110 Fun Facts About Jimmy Buffett

In which Gulf Coast town was Jimmy Buffett born in 1946?

Pascagoula, Mississippi. The family soon moved along the coast to Mobile, Alabama, where his father worked at a shipyard, so Buffett grew up a state away from his birthplace.

Jimmy Buffett shared his birthday with which holiday?

Christmas Day. Born on 25 December 1946, he went on to record two holiday albums of his own, Christmas Island and, twenty years later, 'Tis the SeaSon.

Buffett flunked out of which university after a single year in 1966?

Auburn. He enrolled that autumn at a Mississippi junior college instead, and later said he had stayed in higher education to keep out of the Vietnam draft.

What subject was Buffett's 1969 bachelor's degree in?

History. He finished the degree at the University of Southern Mississippi, singing on street corners at weekends to help pay his way through college.

As a Nashville editorial assistant, Buffett was first to report the breakup of which bluegrass act?

Flatt and Scruggs. Buffett broke the story as a reporter for Billboard magazine; the duo parted in 1969, when Earl Scruggs left to play with his sons in the Earl Scruggs Revue.

How many copies did Buffett's 1970 debut album sell?

A few hundred. Down to Earth is usually said to have sold 324 copies, and his label then said it had lost the master tapes of the follow-up, which turned up again only once he was a star.

A 1971 busking expedition persuaded Buffett to move, in spring 1972, to which town?

Key West. Country singer Jerry Jeff Walker drove him down from Miami in a 1947 Packard, and Buffett decided he had found his new home.

Which 1973 album was Buffett's first for the ABC/Dunhill label?

A White Sport Coat and a Pink Crustacean. The title is a shrimpy spoof of Marty Robbins's 1957 hit 'A White Sport Coat (and a Pink Carnation)', and Buffett cut the record in Nashville.

Which 1974 song, written for his future wife, was Buffett's first single to reach the Billboard Hot 100?

Come Monday. He wrote it on the road in 1973, missing Jane, and the single swapped the album's 'Hush Puppies' line for 'hiking shoes'.

Why was Buffett ejected from his courtside seat at an NBA game in 2001?

Swearing at the officials. The referee had no idea who he was, and when Heat coach Pat Riley asked whether he had never been a Parrothead, the official took it as an insult.

The Coral Reefer Band's name puns on coral reefs and which meaning of 'reefer'?

Marijuana. Buffett made the joke official in 2019, when he licensed the name Coral Reefer to a line of cannabis products that launched in Florida.

'Margaritaville' first appeared on which 1977 album?

Changes in Latitudes, Changes in Attitudes. Buffett started the song in Austin, Texas, where a margarita eased his hangover before a flight, and finished it once he was back home in Florida.

In 'Margaritaville', some people claim a woman is to blame, but who does the narrator finally say is at fault?

Himself. The first chorus insists it's nobody's fault and the second admits it could be his, before the last one owns up; the single reached No. 8 on the Hot 100.

Buffett claimed he wrote most of 'Margaritaville' in about how long?

Six minutes, by his usual telling, though he once said five. He thought of it as just another song for the album, and it became his only top-ten hit on the Hot 100.

Which hall of fame inducted 'Margaritaville' in 2016?

Grammy Hall of Fame. The 1977 single went in among the 2016 inductees, although Buffett's own Grammy record amounted to two nominations, both for country collaborations recorded decades later.

Which mishap, by producer Norbert Putnam's account, helped inspire 'Margaritaville'?

He lost a flip-flop on the way home, then cut his foot on a pop top and found no salt for his drink. Putnam told him it was a terrible idea for a song, and changed his mind days later.

Buffett dreamed up 'Cheeseburger in Paradise' after a rough sail ended at which of the British Virgin Islands?

Tortola. The ice had melted and the crew were down to canned food and peanut butter when they limped into Road Town, where a marina bar sold him the burger he had been picturing.

Which Mexican beer sponsored Buffett's tours long before he launched LandShark Lager?

Corona. Buffett pitched for the sponsorship in 1984, and the brewer went on to borrow his beach-bum image for its advertising as its sales climbed.

