Reviews of Jimmy Buffett Shows Past

The Washington Post

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July 3, 1986
Though Jimmy Buffett's recording career has been stalled for the last seven years, he still mounts an entertaining concert thanks to his intact showman instincts and his good taste in musicians. He introduced his show at the Merriweather Post Pavilion last night dressed as the Statue of Liberty in a foam rubber crown, a yellow blanket and a half-peeled banana held aloft as a torch.

Also making an appearance in pink sunglasses and a Hawaiian shirt was Godzilla himself, who played congas and delivered a comic monologue. If Buffett never recaptured the poignancy of his early career, his patter and novelty tunes made him seem like the Bill Murray of pop music.

Many of the newer songs work better in concert than they did in the studio, thanks to the loose, high spirits enjoyed by the all-star, 12-man band. The show opened with a couple of dizzying calypso duets by Trinidad's steel-drum master, Robert Greenidge, and Buffett's longtime keyboardist Michael Utley. The rhythms were bolstered by Little Feat percussionist Sam Clayton and perhaps the best bassist in pop music, New Orleans' incomparably funky George Porter.

The icing on the cake was the appearance of the fabled Memphis Horns, saxophonist Andrew Love and trumpeter Wayne Jackson. When the whole band cut loose on new songs like "I Love the Now," old songs like "Fins" or on covers like Little Feat's "Old Folks Boogie," Buffett rocked more convincingly than he ever had before.

Geoffrey Himes

The Washington Post

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June 29, 1987
About the only thing missing from Jimmy Buffett's annual lawn party at Merriweather Post Pavilion this weekend was his trademark walrus moustache. Backed by a rousingly festive rock-cum-steel drum band, the clean-shaven singer again celebrated life as an endless vacation, a notion that the crowd feverishly embraced.

And you can chalk up the size of Saturday night's capacity crowd to word of mouth. For while Buffett hasn't exactly lit up the record charts in the '80s, his concerts are still de rigueur for would-be beach bums.

Not that there weren't some silver moments along the way. For all the success of "Margaritaville" and "Cheeseburgers in Paradise," songs that still elicit romping ovations, some of Buffett's best songs are ballads like "A Pirate Looks at Forty." He added another reflective tune to the list, "That's What Living Is to Me," one of several songs he played on acoustic guitar with little or no accompaniment.

Mostly, though, Buffet sang of life in the fun lane, turning out one steel-drum-ringingly sunny anthem after another. Several of the band's stalwarts, including harmonica player Greg (Fingers) Taylor, keyboardist Mike Utley and percussionists Robert Greenridge and Sam Clayton, joined Buffett and recent recruit Marshall Chapman in making sure the crowd's spirits never flagged.

Mike Joyce

The Washington Post

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July 8, 1989
Jimmy Buffett always keeps good company on the road, and that was doubly true at Merriweather Post Pavilion Thursday night.

For starters, the Neville Brothers opened the concert by showcasing Aaron Neville's breathtaking tenor on "Tell It Like It Is" and then, relying mostly on congas and timbales, rhythmically expanding the new "Yellow Moon" and "Blood" to the point where the recorded versions seemed pale by comparison.
Given the time constraints, the set wasn't as lively or as colorful as some of the band's club dates, but the performance, complete with a joyful medley of "Brother John" and "Iko Iko," was hard to resist just the same.

When the curtain went up on the Buffett show, the singer was flanked by mock palm trees, a couple of dancers in island costumes and a solid edition of his Coral Reefer Band.

Amiable as ever, Buffett thanked the crowd for giving him a "summer job" for the past 24 years, and then rewarded it with a typically boisterous summary of hits that invariably drew rousing ovations.

Amid all the hosannas to cheeseburgers, summer, sailing and the good life was a refreshing acoustic set that recalled the days when Buffett's name wasn't synonymous with frothy fun in the sun.

Mike Joyce

The Washington Post

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May 23, 1992
True to form, Jimmy Buffett's performance at Merriweather Post Pavilion last night was more of a ritual than a concert, a chance for his legion of fans -- or "parrot heads," as he calls them -- to don silly balloon hats and toss beach balls and the occasional inflatable shark to and fro.

