For most teenagers in the 70’s (and I suspect before and ever since) parties fell into three distinct categories:

1. Family Parties: Attendance was mandatory and you had to ‘do yer turn’ for your visiting Family and neighbours.
(This subject has been delightfully covered by  Pauline and John Allan in their blog post ‘Done To A Turn.’ )

2. An Empty: An impromptu, hastily and covertly organised party when a peer gleefully discovered that his/her parents were away for the weekend! 
Grab your favourite albums and any alcohol you could lay your hands and go!

‘Emptys’ could easily last well into the wee sma’ hours, so you had to tell your parents that you were staying overnight with a trusted friend; preferably one who didn’t have a land line phone.

My great friend Rab fitted that bill perfectly and he’d tell his parents that he was staying with me…..
I was very lucky to be invited to many of these memorable parties. 

Thank the gods that there were no phone cameras in those days!

What happened in an Empty…Stayed in an Empty! 😉 😀

3. A Celebration Party: These included 18th and 21st Birthday Do’s and Engagement Parties. They were usually held in a local venue like a hotel function suite, social club or a Church Hall.
They were always planned months in advance. Printed invitations were sent out and a RSVP expected in return.

They were a lot of fun but had the obvious drawback that the person who was 18/21 or gittin’ engaged had to invite ALL their family too! Grandparents to young siblings, nieces and nephews. Sometimes even my own parents were also invited.

These parties, with ‘The Mooneys Band’ providing the excellent musical entertainment, lacked the rawness and excitement of an ‘Empty’ but at least there was always a decent buffet!
However there was one other type of par-tay….

Self Organised Dances: I don’t remember who first came up with the idea to organise our own event parties…. Charlie reckoned it was because the traditional end of term dances with the local girls school, Notre Dame, had been cancelled.

‘B.B.A.G. Productions’ was formed in 1974 by 5th year school friends, Ian Black, Charlie Byrne, Martin Gaughan, and myself.

With a bit of naivety we aimed high and booked the 600 capacity Clydebank Town Hall for our very first event!

We secured a local band ‘Cradle’ to provide live music and the obligatory disco.

Unfortunately this second event by B.B.A.G never took place….and I can’t remember the reason?
Maybe the team had business differences or maybe exams got in the way!? 😀 😀

But back to the Town Hall….
I asked John Lyons, The Principal Art teacher at St. Pats (and fellow lunch time basketball player) to recreate three famous Andy Warhol paintings: Marilyn Monroe; the Stones Logo, and Campbell’s Soup Tin. He also painted a Jimi Hendrix one.

All were painted in vibrant dayglo colours on huge 10′ x 8′ boards.

(The spirit of the hippy 60’s was still a major influence on mid 70’s culture.)

Oh how I wish I’d kept at least one of these masterpieces!

John only charged us £3 per painting! What a legend he was. I met him at a school reunion in 1991 where we reminisced about those fabulous works of art. 
He then he sold me a ‘deluxe’ school wall brick (soon to be demolished) for £20! 😀 😀

Charlie borrowed large spotlights from the school drama dept. which came with different coloured filters to light up the paintings and the dance floor.

One of our business savvy teachers managed to get us a meeting with soft drinks company BARRS! 

Ian and Martin attended the meeting and secured a great deal on all our soft drinks. Aaand it was Sale-or-Return!

Result!

Unfortunately as we were only 16/17 at the time, as were most of our patrons, we couldn’t get a license to sell alcohol on the premises! There was a bar but it only sold soft drinks and crisps.
Though I’m quite sure a lot of alcohol was smuggled into the venue on the night! (I know I certainly did!)

Oh and we also  hired a fleet of buses to ferry our party goers back to far flung locations like Dumbarton, Balloch and Helensburgh.

The entire event was a great success and everybody really enjoyed it.
I don’t recall any incidents of trouble during the dance. Although Charlie did say that there were a few people tried to stiff us on the cost of their tickets – I sought the assistance of some of my ‘larger’ basketball teammates to accompany us on our debt collecting missions!

After all, 70p in 1974 is the equivalent of about £10 now.

Which is roughly the profit we each made after everything was paid! 

Yes…..A tenner!

Did we go on to rival Harvey Goldsmith?
NO.
Did we make a fortune and retire to the Bahamas?
Obviously NOT

Did we enjoy the whole process, have a lot of fun along the way, enjoy the night AND be able to talk about it 50 years later?

A RESOUNDING YES!!!

(Post by Mark Arbuckle from Clydebank – March 2024)

(Many thanks to my friends Charlie Byrne and Ian Black for their invaluable input to this piece.)