The Osmonds were an American family music group who reached the height of their fame in the early to mid-1970s. The group had its best-known configurations as a quartet (billed the Osmond Brothers) and a quintet (the Osmonds). The group has consisted of siblings who are all members of a family of musicians from Ogden, Utah, and have been in the public eye since the 1960s.
The Osmond Brothers began as a barbershop quartet consisting of brothers Alan, Wayne, Merrill and Jay. They were later joined by younger siblings Donny and Jimmy, both of whom enjoyed success as solo artists. With the addition of Donny, the group became known as the Osmonds; performing both as teen idols and as a rock band, their peak lasted from 1971 to 1975. Their only sister Marie, who rarely sang with her brothers at that time, launched a successful career in 1973, both as a solo artist and as Donny's duet partner. By 1976, the band was no longer producing hit singles; that year, they transitioned into television with Donny & Marie, a popular variety show that ran until 1979.
A revival of the original Osmond Brothers lineup in the 1980s achieved moderate success in country music, and both Donny and Marie separately made comebacks in their respective fields in the late-1980s. The Osmonds have sold over 77 million records worldwide.
The quartet continued to perform through their 50th anniversary in 2007, at which point Alan and later Wayne retired due to health issues; Jimmy was recruited after Alan's retirement, with the group performing as a trio until Jimmy suffered a stroke and retired in 2018. On 14 October 2019, the original Osmond Brothers quartet reunited for CBS' The Talk for their sister Marie's 60th birthday, which would be the last appearance for the lineup before Wayne's death in 2025. The brothers performed "The Last Chapter", written as a farewell song and introduced in 2018. Donny & Marie ended an 11-year Las Vegas residency on November 16, 2019. Merrill announced his retirement in 2022 to pursue a church mission, leaving Jay as the last remaining member of the original quartet still performing (Donny continues to perform as a solo artist as well). In later years, Alan's sons, particularly Nathan and David, have made appearances with their uncles.
Links to Peel[]
Let Me In-2
Peel was not a fan of the group or its members solo career. In the January 1973 issue of Let It Rock, various critics and DJs were asked to nominate their choices in ten categories relating to the previous year. Peel supplied more extended comments than usual, and for the worst single of 1972 selected Jimmy Osmond's Long Haired Lover From Liverpool.
Peel reviewed the Osmonds single, 'Let Me In', for Singles Reviews, published in Sounds on 27th October 1973, describing it as "awful, awful, awful".[1] A year later in the same paper, on 24th August 1974, he reviewed another single of theirs, 'Love Me For A Reason', and mentioned being profoundly disturbed by the experience of seeing their TV programme. Nonetheless he described the song as a 'pretty tune', although he wasn't keen on the b-side.[2]
He also reviewed some of the sibling members solo singles in Sounds on 10th November 1973, describing Marie Osmond's Paper Roses and Donny Osmond's When I Fall In Love, as both terrible and boring.[3]
In his column on Sounds music paper, published on 14th June 1975, Peel described how he was dragged to see the band perform in Earls Court and mentioned how he was puzzled by their waning appeal to the very young.[4]
Shows Played[]
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