Tartan-clad teenage fans were screaming, crying and fainting when the Bay City Rollers performed at the Caird Hall in 1975 and 1976.
Fronted by Les McKeown, who sadly passed away today, the Rollers had their Dundee fans whipped into a frenzy before they even arrived on stage.
The band performed in Dundee at the JM Ballroom in 1970 before there were a number of line-up changes and Les joined as lead singer in 1973.
The band’s first two albums, Rollin’ and Once Upon A Star, stayed in the charts for a total of 99 weeks from 1974 to 1976 and Bye Bye Baby, the Rollers’ first number one single, was the biggest selling UK single of 1975.
By the time they took to the stage at the Caird Hall on May 1 1975 they were now one of the biggest acts in the UK.
Their brand of bubblegum pop won fans across the world and they were unashamedly Scottish.
Recalling the 1975 tour in a 2013 interview with The Courier, Les said: “In 1975 there wasn’t a place in the country you could go to where the local kids weren’t all wearing tartan – everyone was a Bay City Rollers fan.
“If boyfriends wouldn’t wear it, then their girlfriends wouldn’t talk to them,” he goes on.
“When we started out there were tartan mills closing and all sorts of things and when the Bay City Rollers adopted tartan as part of their crazy image then it really started to catch on.
“We certainly turned the world tartan for a few years!”
Wherever they went in the world they were constantly mobbed and mass hysteria seemed to follow their every move.
The band returned to perform at the Caird Hall on September 9 1976 before the Rollers’ popularity waned and the shuffling of personnel continued.
Les left the band in 1978 and he released a solo album the following year.
He formed a new band called Ego Trip and enjoyed success in Japan and Germany.
While always working on new material, since the 1990s, Les toured the world with his Legendary Bay City Rollers show treating audiences to the band’s hits.
Les, Stuart Wood and the late Alan Longmuir were the only members of the Rollers’ “classic line-up” to reunite for a tour in 2015 which ended in acrimony.
Carnoustie piper Craig Weir performed during the band’s four-night run at Glasgow Barrowland after meeting Les by pure chance at the Tartan Clef Awards.
“We discussed using the pipes in their show during the evening and we exchanged several messages afterwards,” he said at the time.
“It was pure luck I met him, but it was great as he was very enthusiastic about the work my band Gleadhraich are doing in trying to put the bagpipes firmly on the musical map with young Scots.”