Which 1979 album contained both 'Fins' and its own title track?

Volcano. Buffett recorded it on the Caribbean island of Montserrat, beneath the then-dormant Soufrière Hills volcano that gave the album its name and erupted for real in 1995.

Which restaurant chain's bid to trademark 'Margaritaville' did Buffett fight off in the 1980s?

Chi-Chi's. A song title can't be trademarked, so his lawyers argued instead that the name had become synonymous with Buffett.

Which 1985 album became the best seller of Buffett's career?

Songs You Know by Heart. It kept selling for twenty years and was certified seven-times platinum in 2005, though none of his 1980s studio albums had climbed above No. 30 on the chart.

Which Coral Reefer Band member, better known as another famous rock group's bassist, coined 'Parrot Head'?

Timothy B. Schmit. At a 1985 show at an Ohio amusement park he looked out at a sea of Hawaiian shirts and parrot hats and gave Buffett's returning fans their name.

The first Parrothead club was founded in 1989 in which city?

Atlanta. Scott Nickerson started the club so that concert friends could meet between Buffett's once-a-year shows there, then went on to found Parrot Heads in Paradise, the umbrella body for clubs everywhere.

The nickname 'Parrot Heads' for Buffett's fans was a play on the name for which band's followers?

The Grateful Dead. Buffett had been teasing a 1985 crowd for coming back show after show like Deadheads, and the joke name stuck and grew into an international network of fan clubs.

The first business called Margaritaville with a link to Buffett opened in 1984 in which Alabama beach town?

Gulf Shores. A friend of Buffett's was behind it; the Margaritaville store that opened in Florida the following year is the one that grew into the chain.

Buffett sang 'Mack the Knife' with which crooner on the 1994 album Duets II?

Frank Sinatra. The pair never shared a studio: guests added their parts to vocals he had already recorded with the orchestra, on what proved to be his last studio album.

Buffett's 2003 duet 'It's Five O'Clock Somewhere' was recorded with which country star?

Alan Jackson. He had been looking for a song to record with Buffett, and this one already asked 'What would Jimmy Buffett do?' just before the guest's part begins.

In 'It's Five O'Clock Somewhere', which rum cocktail does the narrator ask the bartender to pour?

A Hurricane. The New Orleans favourite is ordered 'tall and strong' by a man who has decided not to go back to work, in a song that won writers Jim 'Moose' Brown and Don Rollins a Grammy.

Which 2004 album became Buffett's only No. 1 on the Billboard 200?

License to Chill. His first chart-topping album came from the country music he had failed at in Nashville three decades earlier: it is a set of country duets, most of them covers.

Buffett's 1998 memoir is built around a family trip he took to celebrate what?

His 50th birthday. He flew his family around the Caribbean and South America by seaplane, and the logbook he kept on the way became A Pirate Looks at Fifty.

Buffett co-wrote the children's books The Jolly Mon and Trouble Dolls with which family member?

His daughter Savannah. She was only eight when the first of them, The Jolly Mon, came out in 1988, and the pair recorded themselves reading it aloud for the tape sold with the book.

Buffett turned which Caribbean novel into a stage musical in 1997?

Don't Stop the Carnival. Herman Wouk turned his own book into the script while Buffett supplied the songs, and the show ran for only six weeks in Miami.

Buffett bought into a Florida minor-league baseball team in 1989 alongside which comic actor?

Bill Murray. The two bought shares in the Miami Miracle, kept them when the club was sold and moved to Fort Myers, and Buffett stayed a part-owner for 25 years.

Buffett co-produced, scored and acted in the 2006 film of which Carl Hiaasen novel?

Hoot. Its story of children saving a colony of burrowing owls from a developer matched his conservation causes, and he took the part of their science teacher, Mr. Ryan.

Buffett launched the Cheeseburger in Paradise restaurant chain in 2002 with which steakhouse company?

Outback Steakhouse. Its parent company paid Buffett for the song's name and opened the restaurants; Luby's bought the chain in 2012, and the last one closed in 2020.

Buffett founded Margaritaville Records in 1992 with distribution through which major label?

