DRUM ROLL
# Will ye bring me a present just for fun?
# I hope you won't be shocked... #
For more than 30 years,
Scotdisc has been delivering a Scottish soundtrack to our lives.
# Will ye come...? #
Entertaining the world with tartan tunes and Highland hootenannies.
# I've just come down from the Isle of Skye
# I'm no' very big and I'm aw'fy shy
# And the lassies shout when I go by
# Hey, Donald, where's yer troosers?! #
They'd recorded many of Scotland's best-known performers.
# In my kilts I'll go
# All the lassies say hello! #
When the recording industry is supposedly on its knees,
these guys are dancing an eightsome reel.
# To wear the kilt is my delight... #
This is Scotdisc's story.
But it also tells the tale of traditional Scottish folk
and country music since the 1970s.
# Let the wind blow low
# Through the streets in my kilts I'll go
# All the lassies say hello! Donald, where's yer troosers?! #
STEEL GUITAR PLAYS
Producer Bill Garden and steel guitarist Dougie Stevenson
are the men behind the label.
OK?
We've milked it as much as we can, I think.
First met Dougie when I needed a steel guitar
on an album I was doing,
and that's when we first met,
in 1976, I think it was, or '74.
And we got things up from there, until today,
when we're still together.
Basically, I was doing the engineering and producing,
and Dougie was on the sales, marketing, that side of it,
which is very much like what it is today.
We have Scotty's - this is the studio, which is...
That's a brand.
We also have a fulfilment service under that brand,
where we'll ship products anywhere in the world.
We have Scotdisc. That's another brand,
and that's the label that sells and has its own copyright.
Gordon Duncan Distribution sells recordings
of just about any Scottish or Irish recording artist -
we stock them all through here.
We've another brand called Scotsound, targeted to tourism.
And, more recently, we have, um...
..some records which are mail order. So...
And that covers everything.
# Just because we are married... #
The story has more humble roots.
It began in Scotland's vibrant clubland,
with the rising star of the 1970s.
I auditioned for various players,
and Dougie came down with his band at one time
and they were called The Hayriders in those days.
I said, "I like the steel player and the girl singer, and the rest..."
I said, "I don't think I could employ the rest of them."
Bill Garden had a band called The Bill Garden Set.
We just kept Bill, we got rid of The Set.
We kept Bill on piano -
he became a musical director for the group that I had.
# And I can't, I can't stop wanting you... #
The relationship with Sydney Devine has endured to this day.
# Take these chains
# From my heart
# And set me free
# You've grown cold
# And I'm going for a... #
HE LAUGHS
But future musical adventures with Syd were a distant dream
when the pair founded their first record label,
Country House, in 1978.
That's what I was meaning, in the middle of a programme.
That's what happens? That's what happens. That's what happens, yeah.
We were about to play a different key and everything.
THEY LAUGH
We formed a studio in a country house
and, as being a country house, we took that as our label.
Our first album was with Helen Randell.
But, at the same time, we did a recording of Dougie,
Dougie and his steel.
We did that, and we also did a piano album, the same thing -
country music.
So that was really the first ventures
into the new Country House label at that time.
HE SINGS IN GAELIC
Alasdair Gillies was the first big name to sign for Country House.
He'd been a Gaelic-singing protege...
..winning the silver medal at the Mod at the age of just nine...
..and the coveted gold ten years later.
HE SINGS IN GAELIC
His face and voice were familiar on TV in the 1970s,
and he had a successful recording career with major UK labels.
I'd been recording for Decca and Pye Records,
and I was getting a little disenchanted with the fact
that I had to go down to London all the time.
And, by the time you got there, three months after doing
a routining of the songs, very often, the interpretation was wrong.
And people down there,
they didn't understand the idiom of the music, or the style.
And that's when we met Bill Garden and Dougie.
That suited me very well, to be able to work from a home base
with musicians, particularly both Bill and Dougie
are both musicians and they understand music.
# I am a Highland gentleman
# A gentleman am I... #
Live At Eden Court Theatre Inverness
was Alasdair Gillies' first recording for Dougie and Bill in 1980.
A live audience, it was live to tape, there were no edits
and things like that that I can remember.
So if there were any warps in the thing, you were either stuck
with them or say, "Oh, just delete the whole track, I don't want it."
But we ended up with a finished product,
and it's Live At Eden Court, that's fine.
Then it was a question of selling it
beyond the boundary of the Eden Court Theatre.
And that's over to Dougie and Bill for that one.
The solution was through British Transport Advertising,
who had approached us with a view to advertising on buses.
Where you would... It was new then.
Where you could paint the whole bus in any colour
and any design you wanted.
They got a bus! A double-decker bus!
It just said, "The Alasdair Gillies bus."
And the bus then was taken around the country,
to different selling points, and I would come off the bus
and sign records and go into various department stores.
Way ahead of its time marketing.
The great thing about Dougie Stevenson is that
not only a musician is he, but he is a master at sales.
Oh, well, let's try this one.
# Tiny bubbles... #
CHEERING
# In the wine
AUDIENCE: # In the wine... #
Sydney Devine is a wonder of the Scottish music world.
