Do They Know Is Christmas? at LIVE 8

[pepokiss]

I was watching the video of LIVE 8 I recorded on my VCR, and at the beggining they showed a video of LIVE AID, the great opener of Status Quo, U2, Bryan Adams, Queen.. then they showed the London finale: Do they know is christmas?.... And I've never heard that song, but they showed the end, when Geldof says "sing to the world"... and the WHOLE Wembley crowd singing and I was in awe... and I'm in awe EVERYTIME I watch that (I've seen the video like 6 times now)

My question is... though I know that LIVE 8 wasn't flagshiped by a song like Live Aid... I think, I'M SURE that if after HEY JUDE Geldof would've pulled off that song and everyone singing (I mean, ther was Macca, George Michael, Elton john, Sting.. only Bono wasn't there, but the crowd would've sing that part)... WOULDN'T THAT BEEN AWESOME???

I mean... 80.000 people left me watching a video of 20 years ago, what about 200.000 + people singing a song to the world?... now THAT would've been AMAZING... making Pink Floyd look like ants




PS: What's so "infamous" about Bono's line?

 

[alexvilagosh]

If you touch that line, Bono sends people in to kill your family.

 

[Miricale_Drug]

You've never heard the band aid song? They released it around christmas (2004) with a new artist line up

 

[pepokiss]

but still.... WHY didn't they played?... Tom Chaplin could've sang the Bono line

 

[neutral]

PS: What's so "infamous" about Bono's line?

Well Bono has said that he "really really loathed" having to sing that line in the first place. I can't find a quote about why but I think it's because that line is... a little condescending. But the way Bono sang it, he managed to make it sound sarcastic and angry instead of pitying. Ugh I hope that makes sense.


(I can email you the song if you like, by the way)

 

[neilm]

For the 2004 version of Do They Know It's Christmas, they actually lined up Justin Hawkins from The Darkness to sing 'that' line and recorded his version, but Bob Geldolf managed to persuade Bono to come in and sing it again, which pissed Justin Hawkins off no end. He went and ranted to the press that Bono and his management had demanded that Bono be allowed to sing that line again and that his (Hawkins) version was much better.

However, the producer of the single turned around and said one of the reasons they didn't use Justin Hawkins version was that it sounded humouress because of his high pitched voice and they were not making a comedy record, which I found funny!!

 

[pepokiss]

nobody reads this

Well Bono has said that he "really really loathed" having to sing that line in the first place. I can't find a quote about why but I think it's because that line is... a little condescending. But the way Bono sang it, he managed to make it sound sarcastic and angry instead of pitying. Ugh I hope that makes sense.


(I can email you the song if you like, by the way)

Well... people LOVE that line... I saw the Band Aid finale and besides the chorus, the line that averybody sang was Bono's...

the line is "Well thank God it's them instead of you", right?... I find this line very brutal... as in we, people with no problems, should be thankful for what we have and for not being a dying African..., but in a way that says "phew... thank God it's them, not me", as if it's works for us to leave the problems to somebody else.
It's really, really BRUTAL. Because that's what the line's all about, isn't?


And nobody has responded to my question... why there wasn't any Do They Know Is Christmas? at Live 8?... Maybe Geldof didn't remembered


PS: Neutral, I'll be glad if you could send me that song... I haven't heard it, even though I HAVE THE LIVE AID DVD SINCE FEBRUARY AND I STILL HAVEN'T SEEN IT, BECAUSE MY DAMN DVD DOESN'T READ ZONE 1 DVDS ... I don't know how it can read DVDs from the UK (Go Home and HTDAAB) ... that's why

 

[mo786]

A lot of people see DO THEY KNOW ITS CHRISTMAS as a bit of a poor song in the UK (I don't)

Yes it would have been good - with LIVE 8 I feel they tried to get a lot of serious musicians in (Snow Patrol, Killers, Razorlight, The Who, Pink Floyd, Travis etc)

They tried to stay away from tacky pop songs but I feel that was the kind of stuff people wanted to hear - cause at the end of the day it was Robbie Williams and Madonna who got the crowd going with their singalongs... now if only they had reformed the Spice Girls, the place would have went mental!

So thats probably why they did not play DO THEY KNOW... because they didn't want the tacky feel..

Unfortunatley VERTIGO is as tacky as it gets.....