Last nights gig at Los Picos in Lierganos was good fun. We were given nice accommodation too, and was pretty much the darkest hotel room we’d ever seen. Check out was 12pm and we were looking forward to a bit of a sleep in, as the drive the next day was just over an hour.. until the noise started. We still don’t know what it was, but the bloody thing was vibrating the whole building from 9:30am. That was my sleep done, unreal.

Once up and ready we did some work in the lobby before finding somewhere to eat. We walked locally and found a little bar that was open, there were a couple older guys in there, a lady behind the bar and a baby in a pram. We kind of stumbled into a family type place and weren’t sure if they did food. They did food alright. The lovely lady offered us some tappas, which was a mini version of what she could make us for lunch. It was like scrambled eggs with potato and cheese, eat that with bread and it was super yum. Then she brought out a couple rolls, large beautiful homemade bread with warm pork and cheese inside. Again, yum. Add a couple waters to this and it was only 8e for the lot! We threw in a little more and we were on our way to Bilbao.

The drive was pretty chill and we arrived in no time, observing the highways and infrastructure as this would be the first of the bigger cities we’re going to visit. Near the venue we drove past the Googenheim! An amazing musem. Being an admirer of great structures I’d watched a documentary on this place and had forgotten it was in this city, awesome! We find the venue and had to wait around a bit for the guy. Higgsy went in and had a look while I minded the car in an illegal park and came back raving about it being an old theatre, and it was that. A beautiful theatre with multiple purposes used as a base for the Bask people as we were in Bask country. The accom was literally next door so we checked in and got started with the load in. Stairs. I don’t like stairs. Soundcheck was good as we made the time to fool around with our instruments, Higgsy re-stringing his guitars and me making some mods and tuning the kit again. We were set for another rock show.

The setting was a bit different, as we were to play in the mezzanine level of the theatre while there was another show on in the main theatre, a Queen tribute band! Separated by a wall they install when gigs are on. It was time to eat (one of my favourite parts of touring Europe) and we all ate together in a main room with Freddy and the Queen crew, awesome spread and nice guys too.

A quick chill at the hotel afterwards then it was gig time. The crowd a little timid we thought, and there were a few sound issues, also Higgsy split a drink causing a few circuits to fry, then the bass was playing up, so basically most of the things that could go wrong did but still the show went on. Quite a few cds were snapped up including one older guy who bought like 7! So the crowd was pleased and all was well. Pack up time and load out, then finding a park was a little challenge but we got there in the end and off to bed as tomorrow’s drive is 6 hours. Kinda wish we could stay out though, Bilbao was pumping into the late hours of the morning, my kind of party town.

x

-Danny