In a career spanning six decades,
he's sold an estimated 15 million records.
# Tiny bubbles
LAUGHING: # Make me warm all over
# With a
# Feeling that I'm gonna love you till the end of time... #
Go on, yourself.
Magic.
Sydney Devine was very popular.
Just around the '70s, he'd began to make it big as an artist.
It was exciting and...
..a lot of hard work in the early stages.
Sydney had asked me, "Would you be interested in looking after
"the tour business, the concerts and pulling all that together?"
And Bill, at the same time, said, "I'm opening a studio in Strathaven,
"would you be interested in marketing that facility?"
And I thought, "I could put the two in the one go."
So that's when we said,
"Right, OK, we're going to work together
"and run Sydney's business and the studio from one centre,
"keep the overheads down."
And then we snowballed into recording records
for distribution, including Sydney.
His popularity and their success have gone hand-in-hand,
like an exuberant Gay Gordons.
In the 40-odd years that I've been associated with Dougie and Bill,
I think we've maybe had one argument, which is very important.
I don't think I even have a contract with them.
# Two, three...
# Stop! #
That's how good it is.
Sydney Devine gave us the credibility as a recording company,
amongst other potential artists who we were then going to attract.
HE LAUGHS
They included Tommy Scott, a big-time Scottish record producer
who fancied becoming a recording artist.
He'd written for and produced acts like Van Morrison,
the Dubliners, Twiggy,
and Tommy discovered Lena Zavaroni.
# If they could see me now
# That little gang of mine... #
DOUGIE: I first met Tommy Scott in Motherwell Concert Hall,
and Tommy was there to see Sydney, actually,
to talk about his next recording.
Important record producer up from London, Scottish
but knew the ropes in London,
with the big fat cigar sitting in the stalls, that was Tommy Scott.
By the time Dougie and Bill met Tommy,
he'd had more than 30 chart hits,
and some of his stardust sprinkled onto Scotdisc.
# That you've sent me... #
They were telling me that they were looking to open a new label
themselves to handle Scottish talent.
Would I be interested in making product for them?
I said, "Of course I would."
And so we went ahead and produced
Tommy Scott's Pipes And Strings Of Scotland,
and it sold over 100,000.
Those kind of numbers should have put the album into the charts.
But it was sold through mail order at first, and then in shops
that didn't count towards the charts.
We were selling huge numbers.
We'd be way up in the national charts if it were ever reported,
but it wasn't, it was under the radar, which was actually something
we were quite happy with because we'd hit on something that was
really big and we really didn't want London to know about this,
we didn't want the major record companies to know
that we had this market.
He knew that if we exposed those numbers,
that they would all, you'd have EMI, Phonogram, Decca,
you'd have them all putting out Scottish singalong albums.
And they never did. We had a clear field.
# Where are you gaun, my bonnie wee lass?
# Where are you gaun, my dearie?
# Where are you gaun, my bonnie wee lass?
# A message for ma mammy
# What is your name, my bonnie wee lass?
# What is your name, my dearie?
# What is your name, my bonnie wee lass?
# Ma mammy calls me Mary
# Bee baw babbity
# Babbity, babbity
# Bee baw babbity... #
Tommy Scott's new-found singing skills certainly made
a big impression in deepest Lanarkshire.
Tommy Scott, dearie me,
that's the kind of soundtrack of my upbringing, almost.
When I was just in the house in Motherwell, just me and my mam...
# Auntie Mary had a canary... #
..if anybody called, you were put on hold with a wee bit of music.
Cos my mam would answer the phone,
invariably one of my pals or somebody from whatever,
"Aye, wait the now, son, I'll just get him."
But while she's on the phone,
she's got Tommy Scott playing on her tape recorder.
# Come on, get aff Come on, get aff
# I hope you think you're fly... #
And I'd eventually come down. "Aye, hello?"
And one of my mates or somebody from work, invariably would say -
forgive the language - "What the...?"
# Oh! Auntie Mary had a canary... #
HE LAUGHS Right? So...
Then I'd explain, "Ah, my mam's a big, big fan of Tommy Scott."
And that was it.
Ladies and gentlemen, Lena Martell.
Lena Martell was another artist attracted by Scotdisc's
new-found credibility.
In the 1970s, she'd been one of Britain's most successful
recording artists, with her own Saturday night show on the BBC.
# This is a world of everyday people
# People
# You have to understand your fellow man
# Your fellow man... #
Next, it's one of the year's most successful-selling singles,
Lena Martell, and One Day At A Time.
# One day at a time
# Sweet Jesus... #
In 1979, One Day At A Time topped the charts for three weeks.
She never hit those heights again, and came back to Scotland.
# I'm just a woman... #
DOUGIE: She had come to the end of her contract with the record label
in London, but what they didn't know is what I knew,
as a musician I'd been working in her orchestra,
touring around the country, and I could see the audiences,
I could see the reaction and there was lots more
mileage in Lena Martell than they seemed to think about in London.
So that was the attraction.
Dougie and Bill were determined to get Lena back into a recording studio.
The result was My Homeland, released in 2004.
Oh, it was great.
