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Stop by BuffettNews.com and vote for the Top Buffett News Story from 2009. Also check out our photo slide show with the top stories from 2009.

- 2009 Summerzcool Tour
- New Album Buffet Hotel
- Landshark Stadium Announcement
- CMT Crossroads Taping with Zac Brown
- Performs in London
- Walter Cronkite Service
- Performs at Bonnaroo
- Margaritaville Rum Line
- Performs in St Barts
- Trump Casino Deal is Off
- Winter Shows in the Caribbean

Jimmy Buffett comes in at number 10 on PollStar’s highest-grossing touring artists of North America for the decade.

10 Jimmy Buffett: Gross $285.8 million; tickets sold 4.5 million

From Casual Living: Schou USA and Margaritaville Enterprises, Inc. have formed a partnership for the design and marketing of a new collection of outdoor furniture and accessories based on the internationally popular Margaritaville lifestyle.

Colorful, high-energy pieces will include beach furniture, umbrellas, pavilions, dining and deep seating sets and a wide range of accessories for outdoor entertaining. The Schou collection will be the most extensive line of Margaritaville®-branded products developed to date, targeting a core consumer following numbered in the millions worldwide.

“Our partnership is focused on creating outdoor furniture and accessories that will invite people to kick back, relax and immerse themselves in a lifestyle that relishes good friends and good times,” said Chris Curran, president of Schou USA. “We will create products truly unlike anything on the market today.”

Schou USA’s brand portfolio includes the Margaritaville Outdoor and Jamie Oliver licensed collections. For more information, visit www.schouusa.com.

A Margaritaville Cafe is rumored to open in Nashville, TN. They are currently seeking a General Manager. The job is mentioned in the Nashville Post: “Perhaps he needs help finding that lost shaker of salt“.

Listings on the Careers page of the Web site for Jimmy Buffett’s Margaritaville restaurants include “General Manager-Nashville, TN.” Curious, as the Music City is not yet the home of the Gulf-and-western singer’s themed eatery. And the Web site margaritavillenashville.com is listed as “under construction,” not available for sale, as it had been.

Long-rumored to be headed for the Music City, this looks like a step in that direction (just don’t blow out your flip-flop while stepping in that direction). One possible location for the purveyor of the Cheeseburger in Paradise is the former home of Planet Hollywood, but Mark Bloom, part of the trust which owns the space at Third and Broadway, said there’s no lease agreement — at least not yet.

FMQB reports Jimmy Buffett’s Buffet Hotel debuted at #16 with 68,000 sold according to Nielsen SoundScan.

Update: Buffet Hotel debuts on the Billboard 200 at number 17.

Jimmy Buffett’s new album Buffet Hotel is estimated to sell 68,000 copies in it’s first week of release according to Hits Daily Double. In the second week of sales Buffet Hotels drops down to #19 according to Hits Daily Double.

Jimmy Buffett comes in at number 22 for the Top Box Office Grossers of the decade according to Billboard Magazine

22. JIMMY BUFFETT
Total Gross: $215,367,754 Number of Shows: 196
Total Attendance: 3,927,053 Number of Sell-Outs: 131
(in case you’re wondering…The Stones #1.)

Jimmy and his wife Jane hosted a Child Study Center Foundation benefit in their home.

As far we know, no one was “searchin’ for [their] lost shaker of salt” at Jimmy Buffett’s home during the kickoff celebration for the Child Study Center Foundation.

That was probably a positive, as this isn’t really margarita season, and it also enabled guests such as Ronald Perelman, Jon Corzine, Linda Carter and Claude Wasserstein to discuss the charity more coherently. The author and musician and his wife, longtime supporters of the organization, looked every bit as casual as they would, say, at the beach.

The Tennessean has a nice article on the taping of the CMT Crossroads show: “Jimmy Buffett passes tiki torch to Zac Brown“. The CMT Crossroads episode airs at 9 p.m. Central on Friday, March 19.

Jimmy Buffett had this reaction when he saw the Zac Brown Band in concert: “He reminds me of what I was doing 25 years ago and it’s nice to see that passed on.”

No one’s sound is completely his own, Buffett said on Wednesday night in Franklin during a taping of CMT’s genre-mixing performance series Crossroads; Buffett’s own work was informed by Harry Belafonte, for one.

So in that spirit, during the taping, Buffett announced the passing of the “tiki torch.”

“Here’s the torch, man,” Buffett said, motioning to Brown and then adding, “I’m not going anywhere.”

The CMT Crossroads show featuring Jimmy Buffett and the Zac Brown Band was taped on Wednesday at The Factory in Franklin, TN.

A report of the taping of the show is available from BigR-KyParrothead:

Wow! what a night! I’ll try to give good review so it may be long.

After checking in with no problems, we were let inside the doors. The first thing I noticed as i walked in, how small the place was. 300-350 people max. We had General Admission tickets, so were trying to find a good seat. Right as we walked in, a lady with CMT pointed to us and said to follow her. She asked if we were big fans, we said oh yes, big Parrotheads. She led us to the front row, right in front of Jimmy and Zac’s mic! I almost passed out! She told us they wanted big fans in the front row for the cameras, and if she gave us those seats we had to promise to stand, sing and have a good time … NO PROBLEM! I was in shock at this point. Getting to see this show…and front row, I had to be dreaming!

Anyway, the show began and it was amazing. They split it up into 2 sets, first the Zac Brown Band song and then Buffett’s set. During the Zac Brown set Nadirah, Tina, Robert, Ralph, and Utley were also on stage. Mac joined for the final 2 songs. During Jimmy’s set Roger Guth, Will Kimbrough and Uncle Jim joined the party.

It was obvious, Jimmy was really focused during the Zac Brown set. He didn’t want to screw up, he even joked about it after the set was over. It was tough for them to get into a rythm, because CMT had to give the thumbs up after every song, making sure it was a good take. They actually had to redo 3 songs but nobody complained.

The set list
Toes (with redo)
Where the Boat Leaves From (with redo)
Free/One Love
Chicken Fried

Son of a Son of a Sailor
Nobody from Nowhere
Wings (redo)
A Pirate Looks at Forty
Margaritaville

The highlights were Toes and Pirate. I wanted to see Jimmy do Toes because I thought it was a perfect JB song and Robert on the pans was great! For Pirate it was just Jimmy, Zac and Mac on stools along with Roberts on the pans, great!

The show lasted around 90 minutes. After the show wrapped, Jimmy was walking off stage and i stuck my hand up. he stopped, came back to me and shook my hand. i almost passed out! Afterward the entire Zac Brown Band and Mac hung-out with the fans, which i thought was really cool.

The CMT Crossroads show that will feature Jimmy Buffett and the Zac Brown Band is being taped later today at The Factory in Franklin, TN.

Only 20 people from each fan club (Buffett’s and ZBB’s) and members of the bands family and close friends were invited to the taping of the show.

According to Margaritaville.com the show is scheduled to air on CMT in March 2010.

(thanks to the BNers on the forum for the updates)

Jimmy was interviewed on the Mike & Mike Show on ESPN Radion on Tuesday morning.

A clip from the interview is available: