Buffett Performs at Belly Up San Diego

Jimmy Buffett performed on Tuesday night at the Belly Up in Solano Beach outside of San Diego, California. The show served as a warm up for Buffett’s 2017 tour that kicks off on Saturday in Las Vegas.

The San Diego Union Tribune reviewed the show:

n’t know what tour this is,” Jimmy Buffett said after he walked on stage Tuesday night at the Belly Up Tavern with his band, the Coral Reefers. “But we’re starting here.”

Buffett is, of course, no stranger to San Diego or the intimate Belly Up.

He and his seven-man, two-woman group performed at the same Solana Beach nightclub in 2013. And, back in the early 1980s — before he became an American pop-culture institution for a generation that favors tropical cocktails and attire — he sometimes sat in at the Belly Up with the band Billy & The Beaters.

During that same time period back then, Buffett periodically would sing, unannounced, at such North County nightspots as the Albatross and the Triton (now the Beach House). Richard Davis, his audio engineer for the past quarter-century, used to be the sound mixer at the Belly Up.

After performing a tender version of “Son of a Son of a Sailor,” Buffet said: “It’s a big honor to be doing a musical. I had the thought: ‘If you’re going to do a musical, you should probably do songs people know.’ I’m not giving away secrets, but this is in the show.” With that, be broke into the wistful ballad “Come Monday,” adding the line “at the Belly Up.”

Read the full review.