Jimmy was more than just beaches and booze

Jimmy Buffett and “Margaritaville”: a song about escapist loathing and escapism

Jimmy Buffett, best known for the escapist Caribbean-flavored song “Margaritaville,” which turned that celebration loafing into an empire of restaurants, resorts and frozen concoctions, died. He was 76.

The cause of death was not given in the statement. Illness had forced him to reschedule concerts in May and Buffett acknowledged in social media posts that he had been hospitalized, but provided no specifics.

“Margaritaville,” released on Feb. 14, 1977, quickly took on a life of its own, becoming a state of mind for those “wastin’ away,” an excuse for a life of low-key fun and escapism for those “growing older, but not up.”

The song is about a loafer sitting on his front porch and watching tourists sunbathe while a pot of shrimp is starting to boil. There is a new tattoo on the singer and he has a bad memory of a lost love. Someone put a salt shaker somewhere.

Spin magazine wrote about a song about getting blotto and mending a broken heart that turned out to be a serious meditation on beach dwelling. “The tourists come and go, one group indistinguishable from the other. Waves crest and break whether somebody is there to witness it or not. Everything that means anything has already happened and you’re not even sure when.”

The song was on the Hot 100 chart for 22 weeks and peaked at 8. The song was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame in 2016 for its cultural and historic significance, became a karaoke standard and helped brand Key West, Florida, as a distinct sound of music and a destination known the world over.

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Buffett’s evolving brand began in 1985 with the opening of a string of Margaritaville-themed stores and restaurants in Key West, followed in 1987 with the first Margaritaville Café nearby. Over the course of the next 20 years, many more of each opened in Florida, New Orleans and California.

The song became a multimillion brand due to the influence it had on restaurants and resorts. He was the 13th richest celeb in America’s Richest Celebrities in 2016 with a net worth of $550 million.

It has a country flair with touches of percussion and flutes, and a style called Gulf and Western. It is a drinking song, and it is a fantasy of creature comforts close at hand. It was used as a major brand in restaurants, resorts, clothing, food and drink, and a constant singalong on his robust touring circuit, which attracted his devoted fans, the Parrot Heads.

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He told the Republic that it was all a bit of a lie. “I’m not the first one to do it, nor shall I probably be the last. It’s really part of the human condition and you need to have some fun. You’ve got to get away from whatever you do to make a living or other parts of life that stress you out. I try to make it at least 50/50 fun to work and so far it’s worked out.”

His special Gulf Coast mix of country, pop, folk and rock added instruments and tonalities more commonly found in the Caribbean, like steel drums. It was a stew of steelpans, trombones and pedal steel guitar. The amazing ear for hooks and grooves was always overshadowed by the lyrics of the fish taco and sunsets.

Rolling Stone gave props to Buffett’s 2020 album “Life on the Flip Side” in a review. “He continues mapping out his surfy, sandy corner of pop music utopia with the chill, friendly warmth of a multi-millionaire you wouldn’t mind sharing a tropically-themed 3 p.m. IPA with, especially if his gold card was on the bar when the last round came.”

The brand has grown to include resorts, apparel and footwear for males and females, a radio station, a beer brand, ice tea, liqueurs, and home décor.

“Escape to Margaritaville,” a musical that is set in a hotel bar where a singer-bar worker falls for a more career-minded woman, is a musical that was bound for Broadway.

James William was born on Christmas day 1946, in Pascagoula, Mississippi, and grew up in Mobile, Alabama. He got his degree from the University of Southern Mississippi and played six nights a week at the Bourbon Street clubs in New Orleans.

In 1970 he released his first record, “Down To Earth,” and seven more on a yearly clip, with his 1974 song “Come Monday” from his fourth studio album peaking at 30. “Margaritaville” came next.

He performed on more than 50 studio and live albums, many of which were accompanied by his Coral Reefer Band. He earned two Grammy Award nominations, two Academy of Country Music Awards and a Country Music Association Award.

He wrote some on the plane and finished it while driving down the Keys. “There was a wreck on the bridge,” he said. We were stopped for about an hour. so I finished the song on the Seven Mile Bridge, which I thought was apropos.”

Source: Jimmy Buffett, who sang of wastin’ away in ‘Margaritaville’, dies at 76

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Buffett also was the author of numerous books including “Where Is Joe Merchant?” and “A Pirate Looks At Fifty” and added movies to his resume as co-producer and co-star of an adaptation of Carl Hiaasen’s novel “Hoot.”

But Buffett’s songwriting wasn’t all smiley and one-dimensional. He said we would all go insane if we couldn’t laugh. He wrote about characters with sadder-but-wiser back stories, like the 86-year-old who had lost his wife and son in wartime in “He Went to Paris,” the hapless robber in “The Great Filling Station Holdup” and the sometime smuggler in “A Pirate Looks at Forty,” who shrugs, “I feel like I’ve drowned, gonna head uptown.”