Jimmy Buffett Departs With the Summer – WSJ

Because he instinctively understood his audiences longings, and knew that they echoed his own, he was able to distill that longing into seemingly simple words that reached listeners like notes stuffed into a bottle cast out to sea. From his song Fins : She came down from Cincinnati, it took her three days on a train / Looking for some peace and quiet, hoped to see the sun again . . .

He recognized that the specific logic behind people s secret hungers didn t require elaborate explanation: Don t know the reason, stayed here all season, he sang in Margaritaville, and not knowing the reason seemed reason enough. Although if you listened closely to the words he and his band sang from all those outdoor stages, the urgency of an escape was evident: I m gettin paid by the hour, and older by the minute . . .

The rearview mirror, ever crooking its finger to pull in the driver s gaze, is something Buffett was acutely aware of and doggedly did his best to resist. From Changes in Latitudes, Changes in Attitudes : Oh, yesterday s over my shoulder, so I can t look back for too long / There s just too much to see, waiting in front of me . . .

Life s pleasures, in the musical world Buffett created, didn t need to be extravagant: a lost shaker of salt, shrimp on the boil, the feel of an acoustic guitar s strings on your fingertips as you sit on the front porch swing. Too rudimentary, in a society conditioned to glitter and glitz? Hardly. How can you not smile, and salivate, when you hear the words: Making the best of every virtue and vice, worth every damn bit of sacrifice, to get a cheeseburger in paradise ?

Heaven on earth with an onion slice, Buffett declared, and who is to doubt him? He saw the grayness in 9-to-5 life, the preposterousness in many of the things we tell ourselves are so essential, and reminded his audiences: With all of our running and all of our cunning / If we couldn t laugh we would all go insane.

Buffett has departed at 76, and summer is ending, but be of good heart: It s 5 o clock somewhere.

via www.wsj.com

While some of his songs were too cheesy for me, I generally liked his music, especially the tunes about sailing. And for a guy who presumably enjoyed his beer and his bong, he got a lot done.