The Bay City Rollers are back!

I had to walk back and take a second look. A poster in the street advertised an appearance by Les McKeown's Legendary Bay City Rollers, a reincarnation of the original Bay City Rollers. I am obviously betraying my age but this was a group that I was crazy about MANY decades ago. The very first single (on vinyl, if you please) that I ever bought was one of their hit songs. I was astounded that they were staging a comeback but even more amazed that this was to happen here and not in Britain – perhaps there, they would be pelted off the stage with rotten tomatoes. They obviously anticipate enough people here in Berlin will pay money to go and see them: this assumption quite honestly leaves me flabbergasted. As if this blast from the past wasn’t enough, more posters down the road announce a different event featuring Suzy Quattro and sundry other acts not of this decade (nor indeed of this century).

Don’t tell me there has been a sudden surge of interest in pop music of the 70s and former teenybopper Berliners are pining for nostalgia from their youth. These performers must be as old as Tina Turner (who is also coming here in the New Year), so what has induced them to come out of retirement, when they should be booking cruises or writing their memoirs? Could it be, like the hot dog vendors in Alexander Platz, they are a bit strapped for cash in these straitened times and the pension plan needs a top up?