Celebrities and their Causes - Part 2
In 1984, Bob Geldof was so moved by a television feature on the plight of hungry children in Ethiopia that he decided he must do something about it. He brought the cause of world hunger to the forefront of everyone’s minds using the power of celebrity, and Band Aid - a supergroup made up of British and Irish music stars - created and recorded "Do They Know Its Christmas?" in time for a holiday release.
It would of course be number one on the charts.
Here’s a little insider information from Bob Geldof’s web site:
The recording studio gave Band Aid 24 hours free to record and mix the record on 25 November 1984. The recording took place between 11am and 7pm and was filmed to release as the pop video. The first track to be put down was drums by Phil Collins including the memorable opening ‘African Drum’ beat. Tony Hadley of Spandau Ballet was the first to record his vocal while a section sung by Status Quo was deemed unusable and replaced with the Paul Weller/Sting/Glen Gregory section. Paul Young has admitted since in a documentary that he knew his opening lines were written for David Bowie who was not able to make the recording but made a contribution to the B-side. Boy George arrived last at 6pm after Geldof woke him up by phone to have have him flown over from New York on Concorde to record his solo part.
Years later - 20 years later to be exact, Band Aid 20 would re-record and release a new version of "Do They Know Its Christmas?" sung once again by hot young artists of the day. While the song and video did gain some popularity it would never touch the amazing success of the original version. Still it is worth a watch and a listen, especially for those of us who remember the original so clearly and fondly.
August 19th, 2008 at 3:09 pm
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