Jimmy Buffett - Songs You Know By Heart

Songs You Know By Heart is the Jimmy Buffett starter kit: thirteen tropical sing-alongs on one LP, ready for porches and boat decks everywhere.

First released in 1985, the compilation draws entirely from the run of albums Buffett made between 1973 and 1979, the years when he built his Gulf and Western world of salt air, wry humour and lazy afternoons. The tongue-in-cheek subtitle, Greatest Hit(s), nodded to the fact that one song had towered over everything else he released, yet this collection kept selling for decades and became the record that introduced generations of Parrotheads to the man and his myth.

Margaritaville is here, of course, alongside Cheeseburger in Paradise, a grinning ode to simple pleasures. A Pirate Looks at Forty reveals the reflective songwriter beneath the party shirt, while Come Monday remains one of his tenderest love songs, a homesick note from the road. Steel guitar, easy grooves and Buffett's warm, conversational voice tie the whole set together, with producers Don Gant and Norbert Putnam keeping the arrangements loose and sunny.

Drop the needle and the room temperature seems to climb a few degrees. It's a beach bar in record form, built for long summer evenings and choruses that nobody needs a lyric sheet for.