284 Goodbye The Osmonds - I Can't Live A Dream

Chart   entered : 31  October  1976

Chart  peak : 37

So  far  -with  the  artificial  exception  of  The  Jackson  Five - we've been  saying  farewell  to  survivors  from  the  fifties  and  sixties Now  the  stars  of  the  early  seventies  began  to  feel  the pinch; the  giants  of  my  first  pop  years  started  to  disappear. By  1976  , in  the  wake  of  the  Rollers,  Osmondmania   seemed  a  long  time  ago  and  this  record  completely  passed  me  by  at  the  time.

You  often  hear  that   the  Osmonds  blew  it    in  1973  with  their  mad  Mormon  concept  LP  "The  Plan"  but  that's  nonsense   at  least  as  far   as  their  popularity  in  the  UK  is  concerned . It  spawned  two  big  hits  in  "Going  Home"  and  "Let  Me In" ( with  its  migraine-inducing  promo  film )  and  their  UK  tour  that  year  generated  a  level  of  fan hysteria  not  seen  since  the  Beatles. The  following  year  they  got  their  first  and  only  number  one  with  "Love Me  For  A  Reason" and  "The  Proud  One"  made  number  5  in  1975. These  were  all  good  pop  singles  that  have  never  had  due  credit.

By  1976  though,  they  were  distracted  by   Donny  and  sister  Marie  being  offered  a  TV  show  of  their  own  despite  both  being  still  in  their  teens. The  group  took  a  back  seat  and  the  other  brothers  worked  on  building  a  TV studio  in  Utah  to  give  the  family  more  control  over  the  show.

"I  Can't  Live  A  Dream"  was  the  lead  single  from  their  last   album  as  a  quintet,   "Brainstorm".  The  single  sleeve  is  misleading; neither  Marie  nor  Little  Jimmy  are  on  the  record. It's  a  cover  of  a  forlorn  but   rather  insipid  disco-lite  track  from  Frankie  Valli's  1975  LP  Closeup.  The  boys'  is  the  better  version , giving  the  song  a  shot  of  energy  with  Mike  Curb's  production  skills    Merrill's  gritty  vocals  and  the  harmonies  as  strong  as  they  ever  were. It's  just  not  that  great  a  song  and  didn't  really  merit  a  higher  chart  position. It  was  also  their  last  hit  in  the  U.S.  reaching  number  46.

The  album  didn't  make  the  charts. The  demands  of  the  show  meant  Donny  was  absent  from  the  next  one  "Steppin'  Out"  in  1979  which  was  produced  by  Maurice  Gibb.  Have   a  guess  who  it  sounds  a  bit  like ? The  first  single  was  the  title  track  which  is  like  George  Michael  ( it's  Jay )  fronting  KC  and  the  Sunshine  Band  , a  bunch  of  dance floor  slogans  over  a  credible  groove  rather  than  a  song . The  follow-up  was  the  Wayne-sung  ( not  very well  actually )  "It's  Rainin"  an   AOR  ballad  that  sounds  like  Styx. The  standout  track  though  is  "I,I,I,"  which  blends   a  Giorgio  Moroder  sequencer  pulse  with  Chic  strings  and   a  cheeky  nod  to  Staying  Alive  ( note  the  title )  to  great  effect ; you'd  never  guess  it  was  them. Unfortunately  this  valiant  attempt  to  update  their  sound  went  unnoticed; nothing  charted  anywhere.

Worse  was  to  follow . The  Donny  and Marie  Show  was  cancelled  later  that  year  and  although  ratings  had  been  slipping   it  still  came  as  a  big  shock  to   the  family. In  the  fallout  from  that  they  discovered  that  much  of  the  money  earned  had  been  embezzled  and  they  were  actually  in  debt. The  TV  studio  had  to  be  sold  to  stave  off  bankruptcy.

The  quartet  eventually  re-emerged , back  as  The  Osmond  Brothers,  in  1982 . The  Osmonds'  ferocious  family  loyalty  prevents  us   from  ever  knowing  the  full  story  but  it  seems  clear  that  there  was  some  serious  fracture  between  Donny  and  his  brothers  around  this  point  and  he's  done  his  own  thing  ever  since. We  will  of  course  come  back  to  him.

The  Osmomd  Brothers'  new  direction  was  Country  and  Western. As  we've  seen  before  the  country  audience  doesn't  mind  where  you've  come  from  as  long  as  the  music's  good  and  they  had  a  string  of  country  hits  between  1982  and  1986. In  April 1985  they  returned  to  the  UK  and  the  BBC  broadcast  one  of   their  concerts  but  they  were  widely  derided. After  that  they  became  less  interested  in  touring  as  they  were  now  all  married  and  breeding  like  rabbits. None  of  their  records  crossed  over  and  after  two  albums  they  ceased  recording  when  Alan  was  diagnosed  with  MS  in  1986.

Ironically  just  as  Donny's  career  revived  , the  rest  of  the  boys  dropped  out  of  public  view. Alan's  sons  formed  a  group  the  Osmond  Boys  and  released  a  couple  of  LPs  which  were  quickly  forgotten. Merrill  struggled  with  depression  and  you  can  now  phone  him , presumably  at  premium  rate, to  hear  a  recorded  message  on  why  he  didn't  commit  suicide  ( I  wonder  how  much  he'd  accept  to  go  through  with  it  ) . Wayne  had  to have  surgery  for  a  brain  tumour. Jay  decided  to  go  back  to  college  and  study  accountancy  and  now  largely  runs  the  family  business.

The  Osmonds  returned  to  performing  in  the  2000s  with  Jimmy , who'd  made  a  decent  career  for  himself  in  entertainment  management  replacing  Alan.  Generally  they  don't  perform  too  far  away  from  their  entertainment  complex  in  Branson, Missouri  though  the  whole  family  took  part  in  a  50th  anniversary  tour  of  Europe   in  2007-08  and  the  brothers  toured  the  UK  in  2010. In  2011  Wayne  stopped  performing  on  health  grounds  but  the  others  are  still  going, Merrill  occasionally  doing  solo  gigs,.