When the wheels fall off you stop rolling

By 1977 the clean-cut Rollers were smuggling drugs in their tartan turn-ups and Les McKeown was developing a serious cocaine habit. Pat McGlynn stabs Tam Paton after an alleged sexual assault and the band slowly falls apart. In Japan Les bugs the other band members’ rooms and hearing what they’re saying about him decides to quit.

WE went to Japan for our first tour in 1976 so although things may have been slowing down in the UK, they were only just starting to get going in other places. When we arrived in mid-December a mass of over 30,000 fans at Narita Airport were there to welcome us to the land of the rising sun.

At the start of 1977 there was another American tour. It was there I changed the lyrics of a song for the first time. Instead of "what happened to the girl I used to know?" in You’re A Woman, I sang "what happened to the boy". I don’t know why but from then on I would muck around with lyrics just to relieve the repetition. "Shang-a-lang" inevitably became "S***-a-lad" (which the audiences never noticed but Tam always did) and then later "S***-a-slag".

Then we went to Sweden to record It’s a Game. The best bit about making that album was watching Pat and another Roller on acid. We’d developed a knack of smuggling drugs into countries where we didn’t think it’d be easy to get what we wanted - we hid it in the tartan turn-ups of our trews and laughed about how no one ever thought to look there. We were hardly ever searched anyway because Tam’s milk-drinking PR was so effective.

One night we all sat down to dinner and Pat couldnae touch his because the chicken breast was "beating" on his plate. The next day, the other acid-ridden Roller couldnae play a note. "My f****** guitar neck is bending!" he panicked.

Soon after we finished It’s a Game, Pat left the Rollers. We were back in New York and one night I’d settled down for a sleep when the door burst open and Pat flew in, hyperventilating. He’d been the unlucky one allocated to share a room with Tam and our manager had apparently jumped him and tried to stick his tongue down his throat. Pat, who cannily slept with a bread knife under his pillow, had stuck the knife in Tam’s shoulder.

I grabbed Pat and threw him in the bathroom. Then Tam tried to kick the door in. We both had to put all our weight against the door to keep him out. Luckily the hotel security were on the scene before he got in. It all quietened down and we went to bed, Pat safe and secure in my room. The next day at the airport, Tam was literally chasing Pat around, trying to get a hold of him. He was so out of control by then, he didnae seem to care.

Pat was instantly relieved of his duties as a Roller. Pat, not wanting to talk about what had really gone on, said at the time Tam had kicked him out because he’d complained about only getting paid £20 a week, but since then he’s been a lot more detailed about what made it impossible for him to stay in the band. Some of it was news to me. I know it sounds incredible that we didn’t all know everything about what was going on with the others, but we didn’t.

It’s a Game, the single, was released in the UK. Either the British market didn’t appreciate the American production or the fans had moved on. It only reached No 16. By September, the Rollers were gone from the charts forever. We weren’t that bothered. It was sad, but you had to move on. In America, 1977 was the year we peaked.

Just over a month after the end of the last tour, the next one started, on July 25. The Rollers hosted a TV show, The Midnight Special. For this critical appearance, I wore no Roller gear, in the hope of getting the message across that times were changing. I think that night might have been one of the first times I tried cocaine.

We had a long break after that American tour but were reunited for another tour of Japan in the middle of September. The Rollermania was more intense and more fraught than ever before.

1978 didn’t start any better. When we got back from a tour of Germany, we tried to have sensible discussions about our next album, Strangers In The Wind, but I didn’t like the way Eric wanted to take the band. We set off to Mountain Studios in Montreux, Switzerland, and asked Alan Longmuir to come and help us out. He decided to rejoin the band.

With things between us at an all-time low, we finished the album and went to Los Angeles. We’d been approached by a couple of US TV producers to make a series of 13 Saturday morning shows for little kids and they wanted the Rollers to appear alongside a bunch of puppets.

I’d had enough of being coerced into doing things I didn’t want to do. On 9 June I wrote a letter to the rest of the band saying that I did not agree with their plans to change the band’s direction and that they should all leave immediately. By mid-June the Rollers were resident in Hollywood. Wherever we went, we were surrounded by opulence and big money, and I was able to get an endless supply of free coke. That whole Hollywood party scene was the perfect antidote for the poison that was spreading through the band and that would finally kill it.

The premiere party for Grease was one of the highlights. My date for that occasion was Jodie Foster and we did go out a few more times. I also dated Britt Ekland.

At the beginning of July, the others finally replied to my letter. They counter-suggested that I should be the one to leave the band, because I wouldnae go along with their majority decisions. They also stopped paying my expenses. I went off on a bender and couldnae face replying, so they wrote again a few days later saying they assumed I wanted to leave. We all met up the following day and I found the courage to clearly state that, yes, I wanted to leave, and with immediate effect. For all my fake bravado, I felt sad, scared and sorry.

I left and went back to England that night, leaving the others to rehearse for the upcoming tour of Japan on their own. Unfortunately I had to go back to Japan as contractually I was in the s**** if I didn’t. I decided to stay as far away from the others as I could but, making the most of the gadgetry on hand, I bought a load of bugs and snuck them into the others’ rooms.

The recordings I have are gut-wrenching. First, Tam was asking whichever Rollers were in the room what I was up to and telling them all to make sure they kept an eye on me at all times. Then they were plotting to start songs in the right key and then change key as I started singing to f*** me up. Another idea put forward was getting the light show changed so that I didn’t have a spotlight. It made me want to cry. I knew they’d never really liked me but the sheer hatred that I was now up against was torture.

With those threats burning in my mind, I started invading Eric’s spotlight on stage. Woody got narked and we had a fight in the middle of the stage. I went off and refused to come back on. The gig was cut short and the next day I was allowed to go home.

• Shang-a-Lang: Life as an International Pop Idol (£15.99 hardback) by Les McKeown with Lynne Elliot, foreword by Irvine Welsh is published by Mainstream on October 20. To receive your copy (p&p free) call The Book Service on 01206 255800 or visit www.mainstreampublishing.com

TOMORROW: Life after the Rollers. Les McKeown discovers he has no money from his time as a pop star and has to start all over again from a London bedsit. But his record company doesn’t make it easy - and neither does Eric Faulkner. There’s a brief reunion for another album, but Les, high on cocaine, wipes the tapes. Still he believes one day they might get together again - even if it’s just to get the money they’re owed.

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