MCA. It was already the label he recorded for, having absorbed his old label ABC years earlier; he later went fully independent with his own Mailboat Records.

Which brewer partnered with Buffett in 2006 to make LandShark Lager?

Anheuser-Busch. The lager takes its name from the land sharks of Buffett's song 'Fins', and for the 2009 season the Miami Dolphins' stadium carried the beer's name.

Latitude Margaritaville, the $1 billion retirement community Buffett announced in 2017, is near which city?

Built with the Minto Group, the 3,900-home village put the beach-bum brand into the 55-plus market.

On 25 August 1994 Buffett crashed his Grumman Widgeon seaplane off which island?

Nantucket. His seaplane, Lady of the Waters, nosed over on take-off in Madaket Harbor; Buffett swam clear with minor injuries and retold the day in his memoir.

Who shot at Buffett's seaplane in 1996, the mix-up he retold in the song 'Jamaica Mistaica'?

Jamaican police. They wrongly suspected the plane of running drugs; U2's Bono and his family were among the passengers, and the Jamaican government later apologised.

With Bob Graham, then governor of Florida, Buffett co-founded which conservation group in 1981?

Save the Manatee Club. It began as the Save the Manatee Committee, which Buffett chaired at Graham's request before it grew into a nonprofit in its own right.

Radio Margaritaville, online-only from 1998, moved to which satellite service in 2005?

Sirius. Three years later the company merged with its rival XM, the tempting wrong answer here, which made the station a SiriusXM channel.

Buffett died in September 2023 of complications from which rare cancer?

Merkel-cell carcinoma. He lived with the rare skin cancer for four years, keeping the diagnosis private and carrying on touring until a few months before his death.

Buffett entered the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2024 with which award?

Musical Excellence. The Hall credited him with creating his own 'Gulf and Western' blend of country and Caribbean sounds, though the honour came a year after his death.

Which posthumous Buffett album takes its title from his grandfather's phrase for a nap?

Equal Strain on All Parts. It came out two months after his death, with Paul McCartney playing bass on a song inspired by a remark McCartney's wife made at a dinner party.

On the Hawaii Five-0 reboot, Buffett had a recurring role as which character?

Frank Bama, a helicopter pilot. Buffett had used the name before: Frank Bama is the seaplane pilot at the centre of his 1992 novel Where Is Joe Merchant?, and he played the television version in seven episodes.

In which 2015 blockbuster does Buffett cameo, running for his life with two margaritas?

Jurassic World. The film's theme park has a Margaritaville of its own, and Buffett, an old collaborator of the producer, flees it clutching the drinks when the dinosaurs get loose.

Which band played at Buffett's 1977 wedding to Jane Slagsvol in Aspen, Colorado?

The Eagles. Buffett had opened for them two summers earlier and told his band that was the group to become; years later they asked him to give their Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction speech.

Buffett's 2010 collaboration 'Knee Deep' was with which group?

Zac Brown Band. Co-writer Wyatt Durrette had been a Buffett fan since childhood, so the band brought in the man its beach song was channelling, and the single went to No. 1 on the country chart.

Buffett's final full concert, on 6 May 2023, was at Snapdragon Stadium in which city?

San Diego. He closed the night with Crosby, Stills & Nash's 'Southern Cross', and after it made only two unannounced guest spots at bandmates' shows before his death that September.

Florida named which coastal highway the Jimmy Buffett Memorial Highway in 2024?

State Road A1A. The beach road along the state's Atlantic shore had already lent its name to his 1974 album A1A, so the legislature gave the whole length of it to him in return.

Which of Buffett's 'Big Eight' concert staples did he credit to the pen name Marvin Gardens?

Why Don't We Get Drunk. He cut the bawdy send-up of country love songs in one take as a joke and kept his name off the credit, and it became a jukebox favourite.

Buffett's 1974 song 'A Pirate Looks at Forty' was written about what kind of man?

A drug smuggler. Buffett modelled him on Phil Clark, a colourful friend from his first years in Florida who, nearing forty, feared that his line of work was dying out.

Buffett named his 1999 live album after which three days, his preferred nights for playing concerts?

Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays. By then he played only 20 to 30 nights a year and avoided back-to-back shows, and the album was the first release on his Mailboat label.

In which Long Island village was the waterfront home where Buffett died in 2023?

Sag Harbor. He died at home there on the night of 1 September, in the words of his family's statement 'surrounded by his family, friends, music and dogs'.

Buffett's first award in three decades of recording came in 2003 from which body?

The Country Music Association. It named 'It's Five O'Clock Somewhere' its Vocal Event of the Year, soon after the same duet had given him his first No. 1 on the country chart.

Despite his Miami Dolphins tie-ins, Buffett was a devoted fan of which NFL team, whose first home game he attended in 1967?

New Orleans Saints. When the league suspended coach Sean Payton in 2012, Buffett wore a 'Free Sean Payton' shirt at a New Orleans concert and put the coach on bongos with the band.

What did investor Warren Buffett, who was no relation, call his friend Jimmy Buffett?

Cousin Jimmy. Jimmy called him 'Uncle Warren' in return, and the pair once took a DNA test together to check; it found no family link.

Who gave the speech inducting Jimmy Buffett into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2024?

James Taylor. Buffett knew the ritual from the other side: back in 1998 he had been the one giving an induction speech, for a band he had once opened for.

Jimmy Buffett's two shows in September 2005 opened which historic ballpark to pop concerts?

Wrigley Field. Buffett's Labor Day weekend shows were the first of their kind at the Chicago Cubs' home, and the ballpark has opened its gates to concerts on a limited basis ever since, with ten in the summer of 2017.

Which rock star was aboard Jimmy Buffett's seaplane with his family when it was shot at in 1996?

Bono was flying with his wife, two children and Island Records founder Chris Blackwell; the plane was barely damaged, and the government later apologized.

Which film star cracks a whip on Jimmy Buffett's 1985 album track 'Desperation Samba'?

Harrison Ford lent the sound effect as a nod to his own whip-cracking in the Indiana Jones films.

Jimmy Buffett usually opened his concert favorite 'Fins' with a few bars of which film's theme?

Jaws supplied the ominous intro because the song's sharks are really men trying to pick up the woman it describes.

Which Daily Show host answered Jimmy Buffett's 1999 song 'Math Suks' with 'Math Is Quite Pleasant'?

Jon Stewart was joking, but two national teachers' groups condemned the song in earnest for its supposed effect on children's education.

Which music legend plays on Jimmy Buffett's posthumous 2023 song 'My Gummie Just Kicked In'?

Paul McCartney played bass on it, having been at the dinner party where the incident that inspired the song took place.

Which hard-living writer sublet Jimmy Buffett's Florida apartment in 1977, his breakthrough year?

Hunter S. Thompson took over the apartment in the same year that the album containing 'Margaritaville' made Buffett a star.

Jimmy Buffett's star-packed 2004 remake of 'Hey Good Lookin'' covered a 1951 hit by which singer?

Hank Williams wrote and recorded the original, and Buffett's version enlisted Clint Black, Kenny Chesney, Toby Keith and George Strait.

A creature found in the Florida Keys in 2023 and named for Jimmy Buffett is what kind of animal?

A fish parasite about three millimeters long, Gnathia jimmybuffetti was the first new species of its family found in Florida in 100 years.

Jimmy Buffett began playing 'He Went to Paris' more often on learning which songwriter liked it?

Bob Dylan's approval rescued a ballad Buffett had rarely played live, written after he met a one-armed veteran of the Spanish Civil War in Chicago.

Jimmy Buffett played a free seaside show for 35,000 people in July 2010 to revive tourism after what?

An oil spill from the Deepwater Horizon rig had hit the Alabama coast, and Buffett changed some of his lyrics to refer to the disaster.

Which job did Jimmy Buffett's grandfather hold, a Newfoundland seafarer who influenced his music?

Ship's captain was the family trade, and he passed a love of the sea to his son, a marine engineer, and to a grandson who put it into his records.

Jimmy Buffett grew up and graduated from the McGill Institute in 1964 in which Alabama city?

Mobile was where he went to Catholic school and first played in a school ensemble, though part of his childhood was spent in nearby Fairhope.

