June 2, 2004
Parrot Head

Parrot heads.  I’ve joined the club.  Several folks kept pointing out I was one of a mere handful of Americans between the ages of 40 and 65 to have never witnessed Jimmy Buffet in concert.  Well consider me a Coral Reefer virgin no longer.

     A couple of week’s back, Jan and I joined seventeen thousand other folks at Margaretville’s temporary world headquarter in Denver’s Pepsi Center.  Buffet fans, aka as “parrotheads” for reasons I know not, were out in force and in costume.  There couldn’t have been a tropical shirt left on the shelves of any retailer from Tommy Bahama to Wally World within sixty miles of Denver.  The stylings of a tropical vacation were everywhere.

     Also wandering the streets of Denver and the Pepsi Center parking lot were ladies in bathing suits, ladies in sarongs and ladies who weren’t ladies at all but over-weight males wearing grass skirts and coconut bras.  I’d like to tell you Jimmy’s female fans of both genders were tropical eye candy but the unvarnished truth is most of the Buffet fanatics in attendance appeared to have enjoyed way too many “I like mine with lettuce and tomatoes, Heinz 57 and French fried potatoes, Cheeseburgers in Paradise”

      For over thirty years summertime has seen Jimmy Buffet take his show on the road across America. Many baby boomers follow the Coral Reefer Band and Mr. Buffet from city to city.  This year’s License To Chill tour would be best characterized as Phish or Grateful Dead for geezers. 

     Inside the Pepsi Center beer vendors were lonelier than a Maytag repairman but Parrotheads were twenty deep at the margarita stands dotting the concourse.  And while sales were brisk the plus forty set seemed to be more sippers than chuggers, as the concert faithful appeared far less hammered than your average Bronco crowd.

     Once Mr. Buffet hit the stage the audience was on their feet.  And the Buffet faithful were there to hear his hits, not the new stuff.  The minute Jimmy announced, “Here’s another song from our new album” the aisles were filled with flowered shirts and grass skirts heading for the margarita stands, the restrooms or both.

      But how can you not have a great time at a show with a steel pan on stage and the lead singer barefoot?  For one night the unique sound of steel drums so indigenous to the Caribbean brought a tropical vacation to the Mile High City.

      I was surprised at the number of youngsters in attendance.  Obviously, so was Mr. Buffet.  He remarked all the little ones in the audience should, “put your little fingers in your little ears because Uncle Jimmy is going to sing Mommy and Daddy’s favorite song.”  Immediately scores of youngsters were seen being towed toward the exits by a parent all the while wailing, “But I don’t have to go to the bathroom.”  Then the Coral Reefer band rolled into to the Buffet classic “Let’s Get Drunk”.  Note:  If you’re unfamiliar with the words of this Parrothead anthem go to Google on your ‘puter and type in “Let’s Get Drunk”-lyrics-Buffet.  Not everyone is familiar with the words to this song as a disc jockey discovered one Saturday morning when our station was in Fruita.  A father called in a request for a Jimmy Buffet tune dedicated to the slumber party his high school daughter was hosting.  “What song?” the caller was asked.  “Oh you pick one,” came the reply.  The jock, not a Buffet fan, saw the title Let’s Get Drunk on the CD cover, didn’t know the lyrics but thought the title would be funny for a slumber party.

      Ha Ha. It was one highly upset father calling me at home to bitterly complain.  It would be my guess his radio requests weren’t left to the disc jockey from that day forward.

     Jan and I were blown away by Jimmy Buffet.  On a Tuesday night in Denver we witnessed “Fins to the left, Fins to the right” and Jimmy Buffet was the only game in town.  What a game it was.