July 13, 1985
Organized by Bob Geldof and
Midge Ure (same as Band Aid)
Raise funds for relief of Ethiopian
famine
Held at Wembley Stadium in
London, England (attended by
72,000 people) and John F.
Kennedy Stadium in Philadelphia
(attended by 100,000 people)
One of the largest scale satellite
link ups and television broadcasts
of all time
150 nations watched live
Geldof received an honorary
knighthood for his work in Live Aid
Mick Jagger and David Bowie were
supposed to perform at the two
separate locations together, but
technical difficulties occurred and
they created covers of songs to play
on the screens at the stadiums
Band Aid and “Do They Know It’s
Christmas” closed the UK concert
USA for Africa’s “We are the World”
closed the USA concert
Phil Collins performed at both of
the concerts- he used a Concorde
to get him from London to
Philadelphia
Queen
Freddie Mercury led the entire
crowd of 72,000
Opened with Bohemian Rhapsody,
closed with We are the Champions
Queen’s sound engineer had
switched out the limiters that had
been installed on the sound system
so their performance would be
louder than the others
Their performance has been voted
as the greatest live performance in
the history of rock music
Sang the first song of the three part
Wembley finale “Is This The World
We Created?”
U2- would be established as
superstars
Bono jumped into the crowd to
dance with a girl (who later said
that she was being crushed by the
crowd and he saved her)
David Bowie- “Heroes” dedicated
to his son- and “All our children,
and the children of the world”
Wembley- The Who performed
“My Generation” and technical
problems occurred (fuse blew) and
“Won’t Get Fooled Again”
Paul McCartney’s “Let It Be”microphone failed for first 2
minutes
Performers went out on the stage
with McCartney to help sing back
up since he couldn’t be heard (Bob
Geldof, David Bowie, Alison Moyet,
Pete Townshend all went out)
Bob Geldof was put on the
shoulders of The Who’s guitarist
Pete Townshend and Paul
McCartney- symbolizing his great
achievement of unifying the world
for one day, in the spirit of music
and charity
JFK Stadium
Madonna performed
Tom Petty “American Girl”
Bob Dylan- broke a guitar string
 Ronnie Wood gave him his guitar,
and played air guitar until someone
brought him one
Mick Jagger ripped away part of
Tina Turner’s dress during their
duet of “It’s Only Rock n Roll” and
she finished the song in basically a
leotard
Reunions of Crosby Stills Nash &
Young and original Black Sabbath
(Ozzy Osbourne), Led Zeppelin
(with Phil Collins and Tony
Thompson sharing drum duty)
Teddy Pendergrass made his first
public appearance since his near
fatal car accident in 1982performed “Reach Out and Touch”
with Ashford & Simpson
Duran Duran- performed four
songs
They would not perform together
again in public until 2003
Simon Le Bon hit a wrong note in
“A View to a Kill” known as “The
Bum Note Heard Round the World”
Le Bon said it was the most
embarrassing moment of his career
Geldof had an outburst when he
was disappointed about the
amount of money raised. After
this, giving increased by 300
pounds per second.
Video was shown of starving and
diseased Ethiopian children set to
the song “Drive” by The Cars- rate
of giving became faster right
afterwards
Single largest donation came from
the ruling family of Dubai
They donated 1 million pounds in a
phone conversation with Geldof
Around 150 million pounds was
raised for famine relief as a result of
the concerts
Some of the performers at
Wembley
The Boomtown Rats, Adam Ant,
Spandau Ballet, Ultravox, Elvis
Costello, Sade, Sting, Phil Collins,
Bryan Ferry, Paul Young, U2, Dire
Straits, Queen, David Bowie, The
Who, Elton John, George Michael,
Paul McCartney
Some of the performers at JFK
 Joan Baez, Four Tops, Billy Ocean, Black
Sabbath, Run DMC, Rick Springfield, REO
Speedwagon, Crosby Stills and Nash, Judas
Priest, Bryan Adams, The Beach Boys,
George Thorogood and the Destroyers,
Simple Minds, The Pretenders, Santana,
Madonna, Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers,
Kenny Loggins, The Cars
 Thompson Twins, Eric Clapton, Phil Collins,
Led Zeppelin, Duran Duran, Patti LaBelle,
Hall & Oates, Mick Jagger, Bob Dylan
 “The logistics of this thing are
staggering. But we tend to forget, in
and amongst all the hoopla, what this
is all about, and that is that this should
be able to raise a lot of money to feed a
lot of people.”
 Bob Geldof
 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ax0_lhKnHCY&lis
t=PL2CEB3B442FF5AED2
 This includes over 20 different performances from Live
Aid
 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4FNoIDgNE6o
 This is Queen’s Bohemian Rhapsody and Radio Ga Ga
from Live Aid
 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OM0g-7sZeSo
 Freddie Mercury and Brian May “Is This The World We
Created” at Live Aid