EVERYBODY in Glasgow it seems, knows Bobby Bluebell, or they want to know him. Because why would you not want to know someone who goes by the name of Bobby Bluebell?

We’re sitting outside one of those taverns in Glasgow’s west end which have lately been converted from old churches. Our chat is punctuated by perjink westenders pausing to say hello. “We saw you at St Jude’s the other night. You and the boys were brilliant.” “Are you coming to that event in Oran Mor?” “Will you be here for a while yet? Mary and I are popping down later on.”

But he won’t be here because he’s dashing to attend his boy’s school play. And then on Monday it’s his daughter’s graduation.

All that can wait for a few minutes though, and so can the main purpose for this interview: his 40-year career as one of the most recognisable faces in the popular music industry: singer, musician, song-writer, club deejay. First we must deal with a more pressing matter.

He opens with Glasgow’s newest form of greeting. “Do you know who we’re getting, then?” And we fall to speculating about the identity of Celtic’s new manager. Not until we have wrung our hands over this can we proceed.

Bobby Bluebell’s real name is Robert Hodgens, but as Bobby Bluebell he co-wrote Young at Heart, one of those songs which came to define a moment in time. That time was the early 1980s and Hodgens was dating co-writer, Siobhan Fahey, who would include the song in an album by her band, Bananarama.

But when Hodgens’ band, The Bluebells recorded it a year later it reached the top ten in the UK charts. Almost ten years later it reached Number One after featuring in a television advert for Volkswagen. It’s one of those songs you feel could be released every five years or so and be assured of a top ten slot.

He and his old bandmates, Ken and David McCluskey have re-formed to play some gigs around the city to promote a new album, The Bluebells in the 21st century. The second of these last Saturday at St Jude’s, up from The Barrowlands, was a sell-out and Bobby is delighted with the sales. Today, he’s taken delivery of the new vinyl cover.

The Bluebells emerged at a time in Glasgow when you could walk into any one of several clubs and bars in the city and rub tobacco with bands and musicians

who, over a five-year period, took turns at storming the UK top 40: the Rock Garden, Charlie Parker’s, Henry Afrika’s, Night Moves, the Cotton Club.

It was the era of Simple Minds, Altered Images, Orange Juice, Love and Money, Strawberry Switchblade, Hipsway, Spear of Destiny and, a bit later, Hue and Cry and Texas. And though some of these bands had more sustained success than the Bluebells it was Young and Heart that defined their time more than any other song.

“At that time,” he recalls, “most of us in these bands were friends, but we were also competitive. We made each other up our game. If someone went to number eight in the charts you would want to go one better.”

It was all happening at a time when Scotland was experiencing the first icy blast of Thatcherism. Perhaps rather than write overt protest songs the optimism and sheer fun of these tunes carried another form of radicalism: something that spoke of being indomitable.

“We were brought up to believe that being independent was good,” he says. “We weren’t part of the machine, we could do it on our own. Many of us had school teachers who encouraged us and I was particularly motivated by a sense of Scottish pride.

“In my school jotters I would list all the singers and musicians in the big bands of the time who were Scottish or had a Scottish connection: Ian Anderson of Jethro Tull, Nazareth, Pilot, the Rollers and even Middle of the Road (who I loved by the way).

“I even claimed Ian Huinter of Mott the Hoople because he lived in Hamilton for a few years. I remember being dead proud when the Average White Band began to take America. Yet, in Glasgow alone in the 1980s I could have filled my jotter with them.”

We discuss that recognisable Glasgow sound of the time: spangly guitars driven by eager-to-please melodies which still emerge unbidden decades later when you walk down old, remembered streets. And lyrics that came with a twinkle in their eyes.

He talks again about being independent and how Young at Heart came at a time when young men and women leaving home and taking off for London was the thing to do. “And for me it was also about taking your parents for granted

and then maybe reflecting years later how they toiled to ensure that you could have a happier more carefree existence.”

He speaks warmly of how his dad’s values shaped his. And soon we’re setting the business of music aside and getting into politics. “We were on the cusp of Thatcherism back then where Britain was becoming a completely different place. I went to college because I had a bursary and a grant. That’s the way to treat your children. Give them work.

“The idea of a Universal Income will now have to become a reality because our children simply aren’t going to get jobs as easily as we once did. They’ll have no spending power. You can’t be truly independent without that.

“All those taxes and National Insurance our parents paid. Who did we pay it to? The British state wants to dismantle the NHS and the police force as we knew it – working for us – now operates to protect the state. Our publicly-owned assets have been sold off to make profits for overseas fund managers: the railways, the post office; our natural sources of energy: they’ve all we been looted and pillaged since Thatcher.

“Unionists talk about nationalism as if it’s bad thing and divisive. But Brexit is simply English nationalism and the UK Government has more or less become an instrument of English nationalism.

“Scottish independence means we might have a chance of being a country that can take care of people again. It’s not about being large enough it’s about being small enough to do this. We can own our own infrastructure again. And we can all contribute to it like Finland and Norway do.

“Young at Heart came out of a time when Thatcher and the Tories wanted to convey the idea that being working-class was something shaming. If you were signing-on or receiving any kind of benefits they wanted to embarrass you and humiliate you and make you feel like sh*t.”

He remembers his dad telling him about Britain’s activities in its old crown colony of Aden. “He told me it was how the British operated. They go into other lands; locate competing interests among the locals and then cause them to fight each other. While they abscond with their assets. They’re doing it again now.”

He’s keen to re-connect with Glasgow’s vibrant music and club scene where he had been a totemic figure for 20 years. But it’s difficult for these young musicians and bands to make a rewarding career out of it.

“The music industry is now designed to suppress originality. They want an amorphous and manicured sound. The streaming model means that original young artists wanting to be independent and do it their own way have a slim chance of making good money.”

He tells me how genuine originality is actively discouraged by a dismal, bottom-feeding x-factorism. “It’s not uncommon for songwriters to be told ‘the client is looking for a song. It must be in the style of such and such. Here are some examples’. And they send you links to songs. And you think ‘F*ck me. Why don’t you just do it yourself?’”

We cheer ourselves up once more by talking about Gerry Cinnamon. “He’s great isn’t he? He makes me optimistic. He’s doing it for himself, writing his own distinctive material and the fans are singing all the songs as they go to Hampden to see him. It’s about building a community with Gerry. And that’s something that our politicians and the music industry are eroding.”

Bobby Bluebell is In Conversation during the Edinburgh Fringe Fringe Festival at The Stand's New Town Theatre on August 18 at 12 noon.