Pittsburgh is way away from any real beach, but you wouldn't have known that from Jimmy Buffett's elaborate stage setup Tuesday night.

With faux-fire tiki torches, giant palm trees and bright, natural lighting, along with Buffett playing barefoot, the show felt a lot like you might imagine a Buffett beach party would be like -- except instead of an ocean of water, there was wave after wave of happily dancing fans. About 23,000 of them, in fact, as last night's show was a sellout. Not bad for a slight, giddy 61-year-old who's been touring on the same material, more or less, for years now.

Still, for Parrotheads and those not wearing Hawaiian shirts alike, the show was certainly entertaining.

Buffett played without an opening act, but, really, the hours of tailgaiting (think kiddie pools, full food buffets and more margaritas than you can possibly imagine) proved plenty of pre-show excitement, leading to a crowd not only pumped to see him swim through his classic tunes, but also, in some cases, pumped that they could still stand by the time the show rolled around.

At around 8:10, Buffett entered the impressive stage to booming elation wearing just a loose T-shirt and Hawaiian-print shorts -- the ultimate in ready-to-chill attire -- and quickly dove into his first set, including consistently rousing versions of his hits "Changes in Latitudes, Changes in Attitudes," "Fruitcakes" and "It's Five O'Clock Somewhere."

His band, the Coral Reefers, were predictably tight -- they've been doing this rotation of tunes summer after summer -- and retained sublime, subdued countenances that, behind any other front man, might've seemed out of place. But with Buffett leading the way, and playing to an audience doing quite the same, the sly grins and slowly rocking Coral Reefers were the perfect house band.

"We're all in this together from here on in," he giggled towards the end of the first set before launching into "Cheeseburger in Paradise," which he played on a shark-shaped guitar.

"Certain smells are driftin' across the wind. Burgers from that side, some good reefer from over here -- oh yea, we know where we are."

Like any Parrothead could tell you, Buffett's second set (after a short break) was even more laid-back and, to my pleasant surprise, more musical. The Coral Reefers flexed some musical muscle with piano, guitar and steel drum solos tucked conveniently into many of the songs.

But by the time Buffett hit it with "Volcano," the momentum was rebuilt and the crowd was about to blow -- and that it did, carrying the band towards a fantastically fun, if not unexpected, finale of "Margaritaville."

Buffett barely waited five minutes before returning for his short encore, which included an appropriately more exotic-sounding Dylan cover -- "Rainy Day Women #12 and 35" -- even though Buffett introduced it with "Let's take it back to the '70s!" (The song was released in '66).

Even so, a Jimmy Buffett show may be the only place in the world where you'd get to hear thousands of drunk babyboomers in Hawaiian shirts dance like mad yelling, "Everybody must get stoned!"