Very, you know, hands-on and personal
and could talk about the material and
make sure that the studio time was, you know,
contained, so that you didn't waste time.
The musical discipline was wonderful.
Lena recorded One Day At A Time for the album,
and changed the lyric to one of the song's most iconic lines.
# What I have to do... #
When you think of the great Lena Martell's number one hit,
One Day At A Time, Sweet Jesus.
Now, in the original, I think 1979, 1980, number one,
# I'm only human I'm just a woman. #
But if you listen to the re-recorded Lena Martell version,
more modern, on Scotdisc,
"I'm only human, I'm just a woman," becomes -
# I'm only human And I'm a woman. #
# I'm only human
# And I'm a woman... #
I wouldn't say "I'm just a woman."
Because you're not just a woman.
You're a woman, it's a statement you make because that is a fact.
And I wanted to
not apologise for being a woman or say, "I'm just a woman."
There's none of this "just" patter.
So Scotdisc were right in there for the sisters.
BANGING
While Dougie Stevenson deals with the nuts and bolts
of the business...
..Bill Garden is the recording studio production guru.
Bill Garden is the chap who's working the controls,
and on occasions coming in with a very, very beautiful
and complementary piano keyboard,
cos he's a very talented keyboard player.
So you were aware of the differences, certainly.
Together they were a great team,
and just made you feel so comfortable.
# I bought a wife in Edinburgh for a bawbee
# And then I got a penny back To buy tobaccy wi'
# And wi' you, and wi' you, And wi' you, my Jenny lass
# I'll dance the buckles off my shoes
# Wi' you, my Jenny lass... #
Ronnie Browne, the surviving member of folk band The Corries,
was apprehensive about his solo career after band partner
Roy Williamson passed away.
He needn't have worried.
To go into a studio, that severe a situation,
and I'll never forget, I went in, and Bill Garden was doing
the table, and I explained I was a bit nervous.
He says, "Don't worry about it, we'll take our time." Which we did.
And at the end, when I said to Bill, "Thank you so much for being
"so patient with me", you know, he says,
"Listen," he says, "it's nice to be nice."
I've never forgotten that.
But that's the whole, sort of, feeling
of Scotdisc, cos Dougie's the same.
It's a matter of trust.
And I trust him, that's why I discuss any songs with him,
because he's a musician, he's knowledgeable
and he's been running a record label, this label,
for a while. You know?
So you've got to respect a person's knowledge and what they
can do, especially if it's going to benefit myself and the label.
So cooperation... And of course he's a brilliant musician.
# Pretty woman, don't make me cry
# Pretty woman
# Don't walk away, hey... #
Dougie and Bill have always been working musicians,
playing in Sydney Devine's band for more than 40 years.
And Dougie's in constant demand as a steel guitarist.
Tonight, it's the Inverness date of the Patsy Cline Story tour.
Firstly, I always feel more comfortable and confident
when Dougie's on the stage beside me.
It's the original old-style playing,
which is what endeared me to him in the first place, particularly for
the show we are doing at the moment, which is The Patsy Cline Show.
That's all very traditional country music and he fits right into that.
All in tune, yeah? Smashing.
I grew up backstage at The Opry in Nashville
and then played on The Opry for 30 years with my father.
I heard many, many steel guitar players.
The quality of Dougie's steel stands right up there with them
and he loves the steel.
Pick it, Dougie.
Mighty fine!
OK, let's try it. Here we come.
Dougie and Bill are still working hard for each other in the studio.
..four.
DOUGIE PLAYS STEEL GUITAR
Dougie's second solo album, a mere 40 years after his first,
is a collection of steel guitar and dobro tunes which will be called
The Scottish Steel Guitar Chillout.
That sounds good.
Mr Stevenson here, we're recording an album at the moment.
At the moment it's work in progress but he is playing all three
of his instruments - lap steel, pedal steel and dobro.
And it's turning out to be quite a good album.
We've a long way to go, but it sounds good.
I think we're going to have a good one with that.
In 1980, Scotdisc went on the road to try to get its artists
into tourist shops the length and breadth of Scotland.
Ten years later, what had seemed like a risk was paying off
with products in over 1,000 outlets.
And it was all thanks to spotting a gap in the market
that hadn't been filled.
When tartan shows like Thingummyjig and Songs Of Scotland
were taken out of the TV schedules,
it left a lot of singers and musicians marking time.
..another edition of Thingummyjig.
When that rug, if you want to call it,
when the tartan rug was pulled away from all of that, it did look kind
of bleak, but only because we'd got used to some really fertile times.
It was difficult from the point of view of you didn't know
where your next gig was coming from if the only way people
saw you was in a tartan show.
When they stopped doing programmes like Thingummyjig,
it really pulled the plug on not only that kind of music,
it was like a genocide of the music. They said,
"We've had enough of that," and they just pulled the plug.
Scotdisc were sitting with hundreds of albums by dozens of different
artists, so the lack of TV exposure could have hit the business hard.
But Dougie and Bill found a creative way around the problem.
We had people in the studio, giving us equations of what
we should be going into and what we shouldn't be going into,
and one of the things they said was, "Don't go into video."
So what did we do? We went into video.
