In the 1970s Rubettes

The Rubettes were formed in 1973 by Wayne Bickerton writer, executive and record producer. It was Wayne that wrote the 50s style Sugar Baby Love song, which was originally intended as a Eurovision Song Contest record. But he decided instead to offer it to the 50s style teddy boy group Showaddywaddy. They turned it down.

Wayne decided to put a group of session singers and make it happen himself. So along with Tony Wadington he recorded the song which went on to be a hit in the UK (No. 1) and the U.S. Globally the song sold three million singles. The recording had Paul DaVinchi on the high vocals, but Paul did not perform with the band. However, Paul did have solo single success in the 1970s though. Alan Williams did the high notes on the live events and Top Of The Pops.

The single was a huge success, and the band all dressed in white suits and matching berets on their hands ahead also set a trend and a brand.Still in 1974 they had a hit with Tonight which was a slower single but still got to No. 12 in the charts.

The other band members, including Peter Ameson, Bill Hurd, Tony Thorpe, Mick Clarke and John Richardson were now on Top Of The Pops so often that their faces would become very recognizable.


The last hit of the year was back to the trend of their first one with the highly rocky song Juke Box Jive, again taking us back to a form of 50s style pop music with a 70s edge. Not disco, but great fun.

   

1975 and the group were still rocking the charts with 70s fun pop style music. I Can Do It, was a No. 7 hit . The group during their career actually won an Ivor Novello Award for their songs too.

Now a song that was a hit,but made no sense, well that was the 1970s. Foe Dee Oh Dee was a No. 15 hit for the group.

    

Still in 1975 the group scored a small hit with Little Darling. In 1976 two small hits too with You're The Reason Why and Under One Roof. Under One Roof did not get much airplay at the time, the song was about a gay man being killed by his own father.

The very last hit of the 1970s was the beautiful 1977 hit Baby I Know.