Live Aid: 40 Years Later
The summer of 1985 has lots of memories for me. I was an intern in a law firm in London, and like my flatmates who were also from the States, we were getting by with very little money. At the same time, we gained a cultural and experiential education that summer that was priceless. In many ways, it was a turning point in my life. Through the internship, I visited clients in prison and supported the barristers pleading their cases in the courtroom, and along the way learned that maybe becoming a lawyer was not necessarily part of my career path. Typical of a college student, I had deep philosophical discussions with my flatmates, I learned how to navigate differences, and the friendships that developed made me a better person. And I was exposed to museums, theatre, my first ballet, an opera, and what has been called the greatest live concert ever staged, Live Aid.
Live Aid was a benefit concert organized by Bob Geldof of the Boomtown Rats to raise money for famine relief in Ethiopia. It took place simultaneously at Wembley Stadium in London and JFK Stadium in Philadelphia, with more than 70 artists and bands performing over 16 hours of live music. It was broadcast globally, reaching an estimated 1.9 billion viewers in over 150 countries, making it one of the largest television broadcasts in history. Putting that into perspective, it means that 40% of the world’s population at the time watched Live Aid. Additionally, it is estimated that the concert raised over $125 million.
Looking back at my 21-year-old self, I was not the coolest kid on the block. Fortunately, one of my flatmates, Laurie, was pretty much the coolest person I had ever met. She was doing her internship at a large advertising agency, and she had her pulse on all the action. The internet didn’t exist, so her finding out early about Live Aid was brilliant. £25 was a huge amount of money for us—but not going would have been the regret of a lifetime. We were so fortunate to be college students living in the right place at the right time.
Maybe you have seen videos or read about the music legends who performed, or heard the 16-hour concert described as the day rock and roll changed the world. Sting, Phil Collins, Sade, and David Bowie were all amazing, and the answer is yes, Freddie Mercury and Queen’s performance was unbelievable and pretty much exactly how it was portrayed in the movie “Bohemian Rhapsody.” Additionally, what stands out to me, especially as I read through my comments in the journal I wrote at the time, is the transformative power of such a huge event to create community.
I’m not sure community is what I was thinking standing in the 20th row, packed like a sardine for hours in the blistering heat. However, by the end of the night, and an unforgettable surreal experience, I felt connected and part of something much larger than myself. When Elvis Costello came to the stage, he said, “I want you to help me sing this old Northern England folk song,” and then he played “All You Need Is Love.” Surprisingly, U2’s Bono jumped off the stage to pull a teenage girl out from the crowd who was being crushed. His action resonated with everyone in the audience and became one of the most famous moments of the concert.
During the finale when Paul McCartney’s microphone cut out for a few stanzas of “Let It Be,” the entire stadium filled in by singing the song in unison. And for those of you familiar with Queen, let your brain hear the stomp-stomp-clap, stomp-stomp-clap of “We Will Rock You.” Can you hear the song, can you see yourself at the concert, are you singing along in community? The crowd in Wembley, and via video at JFK, became one community as we sang along with Freddie to that song, as well as “We Are the Champions,” which followed and closed out Queen’s set.
Bob Geldof organized a benefit concert to bring awareness to a crisis and raise money for the cause. In the process, Live Aid created a sense of global unity and shared purpose and provided the experience of a lifetime to college students like me. When I called home and learned that my parents, part of the Greatest Generation and Big Band era, had watched Live Aid on TV, I was astounded and realized that the experience crossed over boundaries that were unexpected.
This same sentiment, to create experiences that engage and advance our campus communities in hopes of positively changing lives, is what we seek in our work in college unions. While we may not have the resources to bring together dozens of talented and famous performers like at Live Aid, we are experts at bringing students together for a shared experience, with the potential that we just might unify the campus. Stomp-Stomp-Clap!