It also confirmed Buffett's phenomenal summertime popularity, which remains undiminished despite his long absence from Top 40 charts. To see virtually everyone in the crowded arena and on the packed lawn mimicking sharks during "Fins" was to witness Buffett's command of his audience in all its beach party glory. Nor was the crowd any less appreciative when the singer and a horn-bolstered Coral Reefer Band dished up the obligatory "Cheeseburgers in Paradise" and "Grapefruit-Juicy Fruit" or recalled "Changes in Latitudes, Changes in Attitudes," "Volcano," "Why Don't We Get Drunk" and the song that inspired the evening's barroom staging, "Margaritaville." With help from keyboardist Michael Utley, steel drummer Robert Greenridge and harmonica ace Greg "Fingers" Taylor, Buffett energetically reprised most of what the crowd clearly came to hear, but some of his best moments came when he sang subdued ballads.

Mike Joyce

The Washington Post

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August 3, 1998
The usual knock on the seafaring, beach-bumming troubadour Jimmy Buffett is that his lyrics are formulaic and his musical range as limited as a country-western radio station. That should mean his live performances are more of the same old same old -- even when he kicks in new material.

But Friday night's show at the sold-out Nissan Pavilion proved once again that that kind of appraisal comes only from those who listen with their misconceptions instead of their ears. (Saturday's show at Nissan was also sold out, as are shows scheduled for Aug. 21 and 22 at Merriweather Post Pavilion.)

Backed by the 13-member Coral Reefer Band, Buffett played this stop on his summer "Carnival" tour as familiar, exotic and new as the sparkle of sunrise on the Caribbean. A faithful audience of 20,000-some "Parrotheads" arrived via backed-up Interstate 66, many decked out in tropical attire and goofy shark hats.

Buffett opened with the island-styled "Kinja." The lead tune off his newest album "Carnival" -- from the musical "Don't Stop the Carnival," which Buffett adapted with novelist Herman Wouk -- the catchy intro dived headfirst into the long-Buffetted theme of escape to the tropics. Other than a "Kinja" reprise ending the first set, only one other song came from this new material -- the final heartfelt encore of "Time to Go Home."

Perfectly fitting covers of James Taylor's "Mexico" and Crosby, Stills and Nash's "Southern Cross," plus Coral Reefer guitarist Mac MacNally's so-so singing of his own "In the City," were the only pieces to venture far from classic Buffett.
As Parrotheads sang along with the refrains of "The Weather Is Here, I Wish You Were Beautiful" and the reflective "Son of a Son of a Sailor," the musician with the surest smile in the business strummed his six-string and staged playful antics with costumed band members. In a tie-dye T-shirt, shorts, white socks and tennis shoes, Buffett looks 50 but doesn't act it. In beach-dharma songs with tongue-in-cheeky lyrics, like "If the Phone Doesn't Ring It's Me" and "Last Mango in Paris," he looks as though he's having the best time in the house.

The only disappointments: Buffett shared more lead lyrics with Coral Reefers than usual, and his boys on the sound board could have tinkered for better clarity before the night got away.

But Buffett's voice was in fine and frolicking form commanding his minions in the obligatory "Cheeseburger in Paradise" back-to-back with the steel-drum-driven "Changes in Latitude." Tender ballads like "Come Monday" and the funky "This Hotel Room" set up raucous shouters like "Fins," where the audience mimics sharks.

Even at the first two of three encores -- "Brown-Eyed Girl," which Buffett has co-opted in the key of Key West from early Van Morrison, and the eruptive "Volcano" -- the charismatic Buffett promised more songs. He delivered all night.

Don Oldenburg

The Washington Post

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June 12, 1999
A school of sharks, the inflatable or stuffed kind, was seen circling the Nissan Pavilion Thursday night. So were lots of women, young and old, in grass skirts or cut-off jeans or bikinis, toting salt-stained margarita glasses and clearly looking for a good time. Their boyfriends and husbands, not to be outdone, obviously spent much of the day making a spectacle of themselves, too, trying on plastic leis, fin-shaped caps and straw hats laden with enough faux fruit to choke a pink flamingo. Yes, Jimmy Buffett was coming to town.

