the World Wide

The boys make it back to Berlin to recuperate their losses in London, Josiah acquires a new violin, Josh drives across Europe in pursuit of a lady, Brandon plays guitar heaps good, and even I (Damian) get to sing my little heart out at the Mauerpark Karaoke.

So after all that went down in Madrid, and Desigual being so key in getting us there and helping us out with a violin, Josiah and I decide to head over to Barcelona, to their headquarters to pitch them a potential sponsorship deal. Leaving the other boys in Madrid we got on an 8hr bus ride across to the Mediterranean coast.

Barcelona was gorgeous! Alighting our bus at 6.30am, we walked straight to the closest beach (which is never too far away) and had a little sunrise dip, the whole while feeling a little smug that the other boys were stuck inland in sweaty Madrid. On our way into the city I learned that it is illegal to be shirtless (even for men!) in public, even after seeing swimmers getting starkers just an hour earlier on the beach. Crazy Spaniards…

Anyway, a nice old lady warned me about this before I saw a copper, so I avoided any fines or unwanted frisking. We spent a while searching the city and eventually found 3 different offices for Desigual. Turns out the one we needed wasn’t even one of those though, it was around the corner, through a big, unmarked, wooden door.

So we did get there on time and said hi to all the staff that we’d met at their London and Madrid stores, before sitting down with Pedro (Head of Marketing) and Sandra (Head of US Marketing) to present our ideas for working together in the US. All went well, and we said our goodbyes and departed. Hopefully we’ll hear from them soon…

We wandered the city for a while, and what a beautiful city it is! Architecture like nothing I’d seen before. Holing up in a McDonalds, we managed to book tickets for a flight to Berlin where we were supposed to be meeting up with the rest of the boys. Little did we know that they’d managed to get themselves on a tour bus from Madrid that took the most roundabout route one could imagine. So their supposed 28hr ride turned into a 51hr ride.

Josiah and I arrived back in Berlin and spent the next 2 days waiting and wondering on the other two parts of Set Sail, the whole time drinking Germany’s finest Weissbiers in their honour. Cheers…

Catch the next episode, when the boys finally make it back, only to have Josh run off with a woman, leaving Josiah and Brandon to fend for themselves for 10 days.

Happy viewing!

Set Sail got arrested in Madrid for playing in the streets. I pretended I wasn’t with them… :-D

So London was a bit of a downer. Having had a wonderful few days there last May with my family (sun out, never dropped below 30 degrees C), it is still strong at the top of my list of awesome places. But visiting this year with the boys, we managed to catch it in a very bad mood. It rained on us, hailed on us, and stole Josiah’s violin (OK, that was some cheeky bugger at the hostel, but you get the picture). And while filming their desperate plea for funding outside Buckingham Palace, my camera got completely soaked and decided to throw it’s own little tantrum (It calmed down later though and we love each other once again…).

There were a couple of highlights, including cheap meals at the Hard Rock Cafe’s 40th birthday (which turned into free meals after sufficiently chatting up the manager), meeting our first ever Lithuanians, and playing in our underwear outside a Spanish designer clothing chain called Desigual (on my birthday!).

Problem is it went downhill from there and just left us all feeling a little worse for wear.

……(I still love you London, ssshhhh)…

Anyway, Madrid next, let’s go hang out with some Spanish people!

Get a first look at Set Sail’s last Australian headlining show (at Melbourne’s ‘Billboard the Venue’) before they parted for their World Stage Tour in May.

And keep your eyes and ears tuned for their Australian tour kicking off later this year!

The latest in silly buggers from yours truly, Set Sail. Playing in their underwear for a Desigual, designer clothing promo.

They promised us free clothes after crashing their promo, but due to some miscommunication, drew back on the offer. Fortunately, they made up for it when they flew us to Madrid, hired us a violin for the night and got us to play at their Spanish promo. Cheers!!

Epic sunrise happening over Moore Park in Sydney. Shot on a rainy morning from the balcony of my apartment.

Hopefully I’ll be doing lots more of these on my travels and making something nice out of them at the end.