A week later, Wham! arrived. If you watch the Club Tropicana video, Tony is the straw-hatted barman. The night before the shoot Tony and George Michael had a few drinks and then, as Tony recalls in his memoirs, George made “tender and passionate” love to him. “I was surprised,” says Tony, “because I’m not gay.” In Chain Letter, a group of teens who committed a crime begin receiving letters from a mysterious person called the Caretaker who is determined to make them pay for what they did. Pike wrote that “I learned how to isolate people psychologically” in the book: “The gang is surrounded by their family and friends but no one outside their small circle can help them because they can’t reveal their secret. ... What made the book work is how the chain letter forced the characters to do things that embarrassed them. To be humiliated, as a teenager, can be the worst thing in the world.”

A book was recently released discussing the life and times of one of Ibiza's most prolific figures, a worthy tale not often told. The whole venue, of course, became the setting of 80's smash-hit Club Tropicana. For those who do not recall the famous Wham! video filmed at the fairy-tale location, have a look:It was always more about the stories for Tony. He hadn’t taken drugs for a year, when a stray line of ketamine saw him take a tumble. His doctor was unimpressed. They’d talked about the ketamine. And the fact that he’s 84 years old. We have created a facebook group Here you will find pictures not posted anywhere else, and funny stories from friends of Tony throughout the years. July 4, 1980 was the ‘official’ opening date of Pikes. Over the years, Tony would continue its transformation in the off-seasons, adding more and more rooms, turning old stables into the reception area, adding the swimming pool that would go on to become emblematic of the hotel and the freedom it stood for. Finally, he put in a tennis court that was rarely used – except by Pike and his favourite tennis partner, Freddie Mercury. He’s been credited as creating the original blueprint for the ‘boutique hotel’ trend, prior to Ian Schrager staking claim to the title. But knowing Tony, he wouldn’t have cared less for a title. “I didn’t see myself as an interior designer but somehow I ended up being both,” he once said. Dale flew two days before Tony. When Tony arrived, police met him on the plane, explained his life was in danger, dressed him in an airport worker’s uniform, drove him to a hotel and told him that Dale was dead. He had been shot and found naked on a beach. Tony didn’t believe them. They took him to identify the body. It was Dale, but he wasn’t naked. On his wrist was a Pikes bracelet.

Mr Pikes: The Story Behind the Ibiza Legend by MT INK is one of the greatest books of all time to read. HE was the sex-mad playboy who provided a tropical retreat for A-list celebrities to indulge their wildest fantasies.” Much-married, hedonistic hotel owner who partied hard with many a pop star and was known as the Hugh Hefner of Ibiza; John Donne may have written that no man is an island, but Tony Pike came close. Known as Mr Ibiza, he was the embodiment of Balearic hedonism, a brash, hard-drinking, drug-taking philanderer whose way with women would have made even the love poet blush. After two years, he had five rooms and a hand-painted sign saying Pikes Hotel. A few guests arrived, but it wasn’t easy. Tony couldn’t afford a phone. In the evenings he sat exhausted on the terrace, drinking beer and praying for a taxi to drive up the hill. He fought a terrible, rising fear. That maybe he’d made a mistake. That maybe he’d gambled everything and come up short.Feiwel asked to see the book without the supernatural elements, and Pike had to do “a ton of fresh plotting. Yet I think it turned out well.” In the published book, a group of teenagers on a ski weekend discover that one of them might be responsible for a fire that, years earlier, had disfigured one of the girls and killed her sister. “ Slumber Party is short and simple but I think it works,” Pike said. “I wrote it in my parents’ house. In my old bedroom.” 5. One of the characters in Weekend was inspired by an old friend. In 1995, a girlfriend told Tony she had Aids. Tony was tested. He had it too. He was to join the friends he’d started losing, fallen comrades in a war of debauchery. Doctors gave him five years maximum, and he decided to sell up to pay for his care and provide for his children accumulated over four marriages. Buying the farmhouse left Tony skint but charged with a dedication he didn’t know he possessed. He worked seven days a week. Dawn to dusk. It was, he says, “Hard, filthy, dangerous work. Caked in shit, no water to wash with, living by oil lamps at night.”

He also drew the Apartment 3-G comic for a while—the strip was initially drawn by his father—and more than 100 covers of The Hardy Boys Casefiles. 16. You might notice the name Ann in a lot of Pike’s books. TheRansomNote left a wonderful review which you can read here. It’s a great thing to see the story of Tony being spread far and wide. Ibiza legend who founded legendary celeb hangout Pikes Ibiza and helped turn island into party paradise” He escaped from an abusive, poverty-ridden childhood in England by joining the Navy at the age of 12. As a teenager he sailed under Sydney Harbour Bridge and decided to jump ship. Australia meant hard years of labouring until a chance meeting with a man in a pub led to Tony inventing a revolutionary form of plastic display, making a fortune, electing to become an international playboy (to the dismay of his first wife), suffering an existential crisis, getting on a Spanish ferry and, by mistake, disembarking in Ibiza in 1978.In 1951, Tony left the navy with dreams of emigrating to Australia. His strong work ethic saw him take on all types of work within the building trade – which would go on to serve him well when building Pikes in the late 70s – and after a year of saving, he found himself on a ship bound for Sydney; this time as a passenger rather than crew. It’s worth noting that his renowned exploits as a ladies’ man began at this point; despite much bragging about his experience with women prior to the journey, it was during a stopover in Yemen on that fateful trip that Tony finally declared himself “a man”. His work life in Australia was varied – he began working in millinery (where he met his first wife and the mother of his firstborn son), had a stint in the Australian Army, alongside labouring jobs and sales work. With his natural-born gift of the gab, selling was something Tony excelled at. The basis was there for Pikes to become a playboy’s playground; all that was missing were the playboys themselves. In keeping with the ‘if you build it, they will come’ ethos he had been operating on, Tony called on his French connections and soon enough, the rich, famous and influential began to arrive on Pikes’ doorstep. They’d be greeted by Ibiza’s number one host with the most, in every sense of the word. Tony Pike’s big personality was perhaps the biggest part of the hotel’s charm. Drink, drugs, parties, girls, glamour; Tony would promise (and deliver) it all to those who wanted to partake. Of course, given that one of the aforementioned things happened to be illegal, he ended up in hot water with Ibiza’s police chief, earning a two-day stint in Ibiza’s prison as a warning. Word had certainly gotten out that Pikes was the place to be for a good time.