Live Aid Anniversary - by Dan Rather and Team Steady
Today we celebrate a once-in-a-lifetime concert that took place 40 years ago this weekend. It was all in the name of helping people on the other side of the world simply because it was the right thing to do.
The concert was Live Aid, a two-venue, 16-hour event that raised hundreds of millions for famine relief in Africa, especially in Ethiopia, where hundreds of thousands were starving to death.
Live Aid still holds the record for the largest viewership of a televised event, ever; 1.9 billion people in 150 countries watched a who’s who of stars perform hit after hit from stages in England and the United States, with a combined attendance of more than 161,000 concertgoers.
And what a lineup, with Mick Jagger, Bob Dylan, Tina Turner, Led Zeppelin (a reunion), Eric Clapton, Neil Young, Joan Baez, Elvis Costello, Sting, U2, The Who, Run-DMC, and Elton John, to name more than a few of the musicians. Phil Collins performed at both venues, taking the Concord from London to New York and then a helicopter to Philly.
The groundbreaking concert raised public awareness and generated such positive publicity that western countries donated surplus grain to aid the immediate crisis. According to an aid worker, “Humanitarian concern is now at the center of foreign policy” for the West. How our country has changed. Sadly, I am pretty sure that idea would not resonate with our current administration.
On this anniversary, concert organizer Bob Geldof didn’t mince words about the withdrawal of the United States from programs that helped those in need around the world.
“Seriously, the strongest nation on Earth, the most powerful man on the planet, and the richest individual ever seen in the history of our world … cackle over feeding U.S. help to the weakest, most vulnerable people in the world into the wood chipper.”
The power of music to help people was on full display that weekend in 1985. We have chosen three rollicking performances for our reasons to smile, but if you want to see more, every performance is available on YouTube.
Madonna, who was at the beginning of her career at the time, got the crowd at John F. Kennedy Stadium in Philadelphia on its feet with “Holiday.”
Over at Wembley Stadium in London, Queen rocked “Crazy Little Thing Called Love.”
I want to leave you with one more. Sir Paul McCartney sang “Let It Be,” accompanied by David Bowie, Alison Moyet, Pete Townshend, and Geldof. Yes, “Let It Be” was a reason to smile back in May, but the song is so good and this version is more than worth watching.
If you want to enjoy all the songs chosen for A Reason To Smile, you can listen to this Spotify playlist, which is updated weekly.
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Stay Steady,
Dan