We've got a market here
because they are not showing Thingummyjig or Double Bill -
these were the BBC and Scottish Television shows,
light entertainment shows.
# Don't forget the frying pan We'll bring along some minnows
# Going to get you catfish and we'll cook it up for dinners
# Roll it up and fry it up and make it up right
# We're going to go fishing next Saturday night
# Lipstick, make-up, leave behind
# Make-up takes up too much time
# You're a little honey and you're quite a dish
# But Saturday night we're going fishing to fish... #
It was a move that paid off.
Sydney Devine's Country was the first video in 1990
and it snowballed from there.
We got our money back before Christmas on that production,
all in the same year, and that gave us the confidence to go
and make the second and the third and the fourth and then,
once you build, you're on your way.
# A fine wee lass, a bonnie wee lass is bonnie wee Jeannie McColl
# I gave her my mother's engagement ring and a bonnie wee tartan shawl
# I met her at a waddin' in the Co-operative Hall
# Well, I was the best man, she was the belle of the ball... #
Heigh!
Stuart Anderson Jr was an early Scotdisc video star.
The six-year-old from Fife had won the BBC's Young Entertainer of
the Year award in 1989
and Dougie and Bill recorded his version of Bonnie Wee Jeannie McColl.
Very confident wee boy, and he was good. He did all the actions.
Even when he was in the studio without cameras,
he did all the actions for each song he was doing because he had
obviously worked up a sort of routine, even at six years old.
And he was a joy to work with, actually, a joy to work with.
Wee Stewart performed like a pro out on his video shoots as well.
Stuart Anderson Jr was an amazing guy on camera.
His lip-sync was perfect and he could head turn to cameras,
and he knew which was the close-up and he could turn
and knew which was the long shot.
He was quite amazing. It was some talent he had in there.
# Well, I was the best man, she was the belle of the ball
# Heigh! #
Over the years, most of the label's artists have featured on video
and reconnected with their fans.
Jim MacLeod made two Hogmanay specials, and then there were
the pipes and drums of the Royal Scots Dragoon Guards.
And Ronnie Browne.
Scotland's random weather conditions often influenced
how the shoots went.
We would start with the intention of getting to certain places,
but if the rain came on, we would pack up and move.
We wouldn't hang around because we'd use that, the drive time,
to get to the next location. So you couldn't plan ahead.
You would jump out, when you get to the next viewpoint of whatever,
and say, "Right, what will we record here?"
And we'd look through our repertoire of the songs we had laid up
and say, "We'll pick that one, pick that one, we'll do that,"
and that's how it all worked from day-to-day.
And most times,
we would get maybe three or four songs possibly in one day.
But weather was what governed, really, most of what we could do.
Helicopters were hired to cut down on travel time.
# Bheir me o, horo van o... #
And on one Tommy Scott shoot, he was whisked to Barra in a seaplane.
This wee man came over and said, "Hello, boys."
He says, "You'd better leave now,
"that's a big storm cloud that's coming."
And we looked up, and this big black cloud.
Dougie says to me, "Tommy, could you do it in one take?
"We've got to get something from out here."
And I says, "Dougie, I know this song from when I was at school."
And we recorded the Eriskay Love Lilt, and I'm standing on the wing
of the seaplane on this beach, and I thought it worked out good.
It was stressful, you don't know how you're going to get
out of the next hole and there's a budget, like anything else.
So we had to bring it in within a reasonable budget, get it
completed and sometimes we'd have to add another day on or whatever.
For Lena Martell's album My Homeland,
18 tracks were recorded in just five days all over Scotland,
including the bonnie banks of Loch Lomond.
Did anybody choose the song?
I hope it's one I know!
LAUGHTER
So, just looking out there for starters,
and you can turn to camera as you sing.
# Wish I was on a mountain high
# Watching the eagle as she flies... #
I was quite concerned when we got to make a video with her
because I knew she was a strong lady, but she was very professional.
And what she wanted, she got.
But I think we worked a good relationship and what I wanted,
I got as well, provided I gave her what she wanted.
Good luck.
We'll run the whole number through... See how bad I am.
And see how bad.
It was hills and glens, we were out in the countryside,
we were on various locations, so it was showing the country,
which all the videos do, as well as letting them hear the music.
# I've danced the night away in Monterrey
# But my homeland, your beauty shines forever... #
I knew what was in the background
and the fact that other people who weren't from Scotland, who were just
viewing it would say, "Oh, I wonder where that is, I wonder where..."
And that is why I would always say,
I sit here and I always said two or three words to say where I was.
The people that run this particular business,
it is a Scottish company,
it does produce Scottish videos with Scottish music
and it does it very well.
# If you want to know where tram cars go... #
Alastair McDonald had been ever present
in the BBC's tartan TV output.
He rediscovered his audience
when his Gretna To Glencoe album was released on DVD.
# You just have to go to Glesga's Gallowgate
# They sell tickets tae the moon
# A turn for half a croon
# And five bob guarantees a first-class seat. #
When we went along to record The Barras song on location,
it was a great opportunity for me to play the banjo
because it seems that I become almost inextricably linked with the
sound of the banjo and in addition, the location of The Barras.
