Mac Discusses Upcoming Naval Aviation Museum Benefit Show

Next Thursday Jimmy Buffett, along with Mac McAnally and Robert Greenidge, will play a benefit show in Pensacola for the National Naval Aviation Museum.

The Pensacola News Journal has an interview with McAnally on the show:

In a phone interview, McAnally said the sold-out fundraising concert is something that he and Buffett are both excited about.

“We were just bragging about that show last night in Raleigh,” McAnally said. “Jimmy’s been a longtime supporter of the military and the Wounded Warrior Project, and so have I, drafting off him in the NASCAR sense. Both of our fathers were connected to the military. (Jimmy) is a sailor and a military historian, so the Navy and the air, it’s an interest to him. I hesitate to speak for him, but I know there’s a passion there. There’s nothing not to like.”

McAnally said the show will consist of he and Buffett on guitar, accompanied by steel drummer Robert Greenidge.

“It’s a reincarnation of what we did two years ago in Tahiti,” McAnally said. “We enjoy playing that configuration, so we’re looking forward to it.”

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McAnally said his relationship with Buffett on- and off-stage is something that is still enjoyable and exciting, all these years on.

“We are truly old, good friends, and that’s never a bad thing,” McAnally said. “He’s been a supporter of what I do from the very beginning. He sent me a note after my first record came out (in 1977), and it said, ‘we’re both from Mississippi and both songwriters and we’re going to be friends.’ I was a fan before I met him, and I am now. I’m honored to get to stand beside him and play. I was and am sort of bashful. I was from the — as he says — ‘not fun’ part of Mississippi. He was from the fun part near the water, and is less bashful. I was always more inclined to stand to the side. Maybe I’m of more use to him there; I try to be, anyway.”

Read the full interview here.