Monthly roundup...

Less than two weeks after Gary's 40th birthday bash that featured Dirty Vegas as previously posted, sadly his Bophut Hills Gecko venue burned to the ground. Gary was briefly hospitalised with smoke inhalation, but thankfully there were no other injuries. Gecko can and will be rebuilt. The overwhelming tragedy is the loss of Gary's tapes and digitised music representing twenty years of a life recording and DJ'ing. The fire is attributed to an electrical fault in an AC.

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I forgot to follow-up on my pledge to name & shame or acclaim the contractor we used to finally sort-ot the hotel's WiFi package. I'm delighted to recommend the services of Matthew at Bluechip Wireless who have provided broadband WiFi throughout the hotel and beach. Bluechip also upgraded our reception computer and agreed to become our on-call IT department. Good job Matthew - thanks.

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And on the family front...

It's number one daughter Lucy's birthday today. When I called her this morning she was into a sausage roll and cup of tea at Big Joe's and later planned lunch at Ocean's 11 in Bangrak with Jonny. I hope she had a great day.

Self-snap: Lucy and Jonny today

It gives me huge pleasure to let those that don't yet know - number one son Dominic finally asked his Fiona to be our future number one daughter-in-law last weekend. We could not be more delighted with his choice.

A musical mystery tour...

Making it back home with the sun already warming her back this morning, Lucy has since been raving about Gary Gecko's fantastic 40th birthday party bash at his new venue in the Bophut Hills last night. And in absolute raptures over featured artists - Dirty Vegas, who also opted to spend their two nights on the island at Baan Bophut. By one of those weirdly, ever contracting degrees of separation their next gig is here in Dubai tomorrow night, in support of former Stone Roses frontman - Ian Brown - followed by Manchester, our family's birth city, on 3rd Oct.

Predictably, Lucy has been Facebooking her enthusiasm, urging friends in both cities to go hear the Grammy Award winning UK based band that exploded onto the scene with their self-titled debut album in 2002 landing at number 7 on the billboard 200, and selling close to a million records worldwide. Kudos to Gary for snagging Dirty Vegas for his birthday party.

Twenty years a DJ with the last ten on Koh Samui, Gary is responsible, almost single-handedly, for pioneering the now thriving international dance scene bringing scores of the biggest names in the dance world to his famous Gecko beach venue. Recently squeezed off the beach by newly arrived big name hotel neighbours, Gary relocated his operation to the hills above Bophut where, it seems, the Gecko continues to party on. In between running the NEW Gecko Samui and touring the globe DJ’ing at the coolest venues from Ibiza to Japan, you’ll find Gary in the studio doing what he loves best.. making music!

And he now has another outlet for his creativity with the recent arrival of Radio One Samui where Gary has a regular spot on Tuesday evenings.