Alastair McDonald in The Barras, he was different class.
And although it's not easy to perform in the high street,
bad enough up the mountain, but in the high street
with thousands of people around, not easy.
But that was one of Alastair's talents.
He was a performer and he loved an audience.
He played to an audience and they loved him as well.
# And five bob guarantees a first-class seat. #
# But don't tell my heart
# My achy breaky heart
# I just don't think he'd understand... #
Sydney Devine was a regular in the video catalogue and in 1996,
a leap of faith by Dougie Stevenson turned into a surprise hit.
I phoned Sydney and I said, "I've got an idea to put to you."
He said, "Well, what is it?" I said, "Well, line dancing."
I didn't want to do the line dancing. I says, "Line dancing?
"Line dancing, that's gone, that was last year, two years ago."
He says, "No, no, I think there is still a market for it."
He said, "Right, we'll go for it."
That was where it came from and we got into the studio
and Bill recorded all the tracks with Sydney,
but all to the line dance tempos.
# I just don't think he'd understand
# And if you tell my heart
# My achy breaky heart
# He might blow up and kill this man. #
Dougie was right, I was wrong.
Well wrong.
I think it finished up outselling Oasis at Christmas.
CHEERING AND APPLAUSE
# Let's have a ceilidh, come wi' me
# Dance to the music, merry, merry music
# Come, let us make the rafters ring
# Let's have a real old highland fling
# The band they will play an eightsome reel
# Laddies will shout and lassies squeal
# Some folk will get a wee bit fu'
# Still they will dance the whole night through... #
The videos were Scotdisc's calling card to the thousands of
woollen mills and tartan tourist shops.
# Before you chase another lass... #
We hand a two-pronged attack on that.
We had learned enough about the domestic market
and the tourism market, so we put them both together,
so we made a video that would sell for Christmas for the domestic
market, but it would also sell for the rest of the year,
in the spring and Easter, for tourism.
So that was the big first.
Tourists coming in in their droves to Scotland,
they want to see Scottish music,
they want to hear Scottish music and see the artists, if possible.
Both Dougie and Bill got into that market very successfully
and the rest is history.
# Let's have a real old highland fling. #
More than 14 million people. visit Scotland
and its traditional tourist hot spots every year.
It's a monster market worth an estimated £9 billion
a year to the Scottish economy.
And Scotdisc is right in amongst it, battling for every pound,
euro, dollar and yen it can get its hands on.
A lot of their customers are going to buy it, impulse purchase
in the visitor centres or in castles or woollen mills.
In the way they might see an ornament, a picture,
a postcard, they see albums, hear the albums playing in the shops
and it's an impulse thing.
You know exactly what you're getting if you see an album with
a piper on the front of it and I think it's knowing your market.
It was a gamble, but I think it was calculated
because we saw the various angles that other people weren't doing.
And OK, we were out on a limb,
but we did feel sure that it would pay off.
So a little concerned but we went for it.
We would quite often put quite a bit of tartan in.
We would get slated for that because people would say,
"Well, haggis and bagpipes, you know, that kind of company,
"you don't want them," so people would be snobbish about that.
But we knew that people wanted tartan
because it's such an iconic image of Scotland.
We were never going to be fashionable, what we did,
because we're not going to hide it.
We're selling souvenirs as well as the recordings,
but the packaging is important.
It's probably the most important part of it.
You won't sell it if it's in a brown paper bag.
Troy Haig has worked for Dougie and Bill since 1994.
When a shop in any town north of Gretna decides it wants to
stock some Sydney Devine, Eve Graham or Tommy Scott,
it's Troy's job to assemble one of these audio players.
Back in the day it was just, like, video players
and televisions playing just the music in the shops.
So, it changed to these things,
where the people have got wee bit of interaction.
You take the CD, you scan the unit,
and it plays you the music without people having to ask
the staff what's playing, it tells them on the wee screen.
So, it's quite a nice wee bit of kit.
That's us. It just all fits in nice and tidy, and that's you.
There's a waiting list for these new MP3 players,
so once it's assembled,
it has to get on the road as quickly as possible.
27-year Scotdisc veteran Alf McLean is making an early start,
as he heads off to the highland capital, Inverness.
The idea of the TV unit and video
had never really thought of before,
so through contacts we spoke to a great friend of mine who was
a buyer in the woollen mills, and I asked her to do a trial run.
She gave us eight of these units to put into various shops.
Good shops - Spean Bridge, Fort William, Inverness, etc -
into the coach stops.
And six months later, it went ballistic,
and she put in another 40 of them.
So, that 40 went from Windsor to John o' Groats,
right through the whole of England, right up to John o' Groats.
It was amazing, absolutely amazing.
After a day of sales calls,
Alf's ended up here at one of his best customers.
Hi, Willie. How are you today? Alf, good to see you.
Welcome back to Loch Ness. Ah, good stuff. And how's business for you?
It's been a good season. Very, very good season.
Very busy, very busy indeed.
How are you enjoying the scanner and the new scanning unit?
Is it doing well? Scanning unit's absolutely excellent.
Customers love it, and the staff love it too,
cos they can change the tunes as soon as they like without any
hassle, without having to ask.
