On 13th July 1985, the world witnessed a moment of collective action and cultural unity that, even now, has never quite been matched.
Live Aid was simply unique, and the old footage of Wembley Stadium packed to the rafters and the sight of some of the biggest artists of the time standing shoulder to shoulder to fight famine in Africa still feels electric today.
And, in the immortal words of Max Boyce, “I was there!” In the days before Ticketmaster, Live Nation and online ticket touts, I patiently queued outside Spillers Records in Cardiff - the world’s oldest record shop - to buy four tickets for a group of us for then expensive price of £25 (with 80% actually being donated directly to the Live Aid charity).
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Forty years later, I still remember it like it was yesterday. Walking down Wembley Way to the old stadium on a gloriously sunny day with not a cloud in the sky, Status Quo opening at noon with Rockin’ All Over the World, and Queen’s show-stopping set that many now consider one of the best live performances ever (and was only twenty-one minutes long).
It was a time before mobile phones and social media yet the memories are still vivid. I was lucky enough to be down at the front of the crowd for most of the evening, including when Paul McCartney came on to play Let It Be at the end of the show, his microphone failed and Bob Geldof, David Bowie, Pete Townsend and Alison Moyet ran on to sing along and save the day.
I was also one of the last to leave as my great friend Alan Jones had somehow lost his Welsh flag and we ended up searching for it through a sea of plastic bottles and cups on the empty pitch before a security guard told us, quite firmly, to bugger off as he had to go home to the missus. We ended up sleeping on the floor at Euston station before catching the early morning mail train back to North Wales at 4am.
Live Aid was born out of a simple but powerful idea and when Bob Geldof saw Michael Buerk’s BBC report on the Ethiopian famine in late 1984, he didn’t just watch, he decided to do something about it. He picked up the phone, rallied the music industry, and a few months later brought together an all-star line-up as Band Aid to record “Do They Know It’s Christmas?” one of the best-selling singles ever.
But Geldof knew a hit record alone wouldn’t be enough and on that sweltering summer’s day, two concerts at Wembley in London and JFK Stadium in Philadelphia were broadcast live to an estimated 1.9 billion people in 150 countries (or 84% of the eorld’s TV sets).
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It was the biggest satellite link-up and TV broadcast in history at the time and the line-ups were legendary at this Global Jukebox. As well as Queen and Quo, there was U2, Bowie, Eric Clapton, Elton John, The Who, Led Zeppelin, Madonna, Bob Dylan and many others, including Phil Collins who played Wembley before jumping on Concorde to fly to the USA to perform there.
Each act gave their time for free, millions picked up their (landline) phones to pledge money and by the end of that day, over £50m had been raised for famine relief in Ethiopia and Sudan, equivalent to more than £170 million in today’s money.
But Live Aid’s real impact went far beyond the cash raised and marked the moment when popular culture finally collided head-on with global politics and humanitarian action.
It showed that music could do more than entertain and that it could mobilise, educate, and hold those in power to account. As a result, governments were shamed into pledging more aid and, for those watching on the day, the Cars’ haunting Drive played over harrowing footage of the famine in Ethiopia brought home the brutal reality of famine in a way that a documentary alone never could.
Of course, Live Aid wasn’t perfect and even today, critics point out that some of the money was mishandled or misused, and the images broadcast to the world often reinforced stereotypes of a helpless Africa that overshadowed local voices and solutions. However, these lessons have shaped how today’s charity campaigns operate with more emphasis on indigenous partners and developing long-term solutions rather than just emergency relief.
Yet for all its flaws, the legacy of Live Aid remains remarkable even today as it inspired generations of artists and campaigners to use their platform for more than just music. It paved the way for Live 8, Farm Aid and the Freddie Mercury Tribute Concert and proved that collective action could ripple across continents without social media, crowdfunding, or viral hashtags.
Forty years on, the world has changed in ways few of us could have imagined and yet famine still exists in Africa, inequality persists across the World and we’re still grappling with how to turn awareness into real, lasting change. But Live Aid’s four-decade anniversary reminds us that however imperfect, hope, solidarity and action remain powerful when people come together to support a common cause.
As I look back on that blisteringly hot day in 1985, I don’t just remember the big names and the anthems, I remember the feeling that something really special was happening in a football stadium in North London and that, for once, the world was united by something quite extraordinary.