TOP TENS THIS WEEK IN 1975
1 Bye Bye Baby Bay City Rollers
2 If Telly Savalas 3 Only You Can Fox
4 There’s A Whole Lot Of Loving Guys and Dolls
5 What Am I Gonna Do With You Barry White
6 Pick Up The Pieces The Average White Band
7 The Secrets That You Keep Mud 8 Fancy Pants Kenny
9 Girls Moments and Whatnauts
10 I Can Do It Rubettes
In the mid-1970s, the tartan-clad Bay City Rollers were hailed in some quarters as being as big if not bigger than the Beatles. But, almost half a century later, while the Scottish band are estimated to have sold something in the region of 120 million records, their place in music history is not in the same realm as the Fab Four’s.
‘Bye Bye Baby’ was the first of two UK (and Irish) number one hits for the Rollers, the other being the follow-up ‘Give A Little Love’. In 1975 they were still at their peak on this side of the Atlantic; US success would come the following year with ‘Saturday Night’ climbing to the top of the Billboard Hot 100.
‘Bye Bye Baby’ – sometimes called ‘Bye Bye Baby (Baby Goodbye)’ - was written by Bob Crewe and Bob Gaudio for Gaudio’s band The Four Seasons. On its 1965 release, it reached No 1 in Canada and number 12 in the US. The Bay City Rollers version, which sold a million copies and was the top-selling single in the UK in 1975, was faster in tempo than the original and included an eightbar guitar solo not present in the Four Seasons hit.
The Rollers were not familiar with the original version of ‘Bye Bye Baby’ when they went to record the song. They learned of the song from their guitarist Stuart Wood whose record collection included a version by British band The Symbols which had reached number 44 in the UK charts in 1967.
‘Bye Bye Baby’ was the first major hit for the Bay City Rollers not written by Northern Ireland’s Phil Coulter and lyricist Bill Martin. The songwriting duo penned four UK number one hits between 1967 and 1976 (‘Puppet On A String’, ‘Congratulations’, ‘Back Home’ and ‘Forever and Ever’) but never made it to the top of the UK charts with the Bay City Rollers. – JIM HAYES