As his MGM contract came to an end in 1973, Roy signed a one-year contract with Mercury Records in 1974 without major acclaim, but as he would say, he always had a record in the charts in some part of the World. For example "Penny Arcade" was number 1 in Australia for weeks on end and "Too Soon to Know" was number 3 in England. After that brief stay with Mercury Records, Roy re-signed with Monument in January 1976 in an attempt to recharge his career in the midst of heavy touring on the Far East, Australia, Asia and Europe. Roy paid the price of heavy smoking, heavy touring and life on the road when he underwent open-heart surgery at the St. Thomas Hospital in Nashville in January 18, 1978, but he was back on the road three weeks later just to prove he could do it.

But about this time things started to look a bit brighter in the US. Roy was always out of the shadow in Europe, mainly in England and everybody over there knew who he was, he was still popular and doing more shows overseas than at home, but when Linda Ronstadt had a huge hit with Roy's "Blue Bayou" which sold about 7 or 8 million copies, Van Halen had an enormous success with "Oh Pretty Woman" and Don McClean did the same with "Crying", a rejuvenation process started.