Friday, October 22, 2004
Copyright @ Las Vegas Review-Journal

Wastin' Away Again
One man comes from Japan, his buddy wears a coconut bra -- a Jimmy Buffett show is that kind of party
By DOUG ELFMAN
REVIEW-JOURNAL

Jimmy Buffett rocked the house at the MGM Grand Garden arena last weekend. He plays there again Saturday.
Photo by CHED WHITNEY/REVIEW-JOURNAL (Check with the newspaper please.)

Jimmy Buffett concerts are a lot like bar sing-alongs, but -- as was the case Saturday at the MGM Grand Garden arena, where 14,000 fans showed up -- they can be much bigger than that.

Buffett takes his traveling drink-along show back to the MGM this Saturday. If the previous weekend's show is any indication, it will look like this:

It started with people streaming into the arena, thousands wearing Hawaiian shirts, shorts, thongs (mostly the shoes and not the underwear, for once in this town).

One "Parrothead" walking into the arena was Jason Putman, 32, of Las Vegas. He builds bombs as a member of the Air Force. He was wearing a fake-grass skirt, a coconut bra covering his bare chest, a lei, a straw hat and an acoustic guitar hung on his back.

His bomb-building Air Force friend Kurt Tom, who was also shirtless, held bongos. Tom flew in from Japan to see the show.

Putman, heading into his 14th Buffett concert in a decade, described himself as the No. 1 Jimmy Buffett fan, able to perform every single Buffett song from more than 30 albums and even more bootleg albums.

"He's had a profound effect on my life," Putman said. "Jimmy affects the way you look at life.

"I think a lot of Parrotheads want to live through Jimmy vicariously. Personally, I escape through him if I'm having a bad day at work, or not."

Listening to Buffett transports his mind, he said.

"I'm sittin' in a lawn chair on the beach with a beer in my hand, and I hear steel drums in the background," he says.

Around him were screaming, joyous fans.

"It's a mix of people. You've got older, younger. But everyone here -- it's like a big family," Putman said.

The show lasted three hours, counting a brief opening by the Coral Reefer Band, plus an intermission that lasted just a few minutes.

Buffett performed many of his more popular songs, faithfully. "Pencil Thin Mustache" sounded very much as it did when he released the song years ago. The same went for "Son of a Son of a Sailor," "Cheeseburger in Paradise" and "Margaritaville."

Most fans stood the entire time and clapped along. Buffett performed in a Hawaiian shirt, shorts and barefoot, smiling often. He chatted up the crowd, offering relevant song introductions, such as one-liners about being hungry before singing "Cheeseburger in Paradise," or mentioning that Vegas is a carnival before launching into "Carnival World."

Buffett may have headlined a fund-raiser for John Kerry in August, but the closest Buffett got to being topical on Saturday was mentioning Mount St. Helens' recent activity before he performed "Volcano."

Saturday was all about partying. Buffett's guitar strap read "CHILL." Three percussionists instilled steel drums and Jamaican rhythms into the music. A steel guitarist added a soaring tranquility to "Come Monday."

Four women -- back-up singers and dancers -- jogged in skirts to beachy beats, on a stage dotted with tiki hut umbrellas and potted plants.

During "Fins," fans put their hands together and moved to the left and right, while a car-sized, inflatable shark floated through the air, its movements operated by remote control.

Fans rarely sat or stopped moving. A couple seemingly combined at the pelvises, way up in section 21, bumped and grinded during "Why Don't We Get Drunk," and during "Southern Cross," and during almost every other song. One of their friends poured booze into plastic cups out of a plastic flask that made it past the arena's metal detectors.

A woman standing directly behind the pelvis-people said Buffett concerts are often filled with marijuana smoke, but this one seemed to be nearly devoid of it.

Buffett was generous with his band and fans. "Thanks for the ride," he said. "I'm not broke, and I'm not in rehab."

He drank water during the show. But when he arrived onstage for an encore, he gave that up. "It's that time of the show where I can indulge in a cocktail," he said.

Then, as Parrotheads streamed out of the MGM and onto the streets, some carrying giant inflatable replicas of booze bottles, fans glowed about their experience.

"Awesome," Ronda Stevens said. She drove in from Reno for her second Buffett experience. "I will come every year!"