Read This: This Bay City Rollers LP should be rescued from obscurity
Ricochet from 1981 is the kind of album that seems destined to languish in bargain bins for all eternity, still sealed in its original shrink wrap. After all, it was recorded by Scottish pop quintet Bay City Rollers after that band had swapped lead singers, with South African Duncan Faure replacing Les McKeown. The act had also moved from Arista Records to Epic and shortened its name to simply Rollers. Under any name, the group had not scored a hit single in America or the U.K. since 1977. Even the Rollers’ fiercely loyal fans, the kilt-wearing “Tartan Horde,” had moved on by then. Other than some latter-day reunion discs, this was pretty much the band’s last attempt at a studio album, i.e., the one that made them decide not to record another long-player. The obscure record did not chart in any country. Nevertheless, over at The Federalist, writer Matthew Walther makes a convincing case for why Ricochet should be considered Bay City Rollers’ overlooked pop gem. He even calls it “a masterpiece worthy of Big Star or Badfinger.”
