On Art and ‘Artists’, the Music of Jimmy Buffett, and the Power of Association

Refer to yourself as an artist, and I’ll have no choice but to regard you as one who has no clue what it is to which you think you aspire, and as one who takes him/herself much too seriously

Sep 04, 2023

Jimmy Buffett passed away on Friday, September 1, 2023.

The news took me by surprise, a little, because for some reason it just seemed like he would keep on going. Yes, I know that would have been impossible but it seemed a little premature, nonetheless.

As a lapsed Parrothead, I enjoy much of his work beginning with, A White Sport Coat and a Pink Crustacean, through Christmas Island. The hook was set in 1980 when I visited my brother in Montana for a Spring Break of skiing Red Lodge, Brigder Bowl, and Big Sky. During those four days, the playlists on the cassettes featured the complete albums, Son of Son of a Sailor; Changes in Latitudes, Changes in Attitudes; Havana Daydreamin’; Living and Dying in 3/4 Time, and the aforementioned, White Sportcoat…

Just a note to let you know, dear reader, that I’ll be including videos of some of my favourite songs of his throughout, and likely they will have nothing to do with the content that is before and after each one, but in some cases, they might.

In 1983, I heard the album, One Particular Harbour reviewed on a local radio station (yes – terrestrial radio, in this instance a frequency on the FM spectrum. Something about which the generation that grew up on iTunes, podcasts, and Spotify will never know), and realized that I was a fan of his music – the moniker Parrothead wouldn’t be coined until a couple of years later.1

For me, and for many others who are familiar with his body of work outside of the song, “Margaritaville”, his music has augmented good times with friends spending an afternoon or longer tailgating in the parking lot before the concert, and other get-togethers not so related. His music has also been a salve to a wounded spirit from being unexpectedly dumped by a girlfriend, other relationships that went south with more than one woman, marriages in which there seemed to be nothing but struggle, and marriages that ended. Incidentally, Sinatra is great for that, as well.

We’ve found that often, many of his songs make the good times that much more memorable, and many others make the hard times seem a little less so because of the promise of better ones to come. Can the same be said of the music of other performers? Sure, it can – but I can’t say that I ever felt better or any more optimistic after listening to any song performed by Bruce Springsteen.

My enjoyment of Buffett’s songs required a conscious effort to divorce his music from his politics, but even that wasn’t very difficult to do. Perhaps intentional, perhaps not but his concerts were as apolitical as they come.

To his credit, not one concert that I attended was even remotely a political rally for the Democrat of the day. Those that were fundraisers for Democrats were never part of any given tour, which meant that only those who were political friendlies would be in attendance, so I’ll give him credit for that. Truth be told, I’m willing to bet there is probably an even split between left-leaning and normal Parrotheads who largely would identify as Trump supporters, if asked. Frankly, I’m glad that I haven’t run across the results of such a survey.

All of that isn’t to deny his mental illness first of liberalism, then full-blown support of Democrats. Whatever were his issues with the Bush klan, it is doubtful that they were the same as that of conservatives and libertarians after W bailed out the investment “bankers” and the “banking” cartel.

Despite my memory not being what it once was, I know that on more than one occasion he referred to himself as an artist. If memory serves, this would have been on either side of when the musical, Don’t Stop the Carnival, his collaboration with the author Herman Wouk, was being produced and playing on Broadway, in New York City. I knew then that there was something not quite right.

As it happens, on Sunday, September 3, Instapundit linked to three different articles on art and ‘artists’.

The first is, “Only Thing Today’s Avant-Garde ‘Artists’ Challenge is Our Patience”, by Roger Kimball in, American Greatness.

What is it about the word ‘art’ that endows it with this mind-and-character-wrecking property? Why does it induce incontinent gibbering, not to mention mind-boggling extravagance, among normally hard-headed souls?
A full answer would take us deep into the pathology of our time. It has something to do with what I’ve called elsewhere the institutionalization of the avant-garde, the contradictory project whereby the tics and outré attitudes of the avant-garde go mainstream. The half-comic, half-contemptible result is that ordinary bourgeois adults find themselves in the embarrassing position of celebrating the juvenile, anti-bourgeois antics of people who detest them.
Our misuse of the word ‘art’ also has something to do with our age’s tendency to look to art for spiritual satisfactions traditionally afforded by religion. ‘In the absence of a belief in God,’ Wallace Stevens observed, ‘poetry is that essence which takes its place as life’s redemption.’

Speaking of “art”…

To my way of thinking, being or even becoming an ‘artist’ is not something to which one aspires. It’s like being a biker – one doesn’t one day think to himself, “Y’know? I’d like to be a biker!” It isn’t a title that one is given upon beginning employment with some large, soulless, multinational corporation, it is not a certificate one can earn through prescribed coursework, nor is it a certification as one might earn from Microsoft that indicates a certain level of knowledge of unreliable, user-unfriendly software.

No, it is as described by the late David Rakoff in his book, Half Empty:

…hanging out does not make one an artist. A secondhand wardrobe does not make one an artist. Neither do a hair-trigger temper, melancholic nature, propensity for tears, hating your parents, nor even HIV - I hate to say it - none of these make one an artist. They can help, but just as being gay does not make one witty…the only thing that makes one an artist is making art. And that requires the precise opposite of hanging out; a deeply lonely and unglamorous task of tolerating oneself long enough to push something out.”2

It is a status, or title given you by others, and not necessarily on a permanent basis.

One can have artistic pursuits and outlets, one can be artistically gifted, one can display an artistic talent. Contrary to what ‘art’ schools represent, ‘artist’ is not a career path available to just anyone. Such schools might help one who is so gifted to refine the raw talent to an extent, but one is not trained in a discipline in the same way one is in say, engineering, medicine, or the law.

