When Jimmy Buffett survived a spinout near Peoria in the 1970s and it inspired a song
Iconic singer-songwriter Jimmy Buffett — who popularized beach bum soft rock with the escapist Caribbean-flavored song 'Margaritaville' — has died....
Iconic singer-songwriter Jimmy Buffett — who popularized beach bum soft rock with the escapist Caribbean-flavored song 'Margaritaville' — has died. He was 76. And decades before Buffett turned his musical works and stage persona into a billion-dollar empire of restaurants and resorts, the singer's fortunes could have gone in a very different direction. That turning point came back in the 1970s, when an industrious Buffett was on a solo tour in Illinois, according to a 2016 Journal Star article by Steve Tarter.