When Boomtown Rats singer Bob Geldof saw news footage of starvation and deaths in Ethiopia during the fall of 1984, he decided to do something about it. He created Band Aid, a UK-oriented super group whose single Do They Know It’s Christmas? raised millions of pounds for relief work in the affected parts of famine hit Ethiopia in1983–1985.The charity song written in 1984 by Bob Geldof and Midge Ure was a sellout.

This was followed a year later by America who recorded We Are The World, in a session after the American Music Awards, by a group called USA for Africa a song penned by Michael Jackson and Lionel Richie. On similar lines as Do They Know It’s Christmas? the star-packed recording of USA For Africa sold millions of copies. Later, the album ‘We Are the World’ followed and included songs by Prince, Bruce Springsteen, Tina Turner and others.

Back home in England, Geldof decided to initiate a massive concert event on his own terms, but in connection with what America also brought about. Dubbed “Live Aid”, the ‘One Concert – Two Continents’ blossomed into a massive music event in history. Two huge connected shows on the same day with a time zone difference. England’s Wembley Stadium hosted one while Philadelphia’s JFK Stadium housed the other. The pair complemented each other, and together, they filled about 16 hours with live performances. On this DVD box set we have 10 hours of music of the Greatest Live Concert Of All Time.

Finally to own on DVD, this 94-song, four-DVD set includes many parts of the two concerts and presents the songs in the order they appeared during the day. When you consider the ridiculous amount of planning and preparation that must have gone into staging the event, you feel satisfied that such an event took place in aid of the suffering far away. It also demonstrates that big and small time artists donating their time and talent with no tab on payment issues. The beautiful cover picture is the map of Africa with a guitar embedded in it.

This DVD was released in 2005, 20 years after the event and shows top notch footage from the historic show with live performances, recovered and restored from various sources.

Now over 41 years later, what better way to commemorate the mega event, that to bring out the DVD that has all of it as it happened.

London

So cueing the best of the best to remember in the London’s Wembley, you see Bob Geldof and the Boomtown Rats with the beautiful I Don’t Like Mondays and Drag Me Down, followed by Spandau Ballet on Only When You Leave and True. There’s the bearded Elvis Costello doing a solo version of All You Need is Love. Moving a few places and you have a saucy Sade with the swinging Your Love Is King, Sting performing Roxanne and later teaming up with Phil Collins on Every Breath You Take and Sting later with Mark Knopfler on Dire Straits classic Money For Nothing was nothing short of a great collaboration. Queen and Freddie Mercury at the height of their careers hit it off with an outstanding 20 minute performance of Bohemian Rhapsody to the whole of Wembley clapping hands during Radio Gaga was a sight to behold. Hammer to Fall, Crazy Little Thing Called Love, We Will Rock You ending with We Are The Champions, positioned Queen as one of the favorites at the event. 

Phil Collins performing first in London to his classic love song Against All Odds, then jetting off on a Concorde flight across the Atlantic to Philadelphia to perform In The Air Tonight was unimaginable. The Who doing Love Reign O’er Me and Won’t Get Fooled Again was insane. Paul Young and Alison Moyet on That’s The Way Love Is had its good moments. You cannot miss out Ozzy Osbourne and Black Sabbath reuniting on Paranoid, a simply mind blowing version that gets you to head bang right away. A four-song set from David Bowie brings on TVC15, Rebel Rebel, Modern Love and an inspiring Heroes, which he dedicated to all the children of the world. Elton John in a feathered fez singing Benny and the Jets, Rocket Man, Don’t Go Breaking My Heart with Kiki Dee and Don’t Let The Sun Go Down On Me with George Michael was nostalgic. Bono sets out his groove with Sunday Bloody Sunday and Bad. You cannot miss the moment Bono is running down the stagegetting a girl out of the crowd. Classic Bono. Paul McCartney ends the London concert singing Let it Be after which the finale comes on with Bob Geldof’s Do They Know It’s Christmas? Other performers of the day included Howard Jones, Bryan Ferry, Joan Baez, Simple Minds, Pretenders, Nik Kershaw.

