THE Bay City Rollers frontman Les McKeown has died at 65, the band announced today. He died suddenly at home on April 20, with the band paying tribute to him with “profound sadness”

did they ever make it in the USA?

[www.bbc.com]

[www.theguardian.com]



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2021-04-22 22:23 by bv.

They were enormous in the US for 2-3 years. They once did an entire week on the Mike Douglas show, IIRC.

Sad...

From my memory of the time in the US c. 75, they were sort of a teeny bopper one-hit-wonder band with their big #1 hit Saturday Night.
S-A-T-U-R-D-A-Y! blared out from top 40 radio stations across the nation.

RIP Les McKeown

_____________________________________________________________
Rip this joint, gonna save your soul, round and round and round we go......

RIP Les. Bay City Rollers were really big for those few years in the mid 70s, my pre-teen years! They actually got their name from throwing a dart on a map of the US and it landed near Bay City Michigan! Could have just as easily be named the Detroit Rollers or Flint Rollers! Wasn't there an MTV Behind The Music episode featuring them?

Thats pretty much the only thing I knew about them, Nick Lowe did a "tribute".


jb

Rest in peace, Les McKeown.

Bye Bye Baby is a terrific slice of 70’s pop.

I was surprised to see they reached #1 on the Billboard Hot 100, actually. I’d always presumed they didn’t register stateside.

Sad. 65 is not that old (especially now that I'm 68.). RIP Les and thanks.

Bay City Rollers were really big, especially with young girl teenyboppers here in the UK.
I think it was also in the days when Michael Jackson and David Cassidy were also very popular as well.

I was more into The Stones, The Who,Led Zep which are all very different to what young teenage girls liked at the time.

Les and the Rollers deserved their place in 70's pop music.

R.I.P. Les

I was born in the same neighbourhood as Les, Broomhouse, Edinburgh. Guitarist Stuart 'Woody' Woods was in my class at secondary school. Whilst not my musical taste they were indeed massive in the uk and around the world. Badly managed the band saw little of the proceeds of selling over 120 million albums. - Rollermania was the big thing at the time.

R.I.P.Les.

Went on Wikipedia, didn't realize the history of the band and all the former members. After mid/late 70s, I didn't know they were still around.
My younger sister was a fan, I remember one of their albums had a pic of the band in Toronto at the city hall with thousands of fans cheering.