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The teen bandwagon
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The Bay City Rollers shot into fame with numbers targeted at teenagers
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The Bay City Rollers got its name when manager and mentor Tam Paton stuck a pin on an American road map and hit Bay City, Michigan. Formed in Edinburgh, the line-up had Alan Longmuir on bass, Eric Faulkner on guitar, Derek Longmuir on drums, Leslie McKeown on vocals and Stuart `Woody' Wood on guitar and bass.
Comprising cute youngsters, the targeted market was the teenage segment, towards which there was much promotion. The female audience was conquered quickly, the first hit arriving in 1971. "Keep On Dancing", a revival from the Gentrys' repertoire, entered the U.K. Top10 but another four years passed before the next winner came along in "Saturday Night" which scaled the charts across the Atlantic.
A few personnel changes later, and with lyrics by Phil Coulter and Bill Martin, the band reaped success through a quartet of teenage tracks such as "Remember (Sha-la-la)", "Summerlove Sensation", "All of Me Loves All of You" and "Shangalang". Their popularity peaked with "Bye Bye Baby" and "Give A Little Love" touching No.1 on the UK charts.
Rollermania rocked on until the media exposed the underside of the band's squeaky-clean image. McKeown was charged after killing a 75-year-old widow in a motor accident, while Faulkner and leader Alan Longmuir attempted suicide. Disclosures that they were addicted to Valium drew more disaster, while Faulkner and late entrant Ian Mitchell were treated for overdosing, seen by many as efforts to end their lives.
The excesses didn't end there as Paton was jailed for underage teenager abuse. A 1980s resurgence in their fame found efforts for a partial reunion.
A bid to regroup a decade later hardly had a happy ending when Billy Lyall, a subsequent replacement, died of an AIDS-related complication. It was a seedy end to the most successful act to emerge from Scotland.
A. GEORGE ANTONY
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