America

Moving onto the US side and you can bet that there are no shortage of moments you missed out. Hosted by actor Jack Nicholson in Philadelphia, we have Canadian singer. Bryan Adams kicking off the show with his Kids Wamna Rock and Summer of ’69. A young Madonna gave an energetic, gutsy performance of Holiday and Get Into The Groove. Manywere about to write her off at the time as a minor success, but she turned out to be more successful than most of the others. Her performance was followed by Brian Wilson doing three songs with The Beach Boys Wouldn’t It Be Nice, Good Vibrations and Surfin’ USA. Neil Young’s The Needle and the Damage Done, Eric Clapton’s White Room, She’s Waiting and of course a soul stirring Layla was touching. Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers set included songs like American Girl and Refugee. Mentionhas to be made of the Thompson Twins, Steve Stevens, Nile Rodgers and Madonna performing Revolution.  Other favorites on the stage included Brit band Duran Duran with three tracks to their credit beginning with Union of the Snake, Save A Prayer, The Reflex, followed by a loud Patti Labelle singing Lennon’s Imagine and a cover of Forever Young.

Hall & Oates contributed with Maneater lager on bringing in Eddie Kendricks for Get Ready (Cos Here I Come). They ended the set with Hall & Oates calling on stage Eddie Kendricks once again and David Ruffin for Ain’t To Proud To Beg and My Girl. Rock was at its best with Mick Jagger hitting it up with Just Another Night and Miss You, followed by Tina Turner joining in for State of Shock and It’s Only Rock ‘n’ Roll. As the curtains went down you had Bob Dylan flanked by Rolling Stones’ Keith Richards and Ron Wood for a wheezy, acoustic Blowing in the Wind. America said goodbye with the USA For Africa anthem We Are the World, with an all star ensemble spearheaded by Lionel Richie. Others who also hit the stage were Kenny Loggins, REO Speedwagon, The Cars, Judas Priest.

The Extras

On Disc Four include extra footage from across the world. You have three B.B. King with a performance of songs from Holland, bands from Austria, Australia contributing footage of their own concert by INXS, alongwith Midnight Oil and Men At Work. This is followed by bands from Japan, the former USSR, the former Yugoslavia and Norway. There was also Run-DMC, who performed as a rehearsal for the camera crew but were not broadcast. One of the moving moments was also Ashoford & Simpson with Teddy Pendergrass on the song Reach Out and Touch There’s also the heart wrenching BBC and CBC coverage of the famine, the original Band Aid and USA for Africa videos, and (for some reason) Bowie and Jagger’s Dancing In The Street video. Finally, to wrap it all up, there’s an hour-long documentary shot a year after the event that shows how the $80 million raised was spent in the documentary titled “Food and Trucks and Rock ‘n’ Roll”.

The Missing Link

Among all this there was also rockers Led Zeppelin reunion footage, but sadly it’s not shown and this DVD has no footage because Jimmy Page and Robert Plant were so unhappy with their performance they blocked its use. It's just a shame that Zeppelin saw fit to pull their performance.

Audio and Video

As for the video transfer, the sound is excellent in immersive Dolby Digital 5.1 audio, and for preserving an iconic cultural milestone. Due to legal reasons, this concert wasn’t supposed to be recorded or archived at all. Bob Geldof didn’t want to worry about all the hassles with rights to songs and record company releases. He just told everyone to show up and play for 20 minutes. Both the US and BBC were instructed to destroy any tape they made of the event. Luckily, the BBC ignored this request and kept their tapes, but over the years some disappeared and their set was incomplete.

In the US, the producers had destroyed their tapes, and masters didn’t exist. A lot of the American concert footage included here was from a group of B-roll tapes (alternate and unused takes) that MTV had in their archives, others were on the BBC rolls, downloaded from satellite and converted to PAL. Originally this concert wasn’t intended to be rebroadcast or released to home video, and it’s only through luck that any of it exists. The footage also dates back to a time to realise how fashions were back in the 1980s and marvel at a myriad of hairstyles.

At the time of the two concerts, music fans made comparisons between the US and British concerts, with many favouring the Wembley line-up - while we saw little of the Philadelphia gig on the day itself.  On that note, each of the four DVDs allows you to choose between the two concerts, and also search for your favourite star and proceed straight to their performance.

The Box set also comes with an informative insert booklet with complete song playlist, details of the event, rare manuscripts, rare images of the event and band schedules of the day on 13^th July 1985.

It might be hard to lose sight of the fact that Live Aid was for a worthy cause, even going on to show where the money had gone and reminding us why it all happened.

As for the concerts, they are a revealing chunk of musical nostalgia which will revive memories for years to come of all those years ago.

Everyone should buy the DVD (if you can lay your hands on one) for this day saw the most star-studded concert event ever. You can just sit back and absorb every minute of the concert and read every word of the book. What an event. Truly - The Day the Music Changed The World.

Created by; Bob Geldof

Runtime: 10 Hours

Media Format: ‎ 4 Discs in a Box set, Colour, Full Screen, HiFi Sound, PAL

Release date: ‎ 8^th November 2004

Rating: *****

Reviewed by Verus Ferreira