The Beat Magazine

The Bay City Rollers sold 120 million records. Their singer got less than £30,000. Decades later, he asked their manager where the money went. The manager asked him the same thing. In the video below, Les McKeown says it to Tam Paton's face: "You were our manager. Where is our money?" In the 1970s the Rollers were five Scottish lads in tartan and one of the biggest bands in the world. Les says Paton had him sign his first contract at 18, in the back of his car. On camera, Paton agrees it gave him power of attorney. "I never ever used your power of attorney," he says. The band sued their accountants. They ran out of money to pay their own lawyers and settled. Less than £30,000 each, the documentary said. Les brings a US tax return with royalty figures. Paton says he had nothing to do with it. "There's not any evidence to this," he tells Les. "You talked about something nearly 20, 30 years ago." Then the question comes back across the table: "So where is that money then?" "Sorry," Les says. "I came here to ask you where the money was." By the time of the film, Les lived in a small flat in East London. Paton had made his fortune in property and lived behind spiked gates outside Edinburgh. Did Paton lose the Rollers' money, or was he the reason it was gone? Every day here: a famous fortune, and the people closest to the star who took it.