That's true, aye. So, it's first class. First class.
And they can turn that volume up or down, remember. Turn it up or down. Yeah, yeah. Yeah.
Well, I'm here to take a wee order, you know, the usual. Yeah.
Have you got any other ones you want me
to put a wee bit extra in for you? As always, it's been going very, very well, Alf.
The big, big sellers just now are definitely
Tartan Heart Chillout Album's been selling very well,
as you can see, the stock's going down there.
And the great Tommy Scott, a favourite with all coach parties.
Yes, yes. Doing very, very well.
So, we'll certainly need a complete restock as far as these are concerned.
Brilliant stuff. So, what I'll do, basically, is I'll double up
on Tommy Scott's album and I'll double up on the Tartan Chillout
one as well. Double up. Yep, great. OK? Very much appreciated.
I'll carry on with that. See you in a month's time. OK, cheers. Bye-bye.
Alf's final port of call is Inverness.
Scotdisc delivery, Mr Fraser. Alf, nice to see you again, good morning.
Nice to see you. How are you?
First releases were Andy Stewart, The Alexander Brothers,
and of course Tommy Scott being one of the more popular ones.
We've had a good relationship with Alf from selling cassettes,
LPs, CDs, and we've now graduated to his latest machine,
which is ideal for customers to hear before they purchase the CD.
Hopefully we've got some new titles. Or new to us, anyway.
Back Home, Brenda Cochrane.
Always popular, pipe bands.
Some easy listening as well, maybe Scottish Serenity.
Easy listening and a bit of rock thrown in there too.
Every time I go into a tourist centre,
anywhere in Scotland, what do I see?
Scotdisc. And it's all marketing.
Dougie Stevenson having the thing in the tourists' face,
and it's playing in the background, in the woollen mills,
all the places, and people gravitate towards that.
This happy bunch is a group from Connecticut in the USA.
They've been whisky tasting,
and now the inhibitions have melted away.
It's time for a good old singsong.
# Then swing along to a hiking song
# On the highway winding west
# Tramping highland glens and... #
THEY CHEER
BAGPIPE MUSIC PLAYS
They're on their way to a traditional evening of highland hospitality
in Rob Roy MacGregor's Barn and Bar the banks of Loch Ard,
in the heart of the Trossachs.
We've got 27 Americans coming for dinner.
Our aim is to get them to get under the skin of Scotland.
We give them a traditional Scottish dinner...
# Once again the land's in darkness As we hang our head to mourn
# We remember how the Wallace caused oppression's tide to turn... #
..we entertain them. We give the history of the barn to them.
The barn was built in 1604 as a granary.
Rob Roy came of age in the barn in 1689. They give them all that.
The weapons are on the wall, we ask them not to take them off.
And we really give them a fun evening with music.
# Oh, Campbeltown Loch I wish you were whisky
# Campbeltown Loch och aye
# Campbeltown Loch I wish you were whisky
# I would drink you dry... #
Try it together.
# ALL: Campbeltown Loch I wish you were whisky
# Campbeltown Loch och aye
# Campbeltown Loch I wish you were whisky
# I would drink you dry
# Campbeltown Loch I wish you were whisky
# I would drink you dry
# Campbeltown Loch I wish you were whisk-y-y-y-y
# I would drink you dr-r-r-r-y! #
THEY CHEER
Well done, both teams!
# Oh, the wanderlust is on me... #
Bill McCue's The Heart Of Scotland was filmed
in and around the barn in 1993.
# And the morning sun will find me... #
It's still a big seller at the end of a great night out.
OK, so, excellent. You'll enjoy this.
And I've got the map here for you,
and there's a cross on the map exactly where we are. OK.
There you go. Thank you very much indeed. Enjoy. Oh, I will.
I love the music, I love the history.
And I have ten grandchildren,
four of which I'm raising,
and I want to share as much of it with them as I can,
and this is one way that will help me to do that.
What was great was old tunes that I know,
that we know from Scottish heritage in the US.
So, it was very recognisable to me, and I enjoyed it thoroughly.
It's been a terrific way to end the trip, on a real high note.
The music was terrific.
# William Wallace... #
It keeps the culture alive, the history alive,
and especially for the tourists coming into Scotland, it's ideal.
Yeah, it's wonderful to listen to the music.
Thank you!
Drams at the bar, help yourself.
Music at the bar.
# I'd like to build the world a home
# And furnish it with love
# Grow apple trees and honey bees
# And snow-white turtle doves... #
Eve Graham was the Scottish voice in the 1970s multi-million
selling band The New Seekers.
# And I'd like to hold it in my arms
# And keep it company... #
Eve is taking a nostalgic trip back to the Isle of Mull,
just off Scotland's west coast.
She's travelling with television director Cliff Martin,
to relive memories from their Scotdisc shoot
on the island in 2005.
This is where I stood to sing Never Ending Song Of Love,
if I remember. How does that go again?
# I've got a never ending love for you... #
Well, kind of.
# Never ending love for you
# From now on that's all I want to do... #
The idea was that we would film with me
on the bridge as we were passing the Lismore lighthouse.
