Love gone plaid

>> An analysis of the obsessive Bay City Rollers' book that Courtney Love plans to make into a movie

by JULIET WATERS

I'm not usually a fan of making books into movies, but all the time I was reading Bye, Bye Baby: My Tragic Love Affair with the Bay City Rollers by Caroline Sullivan, I had a recurring feeling that this would probably be a much better movie than a book.

The concept, if not the telling, of this tale is hilarious. A successful critic (Sullivan became rock critic for The Guardian in 1993) hides a tragic secret. For years she stalked the worst-dressed, uncoolest and generally embarrassing band in the history of rock music. "It's not a pretty story," she tells us from the outset. Indeed, it's an extremely uncomfortable story of one woman's pathetic obsession with getting laid by boys who look like they would probably keep their striped kneesocks on in bed. But in the right hands it could be something of a Scottish Soft Core Logo.

Now, as it turns out, those hands will belong to Courtney Love, who's bought the rights to Sullivan's book and apparently hopes to cast Leonardo DiCaprio and Ewan McGregor in her directorial debut.

That Courtney will make this movie I have no doubt. It's the perfect punk fan revenge against boy bands (though apparently Love's first album actually was BCR's Rock n' Roll Love Letter.) But I'd bet hard cash against the prospect of a DiCaprio/McGregor line-up. Not just because I can't see them wearing tight, plaid-trimmed floods, unzipped jumpsuits and feathered lacquered wigs (neither Leo nor Ewan has the natural hair for the roles). But because part of the band's kitschy appeal is that these guys were--on top of being terrible musicians and tragic fashion victims--just plain butt-ugly.

For those too young to remember the Bay City Rollers, (and there are many, given that the band peaked in 1975), they were in many ways the ur-boyband. On an evolutionary scale, they are to the Backstreet Boys what amoebae are to chimpanzees. First appearing in the U.K. when bands like Led Zeppelin were starting to sound heavy handed, their P.R. machine cultivated a wholesome Scottish, milk-drinking, hardworking image. When the Rollers stepped onto American soil they were entering a teen idol wasteland. The Partridge Family was in its last episodes and Bobby Sherman had long since admitted to his secret marriage and love child. This can be the only possible explanation for the #1 success of their roller rink classic "Saturday Night."

But the reason behind Sullivan's five-year obsession with them is far more mysterious, especially since she clearly has the capacity for critical thought. Already an obsessive music geek, the New Jersey native fixated on band frontman Leslie McKeown. As Sullivan describes him, he looked like the only one in the band who might have had sex, important given that Sullivan was easily five years older than the average pre-pubescent Rollers fan. (Later, McKeown's faint bad boy aura becomes fact when he is fined 105 pounds for running over and killing an old lady with his Blue Mustang, then, a few days later, 1,192 pounds for hitting a photographer.)

For some reason Sullivan can't let go of the Rollers, following them through their career, long after McKeown has quit the band, long after their unsuccessful attempt to cultivate a punk image by wearing leather jackets and leg warmers, until finally she manages to sleep with one of them, be disappointed and move on.

Fortunately for Sullivan, she will do fine as a music writer. Unfortunately for the band, they will become tragic has-beens: one BCR member will die of AIDS, two will attempt suicide and their manager will be jailed for indecent acts with minors. There are hilarious moments in the book, especially those that reveal what a prick McKeown is. But for all its potential, Bye, Bye Baby is more often than not a tedious and tragic read. Basically, wait for the movie.

Bye, Bye Baby by Caroline Sullivan, Bloomsbury, pb, 273 pp, $26.99