Re-introducing Merrill Osmond... lead singer of the original boy band, The Osmonds, playing solo in York.

Merrill Osmond, 51, sang lead vocals for the all-singing, all-dancing, all-Mormon family band The Osmonds as they dominated the first half of the Seventies with Crazy Horses, Let Me In, Love Me For A Reason and Going Home. Now with hair as white as the snow at his mountain home in Ephraim, Utah, Merrill starts his 15-date solo British tour on Monday. CHARLES HUTCHINSON reports.

When did you first play solo in Britain?

"I did a tour over there for three weeks last year, and we had such fun that the promoter asked me to do it again. I get a million hits a month on my website, and half of those are from the UK, and it's really growing."

Who is your audience today?

"We're finding that families are coming to the shows, so The Osmonds' legacy lives on. That's why we've done some retro re-releasing of our records."

What are your further re-release plans?

"There's been a lot of interest in re-releasing The Plan, the concept album we did in the Seventies. It was a rock opera, and because it was a concept album it seemed to attract a lot of music people. McCartney made the comment to us that he thought it was one of the new albums of its time.

"The Beatles will always be our heroes, and we modelled ourselves on them. I hold Paul in the highest regard."

Who will be playing alongside you on this tour?

"I've got a four-piece band called Black Bear; they're from Missouri and I hand-picked them about three years ago. I'll be playing bass and saxophone... and singing of course, and I'll have a backing vocalist with me to help me to do some duets.

"We'll be doing all the great Osmonds hits...."

...Ah yes, Crazy Horses. What was that crazy horse sound?

"We created it off a Vox box. It was one of those screaming devices you can run your thumb up and down to make that sound.

"Lots of radio stations wouldn't play it because people thought it was a siren when they heard it, so they pulled off the road - and it got banned in France for ages because the French thought it was a drugs song. I don't know why. It certainly wasn't!"

Do you have a favourite Osmonds' song?

"That's a toughie, because I was involved in the whole process, the writing, the playing, the producing, but I'd choose Let Me In. If you listen to how the melody differs in the verse from the chorus, that's magical."

Do you look on The Osmonds as being a boy band?

"They weren't called boy bands in the Seventies, but I do think we were just a little unique, the way we worked on our choreography. That was influenced by Elvis Presley, who encouraged us to do karate. Chuck Norris was our instructor and we worked out every day, breaking boards and training with the best, and we brought some of that into our show."

When you look back to the Seventies, what are your memories of the hysteria that accompanied The Osmonds' every move?

"I don't think anyone can imagine what it's like if they haven't been there. When that kind of stuff starts to happen to you, it's very, very strange, like when your hotel is surrounded by thousands of fans and the only way out is for the fire department to turn on the hoses to clear the streets.

"It was overwhelming mania, and that's different from hysteria. Mania is when they're out of their minds. It was bizarre, overwhelming and something we will never forget.

"It was scary at times too, like when we played Manchester and we only did one song in two hours. Every time we started Crazy Horses, the police asked us to stop for safety reasons."

Merrill Osmond, Grand Opera House, York, next Friday, 7.30pm; tickets £19.50 and £22.50 on 0870 606 3590. Once In A Lifetime 2005, with The Osmonds (Wayne, Merrill, Jay and Jimmy), Les McKeown's 70s' Bay City Rollers, David Cassidy, David Essex, Sheffield Hallam FM Arena, July 1; box office 0114 256 5656.

Updated: 15:27 Thursday, March 17, 2005