UK Number One Hits From Scotland: Vol 1 Quiz

Answer: The Marmalade

In 1969 "OB-LA-DI-OB-LA-DA" made The Marmalade the first Scottish band to top the UK pop charts. (They later dropped the "The" from their name.)

This was a cover of a Paul McCartney song that appeared on "The White Album" by the Beatles. It was not released as a single in the UK by the fab four - because George, Ringo, and John hated it. However, their version did top the charts in six countries.

Curiously, both the Marmalade and Beatles releases were chart-toppers in Austria.

The Marmalade had a total of seven UK top ten hits between 1966 and 1972. As Marmalade, they had just one between 1973 and 1985.

Their best showing in the USA was with "Reflections Of My Life", which reached number ten on the Billboard Hot 100 in January 1970. It topped out at number three in the UK.

Answer: Middle Of The Road

"Chirpy Chirpy Cheep Cheep" was originally a hit for its writer Lally Stott in France.

In 1971 it was recorded by Middle Of The Road and stayed at number one for five weeks, selling an incredible ten million copies.

The band had two more top ten UK hits in 1971, and remained active for many years after that, although the hits dried up.

"Chirpy Chirpy Cheep Cheep" was a Billboard number 20 in the US for Mac and Katie Kissoon.

Answer: Pilot

Pilot had already had one hit with "Magic" before "January" took them to the top of the charts in the UK. The song stayed there for three weeks in 1975.

The song was written by lead singer David Paton, who had previously played with the Bay City Rollers, as had another Pilot member, Billy Lyall. Both left before the Rollers hit the big time.

"January" was the last top ten hit and the band had ceased to be by 1978.

Answer: Bay City Rollers

The band that became the Bay City Rollers in 1969 could trace its antecedents to 1964. Under differing names and with changing lineups, they had little success.

That changed in 1974 when a new settled line-up came around.

Several top ten hits followed in a time that became known as "Rollermainia" (think Beatlemania with lots of tartan scarves.)

In 1975 "Bye Bye Baby" became the first of their two number ones. The second was "Give A Little Love" 1975.

For all their huge success in front of screaming audiences the world over, particularly Australia, life in the Rollers was not a bundle of laughs.

Writing in the Guardian in 2005, Simon Hattenstone said the Rollers went from being the biggest pop band since the Beatles to unwanted and unknown in a short space of time.

He wrote" "When the Rollers failed, they failed like nobody else. Suddenly no one wanted to know. By 1976, the Rollers were twee and trite, yesterday's teen icons....The story of the Bay City Rollers became an awful cautionary tale of fame and its fallout."

The Rollers sold 120m records, generating income worth £5bn in today's money, yet little of it found its way to the band members.

That newspaper article is worth a look for aspiring pop stars.

Answer: Billy Connolly

In 1968, Tammy Wynette had a UK number 12 hit (US Billboard number 63 and Country number one) with "D-I-V-O-R-C-E."

The song was written by Robert Valentine (Bobby) Braddock and Claude "Curly" Putman, who had numerous other hits under their belts.

It was the story of a woman singing out the sad story of her divorce, but spelling out certain words so that her young son would not understand. Wynette had gone through two broken marriages at the time and probably knew what she was singing about.

In 1975, the former Scottish shipyard worker turned folksinger turned comedian Billy Connolly got his hands on the song. He turned it into comedy gold making it about a man talking about a dog and spelling out words so that the D.O.G. would would not know he was being taken to the V.E.T.
Note that Connolly's songs used full points (periods) between the letters in the title. The original used dashes.

Connolly's parody was number one for one week in November 1975.

Connolly had started out in entertainment as a straight folksinger, but gradually introduced more and more comedy songs and jokes, to the extent that the music was dropped entirely.

Billy Connolly's singing career did not last long and he went on to bigger and better things, with many starring roles in movies and on television. His comedy shows played to huge crowds. In 2017 he was knighted for "services to entertainment and charity."

Answer: Slik

When a song came from the writing stable of Bill Martin and Phil Coulter, you just knew it had to be good. They were the duo behind many of the biggest hits for the Bay City Rollers. They also wrote "Puppet on a String", Sandie Shaw's 1967 Eurovision Song Contest winner. The duo had four pop number ones in the UK, and three number ones on the country or adult contemporary charts in the USA.

In 1976 Slik took "Forever And Ever" to the top in the UK for one week. It was to be their only top ten hit.

The band had been formed as 'Salvation' in Glasgow in 1970 and initially followed a 'glam rock' route. That mellowed and in 1974 the name was changed to Slik. They never able to repeat the chart success of "Forever And Ever".

The Slik song should not be confused with the totally different "Forever and Ever" recorded by the Greek singer Demis Roussos.

Answer: Lena Martell

Lena Martell was a child star, beginning her musical career at the age of 11.

She had significant success as a recording and performing star and hit the top of the charts for three weeks in 1979 with her cover of "One Day At A Time", written by Kris Kristofferson and Marijohn Wilkin .

The song, about a recovering alcoholic, became a Billboard country number one for Cristy Lane in 1980.

Martell went on to host a successful Saturday night BBC television entertainment show.

Answer: Calvin Harris

Some people were taken aback by the contrasts within the Calvin Harris number one of 2009. "I'm Not Alone".

He told the 'Metro' newspaper in 2009: "I like its unpredictability...I wanted to make a track that sounded like 'stadium dance music' - like Faithless but with a singing bit more like Snow Patrol. My main objective is to make everything louder and literally blow people away."

In 2006, his debut single "Acceptable In The 80s" had reached number ten on the UK charts.

Harris, birth name Adam Richard Wiles, was a writer/singer/DJ who established a record when nine songs from his third album, "18 Months", charted as UK singles.

Answer: Leon Jackson

"When You Believe" first appeared on the soundtrack of the 1998 musical film "The Prince Of Egypt".

An altered version sung by Mariah Carey and Whitney Houston was released as a single, and both also featured it on solo albums. It won the Academy Award for Best Original Song at the Oscars in 1999.

After winning the "X Factor" televised talent show in 2007, Scottish singer Leon Jackson released "When You Believe" as a single and it topped the UK charts for three weeks.

Jackson had a number three with "Don't Call This Love" in 2008 and a number 94 with "Creative" in that same year.

Answer: Sandi Thom

"I Wish I Was A Punk Rocker (With Flowers In My Hair)" had an unusual genesis.

It was co-written by Sandi Thom and released as a CD single in 2004. Thom then began to webcast her own concert performances from her home in London.

Initially, only a few people tuned it, but at one point there were 70,000 viewers. After the song was picked up by BBC Radio 2, it was re-released in 2006 and shot to the top of the UK charts. It spent ten weeks as number one on the ARIA charts in Australia and was also a number one in Ireland.

While her debut album "Smile... It Confuses People" was also a chart topper, Thom failed to repeat the success in subsequent recordings.