Osmonds, Mormon Muses

[RBerman]

Note: This is not a "let's mock Mormons" thread. There are plenty of other threads for those with that impulse.

When I was a kid, my sisters and I watched Donny & Marie on TV. We would put on lip-sync shows of their album for family and friends. This week, as part of my project to recreate pop music history on my iPod, I got an Osmonds greatest hits CD. I was surprised to see that Donny had 11 Top Forty hits in the early 70s, plus another 8 during the same period with The Osmonds. In comparison, Michael Jackson (against whom Donny was put forward as a white copy) had only five solo hits during that period, though the Jackson 5 had 16 other Top Forty hits then, 7 of which were #1 or #2. So although we remember the Jackson 5 (and of course, Michael) more today, the Osmonds were pretty successful, for a coattail band.

I was particularly intrigued by the lyrics of the Osmond song Goin' Home, a BTO/Bad Company style rocker which went to #36 in 1973:

I'm a track star, gotta run far,
And I'm ready to go
It's a long, long road.
And I gotta make it on my own.

Everybody's gainin on me,
Tryin to slow me down,
But if I'm gonna make it,
Gotta fight, fight, fight all day,
And night--and day--all right.

Goin' home, goin' home, goin' home,
I gotta make it, gonna make it all right,
Goin' home, goin' home, goin' home,
If it takes me the rest of my life.

I'm a space man, from a different world,
I gotta get back home,
I've been gone so long,
That I'm feelin' like a useless man.

Everybody's lookin' at me,
Trying to help me down,
I gotta fight, fight, fight, even though it takes
Another day, and night, and day, all right,

Oh me, why, why,
Is it either win or lose,
Somehow, someday
I'll never ever have to go away.

The "I'm a spaceman, I gotta get back home" part seems like the most explicit reference to Mormon-distinctive doctrines in the Osmond catalogue. That got me wondering whether there are any other Mormon-rific pop songs out there that charted. You LDSers know of any?

[nrajeff]

Sorry, the only Osmond songs I remember are:

Go Away Little Girl
Little Bit Me, Little Bit You
Crazy Horses
Down By the Lazy River
I'm a Little Bit Country

If anyone can derive LDS doctrine from any of those, more power to you. : )

[Cow Poke]

I always thought Marie was SO pretty. And I think she's frozen in time.



Wait.... there was a DONNY?

[RBerman]

After further research, it appears that "Goin' Home" was actually the finale of a concept album they did about Mormonism entitled, "The Plan." Here's another track, Before the Beginning:

Before the beginning we were living
Oh, so far away from here
And we called it home but didn't stay
We knew that we could leave one day and cry

Before the beginning we were willing
To lay aside whom we had been
And take a chance to slip away
Or make it back to home one day, what for

Ever since we came to be
With the plan we've learned to see
We alone would guide our destiny
In the beginning we'd be living

As we would be, he once was
To look at him, to look at me
And think some day like him I'll be, what more

Ever since we came to be
With the plan we learned to see
We control infinity, what more
What more

[KingsGambit]

Hmm. That's interesting. Based on just the first posted lyrics, I would have been open to just seeing it as a metaphor of sorts, but I had no idea they actually made an LDS concept album.

[Bill the Cat]

Marie is still hot!