The Rollers: The True Underground
My contention has always been that success in the Music Business has never had anything to do with music. Just look at the Bay City Rollers. I rest my case. Two years ago I witnessed hordes of plaid-clad, screaming teenage girls in Glasgow, Scotland.
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The Rollers: The True Underground
ELEGANZA
by
Lisa Robinson
My contention has always been that success in the Music Business has never had anything to do with music. Just look at the Bay City Rollers. I rest my case.
Two years ago I witnessed hordes of plaid-clad, screaming teenage girls in Glasgow, Scotland. Bay City Rollers fans. Cute, I thought, but irrelevant. It could never happen here.
Surely American teenagers were too sophisticated, into all kinds of sex and drugs, buying Led Zeppelin records and god knows what else...to be swayed by five cute (well, some of them are cute) boys wearing toy outfits and singing toy songs.
I should have known better;
The style, image and sound of popular music has contradicted itself so many times during the past fifteen years that the Bay City Rollers and their inevitable American success should come as no surprise. San Francisco’s acid rock was backlashed by laid back folk rock, rebelled against by glitter rock theatrics which led to softer California sounds and Bigtime Muzak/Fascist disco and at the same time, young, brash local bands making noise again.
And don’t forget Peter Frampton’s human rock. I can easily see the Rollers fitting in here somewhere, and I also feel that they’re a lot less hateful than some of the other stuff going on.,
They’ve sold a lot of records here (their first two LPs went gold, the latest sold 350,000 the first four months after release), but more importantly, Rollers live performances create the kind of hysteria prompted ages ago by the Beatles, and more recently, the Osmonds and David Cassidy. With two major differences.
One—the identification is stronger; look at the plaid trim on the shortened bell bottoms of the audience. As one prominent teen magazine editor said, “What could those girls do to identify with the Osmonds? Dress up like Mormons??”
Two—it is, after all, 1977.
But Rollermania and Rollerriots have been spreading across the country, and frankly, it’s more of an “underground” scene than CBGB, even. Complete with its own look, as well as the usual fan hysteria: fainting, screaming, love letters to individual band members, stuffed animals and plaid scarves (none of them cashmere, noted lawyer Nat Weiss) tossed onstage.
Les McKeown, Eric Faulkner, Stuart “Woody” Wood, Derek Longmuir and Pat McGlynn (who replaced Ian Mitchell who replaced Alan Longmuir, the latter because he was too old and the former who couldn’t take the pressure) have been sold as cleancut, cleanliving, non-smoking/drinking/drugtaking tots.
What’s going to happen if The Image cracks?
When the Daily News' Bob Weiner reported that manager/Svengali Tam Paton said, “Eric has a flat in London where he can take whom he likes. He could have four wives there for ail I know,” hundreds of outraged fans called up 16 Magazine and said, “Say it isn’t so.”
Comments I've received since writing [and talking a lot] about the Sex Pistols. [MATCH UP the famous personality with the proper quote]:
“But is the music any g^od? ”
Patti Smith
“What do those kids think of me there? ”
Clive Davis
“Lisa, I’m, telling you as a friend, you shouldn’t get so closely, identified with punk rock.”
\ Mick Jagger
“The Sex Pistols sent me these great dayglo lime green ankle socks. I’m wearing them now.”
David Johansen
“Punk rock? I’ve been in it for years, dear. I saw the Sex Pistols at the 100 Club and thought they were pretty good. Well, not good really, but you know, they could be.”
Bette Midler
When English headlines first revealed that nearly all the boys took tranquilizers and, in fact, Eric almost overdosed on an unspecified drug, the fans went wild and refused to believe it. When Les McKeown—easily the sexiest of the iot, the one who longs eventually for a solo singing and acting career—ran over (and killed) a little old lady with his automobile, again—UK headlines and fan disbelief.
Rumors about the band have included everything from their sex habits to speculation about whether they really only drink milk (not really) and don’t smoke (Eric and Les do). So, when they were at NY’s Palladium last month, I asked Tam Paton—who seems less uptight about the band than I’ve Recalled—about a looser attitude toward the press.
“I was very paranoid about the press in the beginning,” admitted Paton, in between gulping down a variety of pills for a variety of ailments and talking obsessively about his cholestrol intake. “We were trying to build something, and there wds this built-in market available to us. I did most of the talking for the boys because I wasn’t sure of what they’d say.
“But now I can laugh about the press; I mean, you have to. Some of the English music press about us is •humorous, isn’t it?
“As far as I’m concerned, the boys can carry a dog around with them to screw, if they wish...”
One' comment about Patti Smith’s current radio campaign. Whether or not you feel that the current rock broadcasting reflects or fulfills the needs of “the people” (the “people” may really choose Fleetwood Mac, Frampton, etc ), just think about why it always sounds so good when a Rolling Stones record comes on the radio.
(Portions of this column appeared in Lisa Robinson’s syndicated “Rock Talk" column.)