Jimmy Buffett first learned guitar from a college fraternity brother for which stated reason?

To impress girls was the whole plan, and it worked too well: music and dating soon crowded out his classes and he flunked out within a year.

Jimmy Buffett met his future wife Jane in a Florida bar while she was visiting on what kind of trip?

Spring break brought the University of South Carolina student to town, and after meeting Buffett she never went back to her studies.

Robert Greenidge spent over 40 years in Jimmy Buffett's Coral Reefer Band playing what?

Steel drums gave the group its island shimmer from 1983 onward, played by a Trinidadian who had first performed on the pans at the age of eight.

Jimmy Buffett's 1998 memoir made him one of few authors to top best-seller lists in which two categories?

Fiction and nonfiction number ones both belonged to Buffett once the memoir debuted on top; two of his fiction books had each spent more than seven months on the lists.

Jimmy Buffett and Glenn Close both cameo among the villain's crew in which Steven Spielberg film?

Hook hid both of them among the pirates, and cast George Lucas and Carrie Fisher as a kissing couple sprinkled with pixie dust.

Jimmy Buffett wrote 'I Don't Know (Spicoli's Theme)' for which 1982 teen comedy?

Fast Times at Ridgemont High starred Sean Penn, and its perpetually stoned surfer Spicoli got a theme tune from Buffett.

Jimmy Buffett contributed the song 'Don't Bug Me' to the soundtrack of which film?

Arachnophobia, the spider-invasion thriller, was one of several films Buffett wrote for, along with Urban Cowboy and Summer Rental.

In which Australian city did Jimmy Buffett fall off the stage after an encore in 2011?

Sydney was lucky for him in one respect: a trauma surgeon was standing near the stage and treated him on the spot.

Jimmy Buffett played which instrument in his Catholic school band from the age of eight?

Trombone was his instrument from the age of eight, years before a folk group he saw in Biloxi convinced him to become a musician.

Jimmy Buffett's 1966 college acid-rock group, the Upstairs Alliance, tried to copy which band's sound?

Jefferson Airplane was the model for his short-lived psychedelic phase, a long way from the easygoing island ballads that made his name.

Which country singer gave a struggling Jimmy Buffett a room in his Coconut Grove house in 1971?

Jerry Jeff Walker had met him in Nashville, where Buffett was working as a music journalist while his first marriage headed for divorce.

After which singer died in a 1973 plane crash did ABC/Dunhill promote Jimmy Buffett as his replacement?

Jim Croce recorded for the same label, which Buffett had joined earlier that year, so the company pushed its new signing to fill the gap.

Jimmy Buffett's 1983 song 'One Particular Harbour' opens with lyrics in which Polynesian language?

Tahitian opens the song thanks to co-writer Bobby Holcomb, and Buffett shot the video in Tahiti with the ship used in the film The Bounty.

Jimmy Buffett's concert staple 'Southern Cross' was a 1982 hit for which harmony-singing rock group?

Crosby, Stills & Nash took the sailing song to number 18 in 1982, and it later became a fixture of Buffett's own shows.

Which country star duetted with Jimmy Buffett on the 2004 single 'Trip Around the Sun'?

Martina McBride's duet was his last top 40 country hit for years, until a later collaboration took him all the way to number one.

Which day job did Jimmy Buffett hold in early-1970s Florida while playing bars for drinks?

First mate on a yacht was his day job: the boat belonged to industrialist Foster Talge, heir to The Rival Company.

Which longtime Coral Reefer Band guitarist became its leader after Jimmy Buffett's death in 2023?

Mac McAnally first wrote songs for Buffett and then joined his touring lineup in 1994; the group now performs with an empty microphone at center stage.

Which CBS News correspondent used to perform on stage with Jimmy Buffett and the Neville Brothers?

Ed Bradley loved jazz and hosted a radio series about it, and the Neville Brothers nicknamed him their fifth brother.

In Jimmy Buffett's 2004 novel A Salty Piece of Land, hero Tully Mars is put to work repairing what?

A lighthouse on the mythical island of Cayo Loco needs fixing because a ship's 101-year-old commander, Cleopatra Highbourne, wants to be laid to rest there.

