David Essex and the Osmond Brothers brought a little piece of 1970s pop history back to television in 2010
There was something wonderfully nostalgic about seeing David Essex sitting alongside The Osmond Brothers on ITV’s This Morning on 24 June 2010. Almost four decades had passed since their names had been printed across the same pop magazines, yet here they were again, sharing a television studio and talking about a new chapter that brought their musical worlds together. The appearance came during the period surrounding the Once in a Lifetime tour, which united several familiar names from the great British and American pop explosion of the 1970s. A surviving video of the This Morning appearance is dated 24 June 2010, preserving a small but fascinating moment from that reunion era.
For David Essex, the setting was particularly fitting. His career had begun with the extraordinary breakthrough of 1973, when “Rock On” reached No. 3 in the UK and David simultaneously found success in That’ll Be the Day and the stage production of Godspell. The Osmonds, meanwhile, had become one of the most recognizable family groups in popular music, with Donny Osmond achieving enormous solo fame and the brothers building a devoted international following. They came from different musical backgrounds and developed different public images, but they belonged to the same extraordinary generation of performers whose faces became part of everyday life through television, magazines and record shops. By 2010, the excitement of that era had softened into something more reflective, and appearances such as this allowed audiences to see the people behind the old photographs.
The timing was not accidental. The Once in a Lifetime project brought together The Osmonds, David Essex, Bay City Rollers and Leo Sayer, artists who had once occupied a very crowded pop landscape. Contemporary coverage described the tour as a return to the teenage dream of the 1970s, but there was another story underneath it. These performers were no longer trying to establish themselves. They were looking back at careers that had already shaped several generations of listeners while continuing to perform in their own right. For David especially, the reunion was another reminder of just how far he had travelled from the young man who first appeared in the spotlight with that unforgettable “Rock On” image.
What makes the This Morning footage so appealing is the contrast between the memory of these stars and the people sitting in front of the cameras in 2010. The photographs from the 1970s preserve David with his famous hair, youthful face and unmistakable smile, while the Osmonds remain forever associated with the bright, energetic world of their early success. But television in 2010 offered something different. They could talk about their careers with the benefit of hindsight. The years had brought marriages, children, changing fashions, different musical directions and the inevitable passing of friends and colleagues. Their appearance therefore carried a warmth that could not have existed when they were young competitors for the attention of the same audience.
For David Essex, there was also a quiet significance in still being there. He had never confined himself to recording pop songs. His career moved through music, theatre, film and television, and by this point he had already spent decades proving that the young star of the 1970s was only the beginning of the story. The same David who had once filled cinemas and record shops was now able to sit comfortably in a television studio and discuss a career that had crossed generations. That longevity is part of what makes his 2010 appearances so appealing today. There is no need to recreate the past when the past is already sitting there in the room.
And perhaps that is what makes this particular This Morning appearance memorable. David Essex and the Osmonds were not simply revisiting the 1970s. They were showing what remained after the screaming crowds, chart battles and teenage posters had faded. Their presence together created a bridge between two moments in popular music: the dazzling young performers of the early 1970s and the seasoned artists who had carried those memories into another century. For anyone who remembers David Essex and the Osmonds from their first great wave of fame, seeing them together again in 2010 feels like opening an old magazine and discovering that, somehow, the people inside the photographs had stepped back into the room.