Accustomed to being upstaged by his fans, Buffett even videotaped the tailgate parties and played back the footage from the Felliniesque beach party during the show. He also delivered a theatrical experience of his own. Inspired by his new album, "Beach House on the Moon," the concert was loosely--very loosely--built around a lunar journey, complete with thunderous blastoff, taped "Special Reports" from Walter Cronkite, and footage of astronaut Buffett trying to wolf down a cheeseburger under zero-gravity conditions.

Apart from an appealing cameo by the Tams, the animated shag-dancing vocal quintet, the new album didn't add much boost or thrust to the concert--"Math Suks" even generated a sluggish encore. But Buffett compensated by giving the packed and endlessly cheering house exactly what it wanted: a frothy concoction of Top 40 hits, including "Margaritaville" and "Changes in Latitudes," along with a chaser of career novelties, well-crafted ballads and at least one unprintable barroom anthem.

Clearly, Buffett's patented party mix hasn't lost its potency as far as his fans are concerned. The 2 1/2-hour performance nearly sustained a standing ovation from beginning to end, thanks in part to a seasoned 14-piece band that moved gracefully from Caribbean rhythms to Nashville twang. Yet there were plenty of moments when the cheesy costume scenarios being played out on the lawn were a lot more diverting than the music performed onstage.

Mike Joyce

The Washington Post

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September 11, 2001
The pursuit of life's-a-beach escapism seemed more intense than usual Saturday night at the Jimmy Buffett concert at Nissan Pavilion, maybe because the sold-out audience of more than 25,000 felt early autumn stealing away their summer dreams.

With his 14-piece Coral Reefer Band spanning the stage, Buffett opened with a lively "Only Time Will Tell," followed by "One Particular Harbour," which had fans chanting the "Ia ora te natura" chorus as two hula dancers gyrated across the stage.

"I hope you had as much fun on your vacation as I had on my vacation, but it's nice to be back at work," shouted Buffett, before breaking into a thunderous "Brown Eyed Girl," the Van Morrison classic.

Acoustic versions of the Caribbean ballad "Jolly Mon" and the seasonal lament "When the Coast Is Clear" started the second set before the always smiling Buffett turned rowdier with "Boat Drinks" and the country-western laugher "Why Don't We Get Drunk." Buffett also introduced the soon-to-be standard "Far Side of the World," the strong title track from his new album scheduled for release in late October.

Then came the past standards. Buffett perfectly paced the 26-song, 2 1/2-hour show toward the climactic crowd-pleaser "Fins," the Crosby, Stills and Nash masterpiece "Southern Cross," which Buffett has made his own, and "Margaritaville," his best-known wastin'-away classic.

Don Oldenburg

The Washington Post

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June 17, 2005
The giant airborne shark that meandered into Nissan Pavilion on Wednesday night is an apt metaphor for Jimmy Buffett and the Coral Reefer Band: oversize, goofy and entertaining.

What the flying fish didn't have in common with the 58-year-old troubadour: It meandered. Buffett and his cast of more than a dozen performers presented a spectacle as tightly scripted as "Cats" -- complete with enough local references to make it clear the man does his homework between tanning sessions. Every song was announced, one way or another (in the case of "Fins," by shark balloon), giving the Parrotheads that much more time to wriggle their grass skirts in anticipation.

Buffett's voice has lost none of its workmanlike efficiency over thirty-odd years. But if he's a good guitarist, it's hard to tell, since the sound of his acoustic was engulfed by the merry, melodic din, which included such tropical touches as steel drum and ukulele.

He's a brilliant musical ethnographer, though. The show included not only his own famous tales of boozing, boating and bronzing, but also like-minded songs by others, from Crosby, Stills and Nash's "Southern Cross" to Van Morrison's playful "Brown-Eyed Girl." A range of songs from his 1974 album "A-1-A" to his 2004 "License to Chill" showed his impressive consistency. The only real surprise was a video tribute to Johnny Carson, featuring Buffett reminiscing about his appearances on Carson's show.

Come to think of it, Carson's a better analogy for Buffett than that shark was. The concert provided cozy reassurance to people who endured two or more hours of the evening rush hour to dream of catching a wave, people whose last sight of the ocean was probably on a screen saver.

Pamela Murray Winters

The Washington Post