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Jimmy wrote the song Margaritaville after sampling his first Margarita in a bar in Austin, Texas. What was the name of the bar and what as the physical location (what street/cross street) of this bar? I am having lost mental moment about this important history PHact.

I think it was in Houston, not Austin ...... Bayou Mama's Swamp Bar if memory serves ... and if it doesn't, I'll have another please ..... blended with salted rim .....

austin_parrothead wrote:Jimmy wrote the song Margaritaville after sampling his first Margarita in a bar in Austin, Texas. What was the name of the bar and what as the physical location (what street/cross street) of this bar? I am having lost mental moment about this important history PHact.

I've never seen or heard that it was his first margarita (and I can't imagine it was). In an interview a year or so back Jimmy said he can't remember the name of the bar but remembered the friend who took him there. He was inspired at the bar in TX and finished writing the song back in Key West.

Quiet and Shy wrote:He was inspired at the bar in TX and finished writing the song back in Key West.

Just inside the gate on the right is a porch. There used to be a porch swing there. Yes, that porch swing.

I stayed in the bunkhouse at the dive shop for a couple of weeks in 2002. Every afternoon the Trails of Margaritaville tour group stops to see the porch and the building at the rear of the compound where Jimmy lived at the time the song was written.

If you stopped at the dive shop and asked to see the training area, you could see the porch without paying to go on the whole tour.

Hermit Crab wrote:I think it was in Houston, not Austin ...... Bayou Mama's Swamp Bar if memory serves ... and if it doesn't, I'll have another please ..... blended with salted rim .....

It was definately right here in Austin!

"1977: Changes In Latitudes, Changes in Attitudes becomes Buffett's first platinum album. He also scored his only top ten single with the song Margaritaville coming in at number 8. The song was inspired by a margarita that Jimmy had at a bar in Austin Texas back in 1973." From the timeline here on Buffettnews.

I need to find where the physical address was of this bar for some event planning I have in mind.

I can picture the place I had my first frozen Margarita in Austin at a Tex Mex place, but I can't remember the name of the place. It was very popular and always a long wait to get in. It was a small restaurant and bar on either 19th or Guadalupe maybe??

We didn't have liquor by the drink in Texas until 1971.

Buffettnews says it was drunk in 1973.

Here is an interview where Jimmy answers the questions some-what??

Q: Did you have your first margarita here in Austin and is that what started "Margaritaville"?
http://kgsr.com/Interviews/Index_buffett.aspx

A: I don't think I had my first margarita, but I'll tell you want it was. It was one of the best margaritas I ever had, because it made a lasting impression. I'd never thought of it until Jerry Jeff said it to me when we were going to rehearsals today "Didn't you start Margaritaville in Austin?" I went, "Oh, my God, yeah." And I remember it being a really, really hot day. But I remember it. I remember the funny thing was that it led to Jerry Jeff and I talking about the fact that he was the one who and said, "You know, it's pretty cool out here." I've always loved Austin, but I don't get here as much as I'd like to. But I think back to the fact that Jerry Jeff was probably the first guy here. I think even before Willie. And he called me and said, "You've got to come out here, because it's really happening out here." And he got me a gig at the old Castle Creek. And that's how I got to Austin. And so, subsequently, because of the fact that I was working out here that hot day and that great margarita turned into a rather good song.

So maybe the Castle Creek is the REAL place. I never went there, but I remember talk about it. It was first called the Checkered Flag.

It was at Lavaca and 15th Street.

(I don't know if this is the same place, but...I'm almost sure it IS not.)
The Texas Chili Parlor is also at Lavaca and 15th, and has been there since 1976. This place is referred to by Guy Clark in "I wish I was in Austin, at the Chili Parlor Bar, drinking Mad Dog Margaritas and not wondering where you are."

NOT a good Margarita at all...
Turns out that Clark and his friends drank the Chili Parlor's Mad Dog margaritas because of their cheap price ($1.50), not because of their winning flavor. "They're made out of the cheapest, worst-tasting mescal you can get," Clark explained. "They really do taste like s**t."

Here are some bars from 1973

November 17, 1973 notes:

"It's been a hectic but wonderful week in Austin.
It ends tonight - but what a night it is! Tom T. Hall,
with Chip Taylor, closes four nights at Armadillo,
and energetic Doug Kershaw ends the week with two
shows tonight at Castle Creek. But that's not all:
Uncle Walt's Band is back home with their intriguing
sound at Toad Hall. Steve Fromholz is at Saxon Pub,
Alvin Crow at Cricket Club, Kenneth Threadgill at
Shakey's, Doak Snead at Bevo's, and Freda and the
Firedogs at Tumblewood."

http://www.larrymonroe.com/writings/writings02.html

austin_parrothead wrote:

Hermit Crab wrote:I think it was in Houston, not Austin ...... Bayou Mama's Swamp Bar if memory serves ... and if it doesn't, I'll have another please ..... blended with salted rim .....

It was definately right here in Austin!

"1977: Changes In Latitudes, Changes in Attitudes becomes Buffett's first platinum album. He also scored his only top ten single with the song Margaritaville coming in at number 8. The song was inspired by a margarita that Jimmy had at a bar in Austin Texas back in 1973." From the timeline here on Buffettnews.

I need to find where the physical address was of this bar for some event planning I have in mind.

Oh, of course ...... you must be correct ....... now that I have mulled it over, I remember that Bayou Mama's Swamp Bar in Houston is the place that Roger Clemens got into a scrape!