How Blake Shelton Convinced Jimmy Buffett to Co-Write the ‘Barmageddon’ Theme
Blake Shelton knew he was calling on some serious star power when he wrote to Jimmy Buffett for permission to sing one of his songs on his new Barmageddon TV show, but he never could have guessed that that email would lead to Buffett being very involved in his show — and even co-writing its theme song.
Shelton recounts the whole story to USA Today, explaining that he initially got in touch with the legendary singer-songwriter because he wanted clearance to perform "Margaritaville" on one of the episodes.
"I have a mutual friend with Jimmy Buffett ... and we reached out to get permission to sing 'Margaritaville' as one of the intro songs — every show opens with a singalong song," Shelton relates. "And I got an email back from [them], they just forwarded Jimmy's email back to him onto me that said, 'Yeah, they can do this song ... I love the title of that TV show. That sounds like a good song."
Always looking for the next big opportunity, Shelton jumped on the chance to get Buffett even more involved with his new series. He asked Buffett to write a song, and long before he heard any of the results, he promised to use whatever Buffett came up with as the Barmageddon theme.
"I figured Jimmy Buffett can pull this off if anybody in the world can," Shelton reasons. "... It ends up being perfect. I mean, it really is actually just [a] good, fun song. It gets stuck in your head, and I mean, who else can say that Jimmy Buffett wrote the theme song for the TV show?"
Not only that, but mainstay singer-songwriter Mac MacAnally — who also happens to serve as a member of Buffett's Coral Reefer Band — was in the write that day too, rounding out the song they came up with a surefire perfect fit for Shelton's show.
Barmageddon airs on Monday nights at 11PM ET on USA Network.