PARROTHEADS TURN 20 JIMMY BUFFETT   RETURNS TO CINCINNATI ON SUNDAY FOR HIS FLOCK OF FRIENDS The Cincinnati Post 8/18/2005 Byline: Rick Bird Post staff reporter This summer marks the 20th anniversary of Parrothead-mania. To mark the occasion, the Cincinnati Parrothead Club will hold a benefit bash at Moonlite Gardens  Saturday, the night before Jimmy Buffett plays a sold-out Riverbend. What would become the most famous line in Buffett lore came in 1985 at a concert at TimberWolf Amphitheater at Kings Island. OK, maybe it was '84 or even '83. Hard to remember after all those margaritas and years of searching for lost shakers of salt. "We know it was said here at Kings Island. Jimmy has said it was '85, so that's good enough," said Tim Klaber, a veteran of some 60 Buffett shows. Bill Whyte, the veteran country DJ and WUBE-FM morning host, was probably there to hear the immortal line but isn't sure, which means he probably was there, echoing the mantra about the '60s. "Gosh, it's possible, but if I was, I do not remember it," said Whyte, who counts himself a Buffett fan from the early '70s. What was said 20 years ago this summer at Timberwolf would sort of officially launch the Margaritaville cult. There was some stage banter as Jimmy looked out at something he had never seen before at one of his concerts -- a sea of thousands with everyone decked out in crazy, colorful beach attire -- shark hats, Hawaiian shirts, parrot inflatables. He said to bass player   Timothy B. Schmit, "They look like tropical Deadheads." Schmit replied, "Yeah, Parrot-heads." It was the birth of a Parrothead nation. "It was more like those two were chit-chattin' to each other, not like they were talking to the crowd," recalls Nan cy Barth, who was at the TimberWolf show and first saw Buffett at Music Hall in 1979. "I think it was more that they were laughing at us. I think they were making fun of us, to tell you the truth." For the charter Parrotheads, those early days can be a delightful blur. Klaber remembers it as almost a secret society. The Buffett phenomenon was full blown, but would not really be covered by the local media until the late '80s. "The best Buffett concert atmosphere was back at TimberWolf," Klaber said. "Many days we camped out overnight (for tickets) at the old Record Theater in Norwood. They let us and everyone behaved. The Norwood cops would come and talk with us." Buffett would move on to Riverbend doing over 40 shows the next two decades, playing to some 800,000 people, grossing perhaps $30 million-$40 million from the Cincinnati market alone. Fans in other cities soon mimicked what Cincinnati started, especially in hotbeds like Atlanta and Boston. But Cincinnati would go down as the mecca of the Parrothead faithful. "I was always aware Cincinnati was the heartbeat of where it all began," said Pam Inglish, president of the Cincinnati Parrothead Club, who moved here five years ago. "We were always jealous in Virginia -- 'My gosh, they get five shows in Cincinnati.'" The birth of Buffett's cult following wasn't completely spontaneous. Buffett has always been a master of marketing, but by 1984 nothing seemed to be working. His career was on the rocks. He had had only one radio hit ("Come Monday"), so he tried a new tack. He released a country-tinged album, "Riddles in the Sand," even posing for a ridiculous cover standing on the beach wearing a cowboy hat. Country radio would have nothing to do with it. (Buffett would finally get a country hit in 2004, teaming with Alan Jackson on "It's Five O'clock Somewhere"). Buffett decided to build an audience through touring and in the mid '80s he launched a clever direct mail, almost word-of-mouth campaign that made his fans feel they belonged to an exclusive virtual beach resort. He launched the "Coconut Telegraph" newsletter. At concerts fans would fill out cards to win a "Key West vacation with Jimmy," then they started to get mailings telling them the news from Margaritaville and where Jimmy was playing. The strategy now is used by every garage band around with the aid of the Internet, but it was unique at the time for corporate rock. It worked. Buffett managed to turn a mythical lifestyle into a marketable product, selling the Margaritaville promise of "controlled insanity" and escapism. By the late '80s, he had launched a Margaritaville clothing line and restaurant chain. In the '90s he was one of the first to launch an Internet radio station with radiomargaritaville.com (now heard on Sirius satellite radio). In some respects, it got too successful. Along the way a new generation discovered Buffett as Gen X joined the party. The college kids fueled the Riverbend lawn, one of the main reasons Buffett sold out three, four and finally five nights in the mid '90s. The original Parrotheads had mixed feelings, wondering if the insanity had gone out of control. "You saw a younger crowd of high school and college-age kids. They had just learned about Buffett. It was a fad, a party for them, not really about the music," Klaber said. "You saw a lot of craziness on the lawn, people getting sick and all that. In some ways they gave a bad name to the Parrotheads." Said Whyte: "I remember seeing him up at Alpine Valley (Wisconsin) and it was kind of atrocious with the teenage drunks. You had to step over them. It had gotten so big, I enjoyed it more when he was sort of the undiscovered secret." Those kids finally found cult bands of their own generation, such as Dave Matthews and Phish. By 1999, Buffett went back to doing just one night at Riverbend, suggesting