Seventies pop legends announce North East arena date

Suzi Quatro, David Essex, Les McKeown's Bay City Rollers and Smokie will play 10 dates on the Legends Live UK Tour.

The artists, who between them had more than 50 Top 30 hits and sold hundreds of millions of records, will play at the Metro Radio Arena in Newcastle on Tuesday, April 9, next year.

Quatro featured in the British charts for 101 weeks between 1973 and 1980, and has sold more than 55 million records, and counting.

Her hits include the No 1s Can The Can and Devil Gate Drive, and other smashes such as 48 Crash and She’s In Love With You.

She also appeared as Leather Tuscadero in the worldwide hit TV series Happy Days, and has had her own Radio Two show.

From hit records to hit musicals, David Essex has had one of the most enduring careers in music, stage and screen.

He has had 23 Top 30 singles in Britain alone, including a pair of No 1s in Hold Me Close and Gonna Make You A Star, as well as hits like Lamplight, Silver Dream Machine, A Winter’s Tale and Oh What A Circus.

He has starred in the films Silver Dream Racer, That’ll Be The Day and Stardust, as well as appearing in BBC Tv soap EastEnders as Eddie Moon.

Bay City Rollers enjoyed a Top 10 hit in 1971 with first single Keep On Dancing, then enjoyed huge success from 1974 onwards with singles like Remember: Sha La La La, Shang-A-Lang, Summerlove Sensation and All Of Me Loves All Of You.

Bye Bye Baby, released in 1975, was their first UK No1, and for the next four years they toured all over the world to sold-out crowds.

Lead singer Les McKeown is back with his own version of the band, and the demand to hear the hits which soundtracked so many fans' youth is still huge.

Completing the line-up are rock 'n' roll survivors Smokie, who are best known for their 1976 Top Five hit Living Next Door To Alice.

It wasn't their only hit of course: they also made the Top 20 with tunes like If You Think You Know How To Love Me, Don't Play Your Rock & Roll To Me, Oh Carol and Needles & Pins.

Tickets for the Newcastle leg of the Legends Live UK tour go on sale on Friday, September 21, online, from the booking hotline number 0844 493 6666 or from 11am in person at the Arenabox office.