Well, of course, you can't ask the boat to turn round and,
"Could we go past the lighthouse again, please,
"because we didn't get the take right?", so I had to be sure
that I was absolutely right and so did the crew, and we did it.
We did it in a take, and I think it all came off OK.
Cliff and Eve have a 40-minute journey from the ferry terminal
at Craignure up to the biggest town on Mull - Tobermory.
# Mamma can't see me get off the plane
# Her eyes aren't what they used to be... #
Back in 2005,
it was the setting for Eve Graham's version of The Mountains.
# It scares me to see him so weak... #
All the locations we went to were just stunning,
and so different, one from the other. Yes. And the weather.
Like, one minute it was raining and I'd say,
"We're never going to get any shots here."
And then the sun would come out.
And then the sun would suddenly come out.
# And see my guardians unchanged... #
It was just like the story of my life. Yes.
The words and lyrics of The Mountains was just right, yeah.
Perfect. It was perfect. Perfect.
# The mountains will be here
# To welcome me home
# The mountains will be here
# To welcome me home. #
The video was shot in the summer,
so Eve had to sing a rather unseasonable song at Duart Castle.
# When the snowman brings the snow
# Well, he just might like to know
# He's put a great big smile upon somebody's face... #
I had to come across the courtyard,
and there were daisies on the ground
and no snow, so the snow had to be added,
the daisies had to look like snowdrops
and the poor Rowan tree had to have leaves painted out afterwards.
# Well, I wish it could be Christmas every day... #
# Old acquaintance be forgot and... #
The Scotdisc snow machine was working overtime that year.
# For auld lang syne, my dear
# For auld lang syne. #
The Glasgow Phoenix choir got the treatment for their version
of Auld Lang Syne.
# City sidewalks, busy sidewalks
# Dressed in holiday style
# In the air there's a feeling of Christmas... #
And you'd never know Sydney Devine's Silver Bells was filmed at
the end of June.
At one time, I think it was an open house in Edinburgh,
and it was absolutely roasting.
It was roasting! We was trying to pretend.
And then when I eventually saw the video of this, there was
actually snow coming down. I said, "Oh! Er...OK."
It's new and it's fun!
Sydney Devine and the Big Country dancers.
Get The Big Country line Dance Party now.
..celebrates a very special new year
with Jim MacLeod and his all-star cast.
Ah, the old Scotdisc television adverts!
I remember those voiceover sessions.
The way the label has promoted its artists over the years has
played a huge part in their success.
Filmed on the spectacular West Highland Line...
On Scotdisc, from record and Woollen Mill shops now.
New from Slopdisc, Tommy Scott's new album.
The TV ads were so popular, they even had spoof spinoffs on the BBC.
Available now from all good woollen mills.
I do remember it!
Dougie rung me and he says, "You might be annoyed, Tommy,"
he says, "but they've done a spoof."
I thought it was great, I thought
it was the biggest compliment you could pay anyone.
And they were all wearing waistcoats with tartan shirts,
and the hairstyle that I had, which was much longer than this.
No, I thought it was great.
I was well pleased.
I remember creasing myself when I saw that on Only An Excuse
and it was so, it just popped up out of nowhere, of course
because absolutely nothing to do with football, but here it was
like one of these proper Tommy Scott adverts that you would see on STV.
You know and love him from singing the anthem before Scotland games.
# Oh, Flower of Scotland... #
COME ON!
But now hear the full range of Ronnie the Corrie on the best
Ronnie the Corrie album in the world, ever.
Hear Ronnie sing Slade.
# Come on, feel the noise... # COME ON!
I didn't realise that had already caught on with
the people of Scotland.
And I thought, "I'll encourage them to do this.
"Oh, flower of Scotland...
"..come on!" And then it stuck
and then I couldn't stop doing it!
It became part of my image.
Get the greatest Ronnie the Corrie album in the world, ever.
Come on!
Kids in the street, they don't know the song but they,
they pass me in the street saying, "Come on!"
And I'm saying, "Who are you?" I'd forgotten about it.
What are you waiting for?! COME ON!
It's a poke at what we do, but it, it... It's all publicity.
COME ON!
The TV ads were cheap and cheerful,
and Scotdisc had its own quirky marketing style.
Over the years, we've produced various forms of merchandise
for Tommy Scott here, and of course Sydney Devine,
including the Sydney Devine Times
which was a newspaper printed in Inverness as a trial
run for a printing press that was about to open,
so we got a very good deal for that.
And it included the page three, or free,
if you want to call it, whichever way,
of Sydney Devine. Sold at concerts, sell it on the way in.
So we had the newspaper.
Tommy Scott souvenir brochure,
and then the ultimate one was the Sydney Devine tour jacket.
But Dougie's had the last laugh.
Between them, Sydney Devine
and Tommy Scott have sold over a million records through Scotdisc.
# Kiss me, my darling
# Be mine tonight... #
The Highland Cathedral album by the pipes and drums of the Royal
Scots Dragoon Guards is the label's bestselling individual title.
The recording has shifted more than 250,000 copies since it first came out in 1997.
The military bands gave us exactly what we wanted -
all the well-known Scottish tunes, not competition tunes.
