Rock N' Roll Nights

Rock N' Roll Nights

Rock n' Roll Nights is the eighth studio album by Canadian rock band BTO, released in 1979 (see 1979 in music). This album was one of three BTO albums that did not feature co-founder Randy Bachman. Rock n' Roll Nights is also one of the two albums from this band to feature Jim Clench, formerly of April Wine. This album generated world wide sales of only about 250,000 copies, though a single from the album called "Heartaches" managed to reach #60 on the U.S. charts. It is a rare find on CD, as it was released only for a short time on that format in 1990.

The band played two songs -- "Heartaches" and "Jamaica" -- live on American Bandstand in February, 1979 to support the Rock n' Roll Nights album release. During an interview segment on the show, Dick Clark mentions to the band that he is concerned about the increasing and dominating popularity of Disco at the time. Many consider disco and the decline of guitar-based hard rock in the late 1970's to be among the reasons that both Street Action and Rock n' Roll Nights sold so poorly.

The band used multiple outside songwriters on Rock n' Roll Nights, including Jim Vallance of Prism and Bryan Adams (who penned the song, "Wastin' Time"). C.F. Turner and Jim Clench would later appear as session musicians for Adams' debut album in 1980.