Buffett, Parrot Fever at Irvine Meadows

IRVINE —  Huge papier-mache volcanoes loom atop RVs; guys walk around in tropical shirts, slurping colorful drinks out of coconut shells with little umbrellas; someone stumbles along, leaning on cars as his brain--clearly shut down except for the most basic of urges--leads him slowly toward the concert entrance. Why, it must be a Jimmy Buffett show!

When Buffett first made his mark two decades ago, he wrote and sang of lassitude and leisure so evocatively that it wasn’t outlandish to think that, when he got around to assaying deeper waters, he might be in the same league as John Prine. But those two languorous notes evidently are the only ones his ship’s whistle will sound, and his musical pleasure-craft never strayed far from port during his show Saturday at the Irvine Meadows Amphitheatre.

Like the Grateful Dead, Buffett may have virtually no airplay and light record sales, and even less respect from the critics, but also like the Dead, the Floridian consistently packs the amphitheaters with ecstatic fans. As the colorfully garbed, boisterous “Parrot Heads” crowding Irvine Meadows on Saturday would attest, Buffett and his 13-piece group put on an entertaining show, albeit in a corporate theme-restaurant kind of way.

There were big jabbering shark heads, audience sing-alongs, and a mini-opera intro to “Why Don’t We Get Drunk.” Before the performance started, some stagehands passed out scores of balloon hats to the crowd, while others sent T-shirts lofting into the audience by way of a water balloon slingshot. Many in the audience already were attired in parrot masks, shark costumes and such.

Early in his set, Buffett, now 45, asked: “What the hell’s going on here? Grown people having fun? Think of someone who’s seeing this for the first time, seeing a guy in feathers and cheeseburger hat next to them. Then they notice that he’s their dentist, and they’re getting a root canal with him in the morning!”

It’s billed as the “Recession Recess” tour (at $37.50 a ticket, no less), and it well could be that folks need a break from the working week. And the whole planet could probably take a hint from the tropics and loosen up a bit. But Buffett’s insouciant good times also can seem just a bit smug and exclusive.

His breezy songs may capture some of the allure of travel and exotic places, but often they advocate a shallow consumer adventurism: Gimme a Mexican beer; gimme the local dive’s T-shirt; I’m outta here. “First Look” is about a trip to Rio de Janeiro, but despite his claim to having spent six months there “researching” it, Buffet’s Rio is the tourist’s Rio, with a pocketful of “fun tickets” and no feel for the people or culture there.

In any case, Buffett recently issued a 4-CD retrospective, “Boats, Beaches, Bars and Ballads,” and, like it, his 25-song show was about as much relaxed down-time as a body could stand.

Along with the unavoidable staples “Margaritaville,” “Fins,” “Cheeseburger in Paradise” and “Volcano,” he served up “California Promises,” “Grapefruit-Juicy Fruit,” (which seemed particularly lightweight given that he dedicated it to the recent Florida hurricane victims) and, of all things, the heavy Vanilla Fudge arrangement of the Supreme’s “You Keep Me Hanging On.”

His band played with a loose precision, with such old hands as keyboardist Michael Utley and harmonica player Greg (Fingers) Taylor joined by a hot horn section, steel drums and backup singers, including one who doubled on fiddle. The playing was particularly solid on Sam Cooke’s “Another Saturday Night” and Buffett’s rollicking “Gypsies on the Palace.” The band was joined by opening act Evangeline for an a cappella version of the Caribbean gospel standard “By the Rivers of Babylon.”

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Evangeline, a five-woman group from New Orleans, is the first new act signed to Buffett’s own Margaritaville label. The quintet, plus a drummer, offered a pleasant simulation of real Louisiana music.

The vocal harmonies were sharp, and the individual singers brought Bonnie Raitt or Linda Ronstadt to mind at times (Ronstadt particularly seems to have influenced Kathleen Stieffel’s treatment of a lovely ballad called “Am I a Fool”).

The group came up playing on Bourbon Street, and as New Orleans aficionados know, that street’s music is mostly tailored for the tourist trade, while the real stuff goes on elsewhere. Evangeline may have a bit more to offer than the average bland stuff on country radio, but its Cajun-inflected sawings on Saturday seemed decidedly pre-fab compared to Beausoliel and other bayou-steeped acts.