So this went straight into our tourism package.
A pipe band from Scottish Regiment, perfect,
and not only that, they looked perfect.
Highland Cathedral isn't Scotdisc's only success
in the world of pipes and drums.
Pipe Major Derek Potter was the Queen's personal
piper for four years.
He's made six albums for the label.
I was asked by Dougie at the time, when I was up in Balmoral for
the summer court with Her Majesty, and I was asked if I would
like to come down and produce an album that was solo piping.
And again, we looked at the fact of tunes that would be well known...
..to put those altogether on one album.
So that was really,
really good and really exciting - to get to, kind of, go in on my own and
record something was a great opportunity with Bill and Dougie.
# There was a soldier A Scottish soldier
# Who wandered far away
# And soldiered far away
# There was none bolder
# With good broad shoulder
# He's fought in many a fray
# And fought and won... #
The most ambitious project involving Derek Potter was
the 2003 reissue of Andy Stewart's A Scottish Soldier video album.
# They're not my land's hills And fair as these... #
Andy died in 1993, the year after the original was released.
And the trick was to mix the old footage with new shots
involving the regiment.
# Because these green hills are not Highland hills
# Or the island hills
# They're not my land's hills
# And fair as these
# Green foreign hills may be
# They are not the hills of home... #
We approached the Royal Scots Dragoon Guards
and we got them into the studio to record just the pipes and drums
playing the tunes that Andy had written.
We had Andy sing Scottish Soldier,
and we had the, then into The Green Hills, with the pipes.
But we took them also to the very locations where Andy sang the songs.
And we brought all that together with pipes and drums and Andy,
and it was a huge success.
Very positive feedback.
The letters we used to receive through to the regiment
from people who had heard the album and said they'd been moved
emotionally, when they were hearing the tracks.
It was great to kind of get that feedback.
The days of huge record sales have gone.
Getting music digitally is the way forward - for now, at least.
And Scotdisc is moving with the times.
We wouldn't survive without streams and downloads.
It's become such an important part of the mix, in music,
and how you can access music.
Music's always going to be accessed, you know,
whether it's a physical format or a digital format. So...
We really...you want to expand your market,
you really have to offer both.
Streams are really in a growth area, and it's working well for us.
It would be in the long shot when he stands up.
No, but it was wrong there as well.
The DVD catalogue is getting a makeover as well.
All right. OK. Carry on, once more, where was it?
It's where you stand up. "Take me home, far across the sea..."
"Home..." It's in there, there's a phrase in there. Yeah. Yeah.
I think it's the word "take", I think. OK.
OK, and rolling. OK, here we come, then.
Where, where am I picking you up from?
You'll hear it. Next chorus. It'll be before that.
Scotdisc has never filmed Alasdair Gillies in his 37-year career
with the label.
But now he and Dougie and the old camera crew are in Argyll and Bute
at the Rest and Be Thankful viewpoint,
putting together a new release.
This will be part of a compilation,
a kind of down the years of Scotdisc video catalogue.
We'll distribute that through social media, through YouTube.
This is new for us to have Alasdair on the catalogue,
cos Alasdair had gone and worked abroad for so many years
at the time when video was in its infancy, for...
..companies like ourselves, so this is a new project.
A new dimension, a new way to go.
Over? Aye, probably, yep. Yeah, I'll take that. Yep. OK.
LAUGHTER
Take me home! That's a wrap for Alasdair.
Which is just as well, because bad weather is beginning to creep in.
And it's threatening to ruin what's left of today's shoot - a melody
from Pipe Major Derek Potter.
Well, I think what we'll do is go for the close up rather than do
another take of the long shot, and wait for this weather to clear.
Dougie's assured us it'll go off in 20 minutes.
We don't take no for an answer, it's...
It'll go off. I can see it's bright there, it's going to come through.
Yeah? Yeah.
LAUGHTER
As long as we're not getting rain on the lens
then this is great, it's fine, you know?
But it's just, you set up, you start,
and then suddenly the weather just turns against you again.
But, I mean, if we get a break like this, it'll be fine.
It's a wee bit cold, but then, as they say, it's all part of doing
what we're doing, you know, for, to get the right shot.
Thankfully, everyone's optimism paid off.
And it's another classic in the bag.
Dougie and Bill are so dedicated to music and to Scotland, and
they've found a way of putting that together and marketing it,
and that hasn't faded.
# Feels so good, I can hardly stand
# This never ending love for you... #
Working with Bill and Dougie...I thought I'd died and gone to heaven.
It was great.
They knew what they wanted to sell.
# Through the eyes of love
# You'll see a thousand stars
# When you dance, dance, dance to my ten guitars... #
I don't think you'll find anybody that has a bad word to
say about them, and that is saying something.
# That we'd never part
# So, hello, Mary Lou, and goodbye heart... #
They have a legacy of a lot of material which will then go into
archive material and will be more and more respected as time goes on.
But they're still going on.
They'll change as well. No doubt they'll introduce other things.
But, no, they have a legacy that will...
..I'm certain, will stand the test of time.
Good for Scotdisc, I tell you.
# An' during a' the years to come || Downloadha.com ||
# O happy may ye be. #