Europe in 80 Minutes

Way back in the early 1960s, I vividly remember reading a Donald Duck story about a classic American Five-Day Guided Bargain Tour of every Tourist Trap in Europe, where - not surprisingly - everything goes wrong… 

Of course, this was a Dutch translation and the magazine in which it appeared - Donald Duck Weekblad - was incredibly popular. 

Luckily, my parents got a subscription to this weekly! 

Many years later, when I started working for my friends’ tour company in Thailand, I suddenly recalled that story and thought it would be fun to read it again, especially since I worked in tourism myself. 

Thanks to the internet, I discovered that it was one of Carl Barks’ later Duck Tales, titled "A Duck's-Eye View of Europe," published in 1963. 

Finding the actual story took considerably more time, but eventually I stumbled upon a PDF version and finally could read it again. 

It was still funny, and the story's main gag was about Donald insisting on taking many photos at each city stop and consequently (literally!) missing the tour bus/boat/plane. 

Also, the image of the guide running ahead of his tourists and telling them to hurry up is classic! 

What has this to do with music, you might rightly ask?! 

Well, I changed the "Five-Day Guided Bargain Tour of every Tourist Trap in Europe" concept to "Listen to Europe in 80 Minutes"...

Therefore, better get ready for a wild trip to the green grass of the Irish domain, the Swiss Alps of white snow and pure rain, and in the south to the softness of Spain. 

We climb the Eiffel Tower and the Tower of Pisa and visit the nice girls in Copenhagen. 

London is experienced through a song by Lord Kitchener from Trinidad, and afterwards we're going to Liverpool thanks to Katrina and the Waves. 

Of course we won't forget visiting Amsterdam as described by Crowded House and Raymond van het Groenewoud's Brussels.

We travel from Vienna to Berlin courtesy of Keiner Mag Faustmann.

Prepare yourselves for some time in Fischer-Z's Berlin. 

Kraftwerk's Trans-Europe Express takes us to Teleman's Düsseldorf. 

Time to go down south, first to Paris with Gruppo Sportivo, then Madrid by way of Robert Wyatt, The Walkmen's Lisbon, and finish it off with a weekend in Rome, accompanied by Etienne Daho. 

North is next; we go straight to Stockholm with Atlas Genius and travel onwards to Autoheart's Moscow. 

Our end destination is in the East, in George Ezra's Budapest.

In between, we celebrate the glory of Europe with Roxy Music, Jona Lewis, The Skids, and John Fox.

Enjoy!