that's all he could sell out anymore. Indeed, this summer Buffett has just a token tour with only 14 dates, the fewest he has done in years. It's one reason the Cincinnati show sold out in a record 10 minutes, drawing fans from markets Buffett is skipping this year, such as Columbus and Detroit. Buffett, who turns 59 Christmas Day, will likely keep up a touring presence as long as he can. After all, Margaritaville Inc. needs to be maintained. "With the restaurants and the books he's got going on, it seems like he needs the constant reminder that he's out there," Klaber said. "It's all part of the aura, and I think he has to tour to perpetuate that aura." There remains the big unanswered question: Why did the beak freak costume show and Margaritaville feeding frenzy start in Cincinnati? "Jimmy has said Cincinnati was always jealous it didn't have a Mardi Gras," Barth said. "So this is it." "You could make a case because we're landlocked," Whyte said. "He paints such a beach picture. But he plays to plenty of landlocked cites, so -- " "It's indicative of Cincinnati. We're conservative, but we are closeted fanatics," said Klaber, who owns a T-shirt and printing business. "It gives us a reason to escape; 364 days a year I'm a normal human being and businessperson with the straight and narrow life. One night you go nuts and escape. Musically it hooks you." Three faces of Jimmy Buffett over the years (left and below). It was 20 years ago this summer at TimberWolf that the Margaritaville cult took root. Serious Parrotheads even remember the stage banter that gave birth to the craziness. Fans of Jimmy Buffett will have another reason to party on Sunday. COPYRIGHT 2005 The Cincinnati Post. All rights reserved. Reproduced with the permission of the Dialog Corporation by Gale Group. The above article is from The Cincinnati Post (Cincinnati, OH), August 18, 2005. SUNDAY WAS BUFFETT DAY. The Cincinnati Post (Cincinnati, OH);    8/22/2005 Byline: Rick Bird Post staff reporter The sense of an anniversary was in the air and it seemed the beak-freak frenzy started earlier than usual this year. Jimmy Buffett was in town for a sold-out Riverbend show, just one of 14 dates he's doing this summer. And, it was 20 years ago this year that Buffett's bass player looked out at the crazily dressed crowd at TimberWolf at King's Island and declared them to be "Parrotheads." The byways around Riverbend were packed and lined by mid-Sunday afternoon with the tail-gaters in full regalia. Hey, Buffett was practically playing on a weekend in Cincinnati, compared to his usual Tuesday/Thursday shows the last several years. Parrotheads had plenty of time to organize this party. What else do you do with a Sunday afternoon? Buffett hit the stage with "Piece of Work" as 20,000 people tossed beach balls, decked out for a night of escapism in the usual faux beach garb. He was well aware of the Sunday angle and the age of his most loyal fans. "A lot of you have to get up tomorrow to take your children to school. That ought to be pretty," he said with his trademark gleam in the eye. "And what the hell is school starting for in August? When I'm president it will be Memorial day to Labor day." Yes, the place erupted in cheers for that remark. It was the same sort of flippant comment that launched the Parrothead nation here 20 years ago. Buffett acknowledged the anniversary by simply saying "Hello, Parrotheads. Twenty years ago you wouldn't have known what that meant." Buffett did his annual set of the requisite tunes expected to complete the party. "Changes in Latitudes" Cheeseburger in Paradise," "Margaritaville" and "Volcano." There was, of course, "Fins" for the first encore. Buffett seemed looser and even more at ease than usual, to the point he had a "senior moment" calling out the wrong song when his bandmates expected something else. "It's not like any of us could read the set list without our glasses," Buffett quipped. For long-time fans it's the unexpected that makes the show. Buffett did a sizzling version of "Coconut Telegraph," a breezy "Diamond As Big As the Ritz," a honky-tonk "Gypsy in the Palace," and a dreamy, rich acoustic version of James Taylor's "Lighthouse." The set included one of the stranger tributes you'll ever see at a rock concert with an extended video of a salute to Johnny Carson. Buffett credited Carson with championing his career in the early '80s and the video showed plenty of excerpts from Buffett's appearances on the show. A Buffett concert can be two worlds: It's Buffett the witty, wry songwriter and Jimmy the Parrothead superstar. He still tours with a tremendous band with guitarists Peter Mayer and Mac Mc-Anally, a solid singer/songwriter in his own right (under-used on this tour, except to handle Alan Jackson's "vocals" on "It's Five O'clock Somewhere"). There is long-time member Michael Utley's keyboard work and Amy Lee's sax. The arrangements are often exquisite, letting Buffett's storytelling mesh wonderfully with the music. Buffett feels a need to push his virtual lifestyle. But one does sometimes wish he would just stop all the marketing and let his simple well-told songs speak for themselves. It's curious that almost every time he's on a Cincinnati stage, Buffett will make as many references to his late '60's Mount Adams troubadour days playing the Blind Lemon as he does to TimberWolf's Parrothead frenzy. Maybe, he too, wishes that's what it could really be about. COPYRIGHT 2005 The Cincinnati Post. All rights reserved.

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