| Studio: | Glaser Sound (Nashville, Tennessee) |
| Genre: | Country |
| Length: | 3:02 |
| Label: | Dunhill D-4385 (US, 7") |
| Producer: | Don Gant |
| Prev Title: | Captain America |
| Prev Year: | 1970 |
| Next Title: | They Don't Dance Like Carmen No More |
| Next Year: | 1973 |
"The Great Filling Station Hold Up" is a song written and performed by American popular music singer-songwriter Jimmy Buffett. It was first released on his 1973 album A White Sport Coat and a Pink Crustacean and was his first single from that album. The single reached No. 58 on the US Country chart in 1973.
The song appears on Live at Fenway Park, a live album that opened with an acoustic set consisting of "Changes in Latitudes, Changes in Attitudes", "The Great Filling Station Holdup" and "Pencil Thin Mustache".[1]
The song is about two robbers holding up a filling station and the aftermath of getting caught shortly after the robbery in a honky tonk, where both robbers are drunk on beer they bought with the cash they stole.[2] Buffett got the idea to write the song after finding amusement in a newspaper article about recovered property from a holdup.[3]
Soon after the release of the single, with "Why Don't We Get Drunk" as its B-side, it was reported that it had sold over 50,000 copies just to jukebox operators, according to B.J. McElvee, country promotion manager for ABC-Dunhill Records.[4] Billboard magazine reported that only the A-side was promoted to country radio, because the word "screw" (repeatedly used in "Why Don't We Get Drunk") was not generally acceptable in country radio programming at the time; however, "Why Don't We Get Drunk" was played by some "underground" stations on FM radio.[4] "Why Don't We Get Drunk" was identified by Billboard as a "jukebox favorite" more than three years after its original release.[5] [6]