A song Jimmy Buffett supplied for the animated film FernGully is sung on screen by which rapper?

Tone Loc sang 'If I'm Gonna Eat Somebody (It Might As Well Be You)', one of the stranger credits in Buffett's film soundtrack work.

Jimmy Buffett wrote the music for which 1975 comedy about two cattle rustlers in Montana?

Rancho Deluxe was scripted by novelist Thomas McGuane, and Buffett appears on screen singing in a bar scene.

Jimmy Buffett played both a con artist and the real Jimmy Buffett in a 2022 episode of which CBS drama?

Blue Bloods had him play a swindler posing as the singer as well as the genuine article, in an episode first shown in January 2022.

Jimmy Buffett voiced which Mark Twain character on a 2011 benefit album for a Twain museum?

Huckleberry Finn was his role, opposite Clint Eastwood as Twain and with Garrison Keillor narrating.

On which French Caribbean island did Jimmy Buffett keep a house and co-own a hotel that burned down?

St. Barts drew him in 1978 and inspired songs and characters in his books; his hotel there was shut by the local authorities and burned down soon after.

Jimmy Buffett said the pills French customs took for ecstasy in 2006 were really what?

A B-vitamin supplement called Foltx was his explanation after his luggage was searched in southern France; he paid a $300 fine and was released.

Jimmy Buffett named his 2009 album Buffet Hotel after a building in which African country?

Mali was hosting the Festival au Désert when Buffett visited and spotted the building in the capital, Bamako.

At which U.S. naval base overseas did Jimmy Buffett play a concert for the troops in 2002?

Guantanamo Bay, on the coast of Cuba, hosted the show; Buffett enjoyed playing for service members wherever they were posted.

Which institution chose Jimmy Buffett's 'Margaritaville' for its National Recording Registry in 2023?

The Library of Congress preserves recordings it judges culturally, historically or aesthetically significant, and the single joined the list 46 years after its release.

In the second verse of Jimmy Buffett's 'Margaritaville', what can the narrator not remember getting?

A tattoo of a woman is the only thing he has to show for a whole season spent in the resort town.

In the first verse of Jimmy Buffett's 'Margaritaville', what is the narrator waiting to boil?

Shrimp are in the pot while he plays guitar on his front porch and watches the tourists sunbathe.

Jimmy Buffett's Margaritaville cafes dropped Canadian seafood in 2006 in protest over which animals?

Seals were the cause: Buffett announced on the company website that the cafes would neither buy nor serve seafood from Canada.

Jimmy Buffett's Margaritaville brand became a main sponsor in 2018 of the U.S. Open in which sport?

Pickleball's U.S. Open is played in Naples, Florida, and carries the Margaritaville name in its official title.

Which animated series won a 2009 Emmy for an episode about a Jimmy Buffett Margaritaville blender?

South Park made the blender a metaphor for American consumerism in an episode satirizing the global recession.

Jimmy Buffett's stage show Escape to Margaritaville first ran in 2017 at which California venue?

La Jolla Playhouse staged it for two months before tryouts in three more cities and a 2018 Broadway opening, where it closed after 124 regular performances.

Jimmy Buffett's 'Margaritaville' stalled at eight on the Hot 100 but topped which other chart?

Easy Listening was the one chart it led; on the country chart it peaked at 13, and it remained Buffett's highest-charting solo single.

A tribute concert to Jimmy Buffett was held in April 2024 at which outdoor Los Angeles venue?

The Hollywood Bowl show, seven months after his death, drew performers ranging from rock veterans to Snoop Dogg and Pitbull.

Which singer co-wrote Jimmy Buffett's 1985 song 'Gypsies in the Palace' and makes a vocal cameo at the end?

Glenn Frey shared the writing credit on the Last Mango in Paris track, from an album whose title plays on the 1972 movie Last Tango in Paris.

Jimmy Buffett plays a version of Jimmy Buffett in which 2019 Matthew McConaughey stoner comedy?

The Beach Bum was his final feature film, an extended cameo in Harmony Korine's tale of a hard-partying poet known as Moondog.