To parents or grandparents who believe they have identified artistic talent in their child or grandchild and believe they are doing said child a favour by enrolling him or her in private tutoring for the purpose of helping your nascent artist to bloom, I would offer this caution:

When I was a little boy, I loved to draw. My folks felt that it was enough talent to warrant fostering, so they arranged for me to be tutored in drawing and painting by the owner of a local art gallery. Long story short, it cured me of drawing – it almost cured me of art. I sketched because it was fun, and I suppose it was also some kind of outlet. It had never occurred to me that it was anything I was good at – I did it only for my enjoyment.

Years later, it was in my head that I was talented enough to enter college as a music major. One semester of theory damn near cured me of music as effectively as formal instruction had cured me of drawing.

Hence, the problem I have with formal education for artistic endeavours like music is that unless one is seeking to teach, or perform in a major symphony orchestra or opera company, it is entirely unnecessary – one does not need a degree to busk on a street corner, or play a gig the local coffee shop, bar, nightclub, or even work as a session musician.

It seems to me that someone who is genuinely an artist is something else, first. He works a day job to pay his bills like rent, and his art is largely an avocation. However, as soon as he seeks to generate income from it by making it available for purchase in a show or in a gallery, he’s no longer an artist, even avocationally – he is an artisan.

Perhaps he can apply his talent (painting, drawing, sculpture) to commercial purposes such as a sketch artist for a police department, or a model builder for an engineering firm while pursuing a true artistic passion. The second article linked on Instapundit contains the account of one who chose to put her artistic gift to work in just that way:

When I was younger, I felt a bit lost as an artist. I was drawn to a slower-paced approach to art, one that is more about excellence in technique and portrayal of beauty. I struggled to find my place. I have a BFA in design, primarily because I craved the perceived stability that a career in corporate design would provide. I took the same foundations courses as every other art major, plus a few extra fine arts courses to satisfy that itch.

Again, there’s that reference to one’s self being an artist – nonetheless, her account illustrates my point.

The third one is all about the Avant-Garde as an artistic movement being on the way out. There was not a single sentence or paragraph I could quote that I found even remotely interesting. It is included in the event that anyone reading this essay feels it might be worthwhile.

It occurs to me that one only achieves status as an artist after one has passed away because it is at that point that his work(s) begin to increase in value as there won’t be any more coming – what he’s produced is it. For that reason, there are no true artists who are among the living.

Hence, my problem with singers, musicians, actors, and other performers who not only refer to themselves as artists but consider themselves to be such. They need to understand that they are only representing another’s work brought to life – the exception to my own rule, I suppose, would be those who are songwriters.

Songwriting is more of an artform than is poetry. The ability to marry lyrics and music, to me is the height of art – it is magical, it is mysterious.

Whatever one’s opinion of Jimmy Buffett, his music, or his business acumen, what is not in doubt that he recognized where he was lacking and surrounded himself with people much better suited to the task than he. That would include Mac McNally,3 who is likely responsible for the success of Jimmy Buffett and the Coral Reefers music fortunes more than anyone else – at least, since the early ‘90s, anyway.

That would also include John Colhan,4 the marketing wizard behind the Margaritaville brand. Who knew what would become of the tee-shirt shop at the end of Turtle Kraals in Key West that sold Caribbean Soul tee shirts emblazoned with lyrics and images depicting the more popular songs like, “A Pirate Looks at Forty”, “Growing Older But Not Up”, or “Cheeseburger in Paradise”?

The last concert I attended was in the summer of 2018, when the Coral Reefers performed at Wrigley Field. His concerts at Wrigley were, for me, the most disappointing. Oh, the music was great – but for someone who for more than ten years previous attended Parrothead family reunions tailgating beforehand with good friends, it was a tremendous come-down.

The guys with whom I formed lasting friendships: Brandon, AJ (Stoney), Mike, and Dann would arrive at the venue as many as six hours in advance of the actual event, stake out our tailgate area (along with everyone else), and begin grilling cheeseburgers, hot dogs, Polish; and either mixing margaritas, or enjoying the first of several Landshark Lagers, pacing ourselves throughout the afternoon. We were experienced enough to know that you had to choose what you would be drinking for the day, or at least, in which order lest you end up worshipping at the altar of the Porta-Potty, or Mother Gaia.

Once we knew the dates he would be playing the Chicago area (usually several months in advance), we would begin planning. I can’t be certain of this, but my suspicion is that he played Chicago as tribute to his friend, the late Steve Goodman. I believe they became friends while they both played gigs at The Quiet Knight, in the Old Town area, but which has long since been gone.

We had attended the concerts at the now defunct Poplar Creek Music Theater in Hoffman Estates, at Toyota Park in Bridgeview, and at the World Music Theater in Tinley Park. When he played Northerly Island near Navy Pier in Chicago, it marked the end of tailgating.

In 2017, when he played the first Wrigley Field concert, we were able to secure a block of tickets in the same row. We weren’t able to do the same for the one in Wrigley in 2018, and by then I knew that I would be leaving Chicago in October, so I just wanted to make sure I attended one last performance. In the time since, the events of my life have made other concerns a higher priority, so I learned to live without Jimmy Buffett and the Coral Reefers concert as the highlight of my summer.

Nonetheless, the news of Jimmy Buffett’s passing was met with a mix of surprise, sadness, and resignation. For me, it is the end of an era, as it is for many.

So long, Bubba. Thank you, for the music and the inspiration to love the now, and in so doing saving me from having to cram lost years into five or six days.

Thank you, dear reader, for your time and indulgence.

Until next time